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I'd say you don't know what you're talking about. Milei cut back government spending by 30% from the first month on (that's a 15% gdp of spending cuts in a mon

I'd say you don't know what you're talking about. Milei cut back government spending by 30% from the first month on (that's a 15% gdp of spending cuts in a month), and achieved fiscal surplus/superavit on that month. Contrary to the (very wrong) keynsian economics, deficit spending doesn't promote economic growth and Milei's measures and results demonstrate that actually having a smaller government with surplus promotes economic growth.

skissane 2y ago
> and achieved fiscal superavit I didn't understand what you mean by "superavit" Then I realised you are using the Spanish word superávit instead of its English equivalent "surplus"
kspacewalk2 2y ago
I'd say you don't really understand Keynesian economics, also known as macroecon 101. Nowhere is it claimed that deficit spending promotes economic growth indefinitely and in all circumstances. Deficit spending (or just more spending, whether financed by deficits or not) can, and demonstrably does, temporarily dampen the effects of economic downturns. It can also promote economic growth if investments that are made will enable longer-term growth, e.g. by investing in infrastructure, education or research. Clearly none of that prescribes structural deficits ad infinitum and spending your way to hyperinflation in order to make good on idiotic populist promises, otherwise known as Argentinian macroecon 101 before Milei. The fact that it took chainsaw guy to trick Argentinians into electing someone who implements adult policies is a damning indictment of the average Argentinian voters, so I'd say leave poor John Maynard Keynes out of it, no one in Argentina was listening to him anyway, possibly ever. Also, just say surplus.
- Findeton 2y ago
  Well, Argentina has been in recession for more than a decade. Now, he's cut 30% of the government spending and... the economy is back to growth. So, sorry for destroying your Keynesian beliefs.
  - kspacewalk2 2y ago
    Honestly, consider taking a macroeconomics 101 course. I promise, the economic terminology you're throwing around will make a lot more sense, as will Keynes' ideas and how they relate to the way every single mature economy is run since circa the 1940s.
  - randomdata 2y ago
    > Argentina has been in recession for more than a decade. To the rest of us layman not familiar with your language, they just entered into a recession earlier this year[1]. And on behalf of us laymen, we'd love to know more about the etymology and context of your use of "more than a decade". To the rest of us, that normally means 10s of years, not mere months. [1] https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/argentina-jobless-rate-jumps-technical-recession-confirmed-2024-06-24/ https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/argentina-jobless-rat...
    - Findeton 2y ago
      Well, nominal GDP was US $642.5b in 2015 and they haven't recovered yet. And if you measure real gdp (not nominal), even worse. What do you call having lower GDP year after year? I call it recession. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Argentina https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Argentina
      - gus_massa 2y ago
        How is that US$642.5b calculated? IIRC in 2015 we had at least two values for the dollar/pesos ratio. The official one was like 10AR$/US$, but you could buy a small amount of dollars at that value. And the street value (so called "blue dolar") was like 15AR$/US$. So which one was used? It's like a 50% difference. (Now we had like 10 definitions of the dollar/pesos ratio. The official one is 950AR$/US$ but it's almost imposible to buy at that price. To buy dollars, the prices are around 1300AR$/US$ or 1500AR$/US$ depending on the day of the week.)
        Findeton 2y ago
- snapplebobapple 2y ago
  I always thought keynes gets a bad wrap because he didnt understand or atleast didnt explain that for his ideas to work the politicians need to be reasonably sure they will be voted out if their deficit spending isnt atleast mostly positive roi stuff or very short duration negative roi stuff, which isnt true unless all voters have real losses when politicians run deficits or decades of negative roi stuff has left a majority of voters sure things cant get better or atleast keep them insulated from the bad down that path.
tmottabr 2y ago
