And the MMT myth sprouts another leg...

[xenon]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/apr/17/coronavirus-deficit-american-economy

Only a month ago, a stimulus bill of $2tn would have been unthinkable. Indignant deficit scolds would have asked how one planned to pay for it, and complained about burdening our grandchildren with debt and bankrupting our country. Bernie Sanders bent over backwards to explain how he was going to pay for a Green New Deal or Medicare for All. These programs don’t seem as expensive any more. Suddenly the government is planning “helicopter drops” of cash. Larry Kudlow, who relentlessly attacked the Obama stimulus during the global financial crisis, is touting the current stimulus as “the single largest Main Street assistance program in the history of the United States”.

Not even Wall Street titans know the true cost of the coronavirus crisis.

Nobody is seriously asking how we are going to pay for this stimulus – and they shouldn’t. It took a global pandemic to explode the myth that federal government spending has to be “paid for”.

The Covid-19 crisis has clearly demonstrated what should have been obvious already: provisioning society – whether with food, disinfecting wipes, toilet paper or medical supplies – is not a financial issue. If we can’t produce enough masks, ventilators or food, finance will not help. Society’s capacity to produce real output is what limits its ability to provision itself. And this is precisely what the virus threatens, as workers stay home, supply chains break down and businesses shut their doors.

On the financial side, a sovereign government can always afford to buy what is for sale in its currency, as Modern Money Theorists have long explained..