MMT: Modern Monetary Theory or Monopoly Money Tyranny?

File photo of miniature houses from a Monopoly board game next to American dollar notes. Under Modern Monetary Theory, government has the monopoly on money creation and can use it to take control of the private sector. Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

Commentary

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), and other democratic socialists have embraced a new-old monetary theory: Modern Monetary Theory, or MMT for short. It is “new-old” in that the label is new, but versions of this theory have been around at least since the French Revolution when the disastrous fiat currency known as “assignats” impoverished the French people.