except economy is not growing.. IMF even recently reviewed their projections down for their economy.. https://business.inquirer.net/464261/imf-downgrades-argentinas-economic-outlook-for-2024 https://business.inquirer.net/464261/imf-downgrades-argentin... people spending is low because people are afraid to spend and\or just do not have money to do anything, most people are barely affording food right now.. also unemployment is increasing.. https://www.reuters.com/markets/emerging/argentine-inflation-cools-single-digits-residents-are-still-skeptical-2024-07-12/ https://www.reuters.com/markets/emerging/argentine-inflation... Dolar blue exchange rates are sky rocketing and is more then 4x higher then before Milei.. https://bluedollar.net/informal-rate/ https://bluedollar.net/informal-rate/ Poverty is also sky rocketing and already affect more then half of the country population. https://apnews.com/article/argentina-poverty-levels-uca-study-milei-devaluation-d5cb0a20b1e768efdeafbad5bf05eded https://apnews.com/article/argentina-poverty-levels-uca-stud... https://foreignpolicy.com/2024/03/05/argentina-milei-economy-peso-devaluation-austerity-hunger/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2024/03/05/argentina-milei-economy... He made a surplus in the first month because he basically withheld all the money he could and some the he couldn't, to the point that Chubut governor, that is also right wing himself, was threatening to withhold all the oil produced there. Milei lost the battle in courts.. https://buenosairesherald.com/politics/the-rosca/chubut-will-not-withhold-oil-and-gas-following-favorable-tax-ruling-says-governor https://buenosairesherald.com/politics/the-rosca/chubut-will... He also immediately faced huge protests when he announced his plans in the first month. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-68085197 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-68085197 And protests against his policies have being a constant.. https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/argentinas-milei-faces-biggest-protest-yet-students-march-over-budget-cuts-2024-04-23/ https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/argentinas-milei-face... https://edition.cnn.com/2024/06/12/americas/protests-argentina-congress-milei-reforms-intl-latam/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2024/06/12/americas/protests-argenti... People did not voted in Milei because they liked him or his ideias, they voted against the other candidate that was the minister of economy from the previous president, and that was clearly not making a good job. Likely anyone running against him would have won, Milei was just luck to be the one. And Milei is not even the first right wing president in recent times, they had Mauricio Macri that is from a center-right party, in the government from 2015 to 2019. Macri did as poor of a job dealing with the country economic problems as all the left wing governments previous and after.. Milei is managing to do even worst.. My guess is that as happened with Macri in 2019, Milei will is unlikely to be elected for a second term or to elect a right wing successor if he decide to not run again himself.. In fact, i doubt he would win again in a election held today..
pas 2y ago
Positive ROI spending promotes growth. For example paying for unemployment benefits and end-of-life healthcare just gets consumed. Similarly increasing military spending and having people just live on bases likely has a very negative ROI (as it removes people from the labor market). The argument is that the government is in a unique position to fund infrastructure projects and do long-term investment in underfunded sectors. (Very high expected ROI, because - by definition - these are areas where some money goes a long way, that's what underfunded means, right? But simply maintaining a very large welfare state while economic productivity is bad is ... you won't believe it, but it's bad and unsustainable.)
- Findeton 2y ago
  Governments don't know what has positive ROI... because they don't care about it. Private companies would go down if they do projects with negative ROI. Tell me the incentives and I'll tell you the result.
  - pas 2y ago
    > Private companies would go down if they do projects with negative ROI. private companies indeed go bankrupt all the time. > Governments [don't care] many governments care. see the table on the second page https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/cost-benefit-analysis-of-investment-projects_5jrxt39402zq.pdf?itemId=%2Fcontent%2Fcomponent%2Fgov_glance-2015-30-en&mimeType=pdf https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/cost-benefit-analysis-of-inves... > Governments don't know what has positive ROI and? no one knows with absolute certainty. we should prefer market based solutions when they work, and we should work on making markets applicable to as many problems as possible, and we should definitely keep an eye on the usual regulatory capture problems (revolving door, incumbents lobbying to keep competition out, etc..) markets work when the playing field is clear and equal. (for example global trade works if the seas are clear of pirates, and when there are mechanisms to keep rate of counterfeiting low enough to have trust between consumers and producers.) https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2020/01/what-libertarianism-has-become-and-will-become-state-capacity-libertarianism.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2020/01/wh...

