Follow-up on Scottish Currency Conference
James Keenan
This is a brief follow-up on the Scottish Currency Conference which was held last weekend and which we were discussing in the thread beginning here.
The live-stream on YouTube was sub-par, but I saw enough to encourage me to try to find out more about this topic. The "Scotonomics" people have been at this for nearly a decade and appear to be having an effect on the political discourse in Scotland. The need for an independent Scottish currency is now widely accepted, which means that now the questions are: How soon can that currency be implemented post-independence? How close do we get to the EU, its Growth and Stability Pact, and the Euro?
Of course, Scottish independence and an independent currency are still a long ways off. But this shows that serious, MMT-influenced thinking about a country's political economy is definitely a real possibility.
Some reading and viewing suggestions:
Undermining Economic Resilience – The Economic Impact of Adopting the European Union’s Stability and Growth Pact in an Independent Scotland. Dr Dirk Ehnts and William Thomson. 2 PDF downloads: the short version and the long version. In the short version, practice your MMT by picking out the concepts from Wynne Godley, Abba Lerner and Warren Mosler, respectively.
Currency Options for an Independent Wales (PDF download), Thibaut Laurentjoye, 2023. Laurentjoye is a French economics prof with a specialty in currency regimes currently who has worked in the City and is currently teaching in Denmark. A couple of years back he was commissioned to write a report asking how Wales would implement a currency if it became independent. He's in the process of adapting that to the Scottish situation and had the cleanup slot at last Saturday's conference talking about that.
For those of you who like videos ... (I haven't watched these yet myself) ...
Scotonomics Episode 129: Scotland's Future Fiscal Rules, Sep 2025
The Madness of Fiscal Rules, Steve Keen, Alberto Paloni, Dirk Ehnts, 2024
The Road to a Scottish Currency, with Dr. Tim Rideout, 2024
Scottish Currency Group Conference 2024, Session 1, Thibaut Laurentjoye's talk at last year's Scottish conference.