Socialist magazine warns Poilievre is a libertarian

American socialist magazine Jacobin has warned its readers that Pierre Poilievre is not just another right-wing populist, but has a "radical libertarian agenda". 

Pierre Poilievre Wants Radical Austerity for Canada | Jacobin | Ryan Kelpin:

February 1, 2025 - "Much has been written about [Pierre] Poilievre in recent years, often framing him as the champion of the Freedom Convoy, anti-lockdown politics during the height of COVID-19, or a right-wing populist fighting against woke tyranny. While these characterizations highlight key elements of his political strategy, they risk oversimplifying his ideology. Poilievre is not merely a populist reactionary; he is a deeply ideological figure with a long-standing engagement with ... particularly the ideas of Milton Friedman. His contemporary anti-state politics are grounded in this intellectual lineage.... Understanding Poilievre’s ideological foundations is critical to grasping the broader implications of his rise — and the threat it poses.

"Poilievre has often expressed admiration for Friedrich Hayek and the Virginia School of public choice founders James M. Buchanan and Gordon Tullock. However, his most consistent and fervent ideological inspiration comes from Friedman’s radical libertarian critiques of the state. This is evident in Poilievre’s decades-long proselytizing in the name of two of Friedman’s most significant books: 1962’s Capitalism and Freedom and 1963’s A Monetary History of the United States, 1867–1960. During his formative years in Calgary, he became an avid reader of Capitalism and Freedom, shaping his worldview around Friedman’s ideas about voluntary exchange versus coercion, economic freedom versus the bureaucracy of the welfare state, and the role of inflation and monetary theory. These ideas informed many of his university essays, including his 1999 scholarship-winning 'Building Canada Through Freedom' essay.... 

"Poilievre himself traced this ideological lineage in [a] recent interview with Jordan Peterson, stating, 'I’ve been saying precisely the same thing the entire time . . . building Canada on freedom. The entire piece was on making government small and maximizing personal freedom'.... For Friedman and Poilievre, voluntary exchange occurs in a social and power vacuum. This notion presents a romanticized view of private economy in which real-world consequences and inequality do not exist. Poilievre has expressed this extreme interpretation of voluntary exchange in stark terms, stating, 'Everything the government does, even the good things, is done by the coercive force of taxation, a gun to the head.' He has fleshed this out even further in the House of Commons:

Every exchange in a free market economy, literally every single one, without exception, is based on voluntary exchange. . . . By contrast, every single transaction done by government is done by force, even legitimate, desirable transactions. . . . However, surely, we should also agree that the use of that force should be limited to cases where it is absolutely unavoidable and necessary. We should not expand government into areas people can decide upon and act out on their own volition. The government continually gets involved in areas that are easily done through voluntary exchange. In fact, it replaces free choice with force very often....

"Poilievre routinely draws on not just Friedman but also Buchanan, whose public choice theory influenced Friedman’s later work, including Free to Choose. Poilievre’s rhetoric reflects their shared disdain for the welfare state, which he once referred to in a National Post op-ed as 'truly horrific,' claiming: '[it] ... engenders a self-serving bureaucracy whose survival depends on a growing clientele of poor welfare recipients. To end poverty, this bureaucracy would have to put itself out of business, something it will never do'....

"Poilievre has routinely championed several key neoliberal policy ideas. Dating to his time in the right-wing populist Reform Party, he has supported the idea of balanced budget legislation — or at least the principle of cutting $1 from government spending for every $1 of new expenditure. This approach aims to depoliticize spending by limiting the ability of 'special interests' to extract benefits from self-serving politicians and a growth-focused bureaucracy. Poilievre has also endorsed Friedman’s specific neoliberal proposals, such as a negative income tax system — where people earning below a certain threshold would receive payments to bring them up to that minimum income level — as well as universal basic income (UBI).... UBI, as Poilievre understands it ... would come with a catch: 'Governments would pay for Friedman’s basic income by eliminating all other programs, including housing, drug plans, childcare and the bureaucrats who administer it all.' Poilievre has criticized attempts to use UBI as a distributive tool....