skissane 2y ago

> and achieved fiscal superavit I didn't understand what you mean by "superavit" Then I realised you are using the Spanish word superávit instead of its English equivalent "surplus"

kspacewalk2 2y ago

I'd say you don't really understand Keynesian economics, also known as macroecon 101. Nowhere is it claimed that deficit spending promotes economic growth indefinitely and in all circumstances. Deficit spending (or just more spending, whether financed by deficits or not) can, and demonstrably does, temporarily dampen the effects of economic downturns. It can also promote economic growth if investments that are made will enable longer-term growth, e.g. by investing in infrastructure, education or research. Clearly none of that prescribes structural deficits ad infinitum and spending your way to hyperinflation in order to make good on idiotic populist promises, otherwise known as Argentinian macroecon 101 before Milei. The fact that it took chainsaw guy to trick Argentinians into electing someone who implements adult policies is a damning indictment of the average Argentinian voters, so I'd say leave poor John Maynard Keynes out of it, no one in Argentina was listening to him anyway, possibly ever. Also, just say surplus.

Findeton 2y ago
Well, Argentina has been in recession for more than a decade. Now, he's cut 30% of the government spending and... the economy is back to growth. So, sorry for destroying your Keynesian beliefs.
- kspacewalk2 2y ago
  Honestly, consider taking a macroeconomics 101 course. I promise, the economic terminology you're throwing around will make a lot more sense, as will Keynes' ideas and how they relate to the way every single mature economy is run since circa the 1940s.
- randomdata 2y ago
  > Argentina has been in recession for more than a decade. To the rest of us layman not familiar with your language, they just entered into a recession earlier this year[1]. And on behalf of us laymen, we'd love to know more about the etymology and context of your use of "more than a decade". To the rest of us, that normally means 10s of years, not mere months. [1] https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/argentina-jobless-rate-jumps-technical-recession-confirmed-2024-06-24/ https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/argentina-jobless-rat...
  - Findeton 2y ago
    Well, nominal GDP was US $642.5b in 2015 and they haven't recovered yet. And if you measure real gdp (not nominal), even worse. What do you call having lower GDP year after year? I call it recession. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Argentina https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Argentina
    - gus_massa 2y ago
      How is that US$642.5b calculated? IIRC in 2015 we had at least two values for the dollar/pesos ratio. The official one was like 10AR$/US$, but you could buy a small amount of dollars at that value. And the street value (so called "blue dolar") was like 15AR$/US$. So which one was used? It's like a 50% difference. (Now we had like 10 definitions of the dollar/pesos ratio. The official one is 950AR$/US$ but it's almost imposible to buy at that price. To buy dollars, the prices are around 1300AR$/US$ or 1500AR$/US$ depending on the day of the week.)
      - Findeton 2y ago
snapplebobapple 2y ago
I always thought keynes gets a bad wrap because he didnt understand or atleast didnt explain that for his ideas to work the politicians need to be reasonably sure they will be voted out if their deficit spending isnt atleast mostly positive roi stuff or very short duration negative roi stuff, which isnt true unless all voters have real losses when politicians run deficits or decades of negative roi stuff has left a majority of voters sure things cant get better or atleast keep them insulated from the bad down that path.

