Fundamentally posits that a national sovereign in charge of its own currency does not need to act like a household: it does not need to balance government spending and taxation, and deficits, which are just private sector savings, are fine.
MMT has an origin story for money that starts with the creation of money on the one hand, and on the other with the enforcements of taxes. This leads to the creation of "unemployment" and forcing people to work for the government so as raise funds to pay those taxes.
Governments create money. They can't run out of money, and can't default on their own currency.
MMT says creating money doesn't necessarily lead to inflation. Argues that historical occassions of hyperinflation were driven by other, compounding factors; points to, e.g. Japan which has been unable to combat deflation even with large deficits. And fundamentally says: money creation is fine up to that point where an economy still has idle productive capacity (i.e. where there is still unemployment, or other idle resources).
MMT includes a job guarantee as a way of 'soaking up' private unemployment, and as a way of spending into the economy.
See: 'The Deficit Myth' by Stephanie Kelton
Last updated 2020-07-19