tmottabr 2y ago

except economy is not growing.. IMF even recently reviewed their projections down for their economy.. https://business.inquirer.net/464261/imf-downgrades-argentinas-economic-outlook-for-2024 https://business.inquirer.net/464261/imf-downgrades-argentin... people spending is low because people are afraid to spend and\or just do not have money to do anything, most people are barely affording food right now.. also unemployment is increasing.. https://www.reuters.com/markets/emerging/argentine-inflation-cools-single-digits-residents-are-still-skeptical-2024-07-12/ https://www.reuters.com/markets/emerging/argentine-inflation... Dolar blue exchange rates are sky rocketing and is more then 4x higher then before Milei.. https://bluedollar.net/informal-rate/ https://bluedollar.net/informal-rate/ Poverty is also sky rocketing and already affect more then half of the country population. https://apnews.com/article/argentina-poverty-levels-uca-study-milei-devaluation-d5cb0a20b1e768efdeafbad5bf05eded https://apnews.com/article/argentina-poverty-levels-uca-stud... https://foreignpolicy.com/2024/03/05/argentina-milei-economy-peso-devaluation-austerity-hunger/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2024/03/05/argentina-milei-economy... He made a surplus in the first month because he basically withheld all the money he could and some the he couldn't, to the point that Chubut governor, that is also right wing himself, was threatening to withhold all the oil produced there. Milei lost the battle in courts.. https://buenosairesherald.com/politics/the-rosca/chubut-will-not-withhold-oil-and-gas-following-favorable-tax-ruling-says-governor https://buenosairesherald.com/politics/the-rosca/chubut-will... He also immediately faced huge protests when he announced his plans in the first month. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-68085197 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-68085197 And protests against his policies have being a constant.. https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/argentinas-milei-faces-biggest-protest-yet-students-march-over-budget-cuts-2024-04-23/ https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/argentinas-milei-face... https://edition.cnn.com/2024/06/12/americas/protests-argentina-congress-milei-reforms-intl-latam/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2024/06/12/americas/protests-argenti... People did not voted in Milei because they liked him or his ideias, they voted against the other candidate that was the minister of economy from the previous president, and that was clearly not making a good job. Likely anyone running against him would have won, Milei was just luck to be the one. And Milei is not even the first right wing president in recent times, they had Mauricio Macri that is from a center-right party, in the government from 2015 to 2019. Macri did as poor of a job dealing with the country economic problems as all the left wing governments previous and after.. Milei is managing to do even worst.. My guess is that as happened with Macri in 2019, Milei will is unlikely to be elected for a second term or to elect a right wing successor if he decide to not run again himself.. In fact, i doubt he would win again in a election held today..

pas 2y ago

Positive ROI spending promotes growth. For example paying for unemployment benefits and end-of-life healthcare just gets consumed. Similarly increasing military spending and having people just live on bases likely has a very negative ROI (as it removes people from the labor market). The argument is that the government is in a unique position to fund infrastructure projects and do long-term investment in underfunded sectors. (Very high expected ROI, because - by definition - these are areas where some money goes a long way, that's what underfunded means, right? But simply maintaining a very large welfare state while economic productivity is bad is ... you won't believe it, but it's bad and unsustainable.)

Findeton 2y ago
Governments don't know what has positive ROI... because they don't care about it. Private companies would go down if they do projects with negative ROI. Tell me the incentives and I'll tell you the result.
- pas 2y ago
  > Private companies would go down if they do projects with negative ROI. private companies indeed go bankrupt all the time. > Governments [don't care] many governments care. see the table on the second page https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/cost-benefit-analysis-of-investment-projects_5jrxt39402zq.pdf?itemId=%2Fcontent%2Fcomponent%2Fgov_glance-2015-30-en&mimeType=pdf https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/cost-benefit-analysis-of-inves... > Governments don't know what has positive ROI and? no one knows with absolute certainty. we should prefer market based solutions when they work, and we should work on making markets applicable to as many problems as possible, and we should definitely keep an eye on the usual regulatory capture problems (revolving door, incumbents lobbying to keep competition out, etc..) markets work when the playing field is clear and equal. (for example global trade works if the seas are clear of pirates, and when there are mechanisms to keep rate of counterfeiting low enough to have trust between consumers and producers.) https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2020/01/what-libertarianism-has-become-and-will-become-state-capacity-libertarianism.html https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2020/01/wh...