"Poilievre has become most notable for his focus on the inflationary crisis of the 2020s. But there has been little examination of the intellectual roots of his inflation rhetoric — it is a mistake to understand it as simply part of his constructed populist persona. When asked by the Canadian Taxpayers Federation what book on economics he would recommend, he held up one book to the camera: his well-worn and bookmarked copy of Friedman and Anna Schwartz’s A Monetary History of the United States, saying that it 'taught [him] was that money supply was the driver of inflation.' This tome has become a cornerstone of his political philosophy, referenced frequently in interviews, his Friedman-inspired Free to Choose–esque YouTube video series Debtonation [see video] and even on the House floor....

"Poilievre’s views on inflation reproduce Friedman’s monetarism and his argument that the overproduction of money supply drives up purchasing costs and government deficits, characterizing inflation as an invisible, coercive tax created by centralized government. As he describes it, 'You could not design a more damaging and unjust tax than the inflation tax.' In his Debtonation series, Poilievre takes Friedman’s ideas to their extremes, making questionable connections between overproduction of the money supply, inflation, government debt, and even the suicide rate. He doesn’t simply reproduce Friedman’s ideas; he amplifies them to appeal to contemporary political audiences. Poilievre clearly views himself not just as a proponent of Friedman but as his Canadian ideological heir apparent....

"Poilievre’s view of the state and capitalism represents a more radical libertarian agenda than that of any previous potential Canadian prime minister. He is an idealogue, a true believer, but also a pragmatist and convincing speaker. If he has his way in 2025, Canada will continue deepening its commitment to neoliberalism, but with a Friedmanite flavor not yet seen in the country."

Read more: https://jacobin.com/2025/02/poilievre-friedman-neoliberalism-canada-converatives

Debtonation (Episode 1) | Pierre Poilievre | December 27, 2025:

Did modern monetary theory elect Trump?

Modern monetary theory (MMT) argues that the federal government, as the sole issuer of legal tender, can issue virtually limitless amounts of new money to fund itself. The years 2020-2024 in the USA provided an unambiguous test of this theory.

Did modern monetary theory elect Donald Trump? | Hill Times | Phillip Magness and Alexander William Salter:

November 19, 2024 - "[M]odern monetary theory is a fringe school of economic thought arguing that the federal government, as the sole issuer of legal tender, can issue virtually limitless amounts of new money to fund itself. Bucking thousands of years of evidence that such reckless policies lead to currency devaluation, advocates shirk all blame when inflation occurs, insisting instead that prices increased due to 'corporate greed' and 'price gouging.' Perhaps some of that sounds familiar....

"The Biden-Harris administration began its term assuming it could 'run the economy hot' while also avoiding inflation. They added another multi-trillion-dollar stimulus to Trump-era COVID relief spending, believing they could escape the repercussions of its price tag..... On the fiscal side, extravagant spending greatly increased government indebtedness. On the monetary side, running the printing press to keep interest rates low flooded financial markets with liquidity. The predictable result was too much money chasing too few goods — the classic recipe for dollar depreciation, better known as inflation.

"When the first signs of an inflationary spiral appeared in summer 2021, the White House responded with an official stance of denialism. Price level increases were only 'transitory,' they assured us, adopting a talking point from modern monetary theory theorist Stephanie Kelton. 

"As the problem lingered ... the White House doubled down on fringe theories, such as blaming 'corporate greed' instead of its own spending habits. As recently as July 2024, Council of Economic Advisors chair Jared Bernstein adopted the modern monetary theory-aligned inflation narrative of economist Isabella Weber, who contends that producers made an 'implicit agreement' to exploit a price shock during the pandemic and extract profits from the public.... Kamala Harris attempted to turn this conspiratorial reasoning into policy by proposing price controls at the grocery store — a scheme rejected by most economists, but championed by Weber, Kelton and other modern monetary theory advocates.... 

"Modern monetary theory fooled Washington’s elite because its message was seductive: If there’s any slack in the economy and the government prints and spends in its own currency, policymakers don’t need to worry about price hikes. The years 2020-2024 provided an unambiguous test of this theory. The answer: It’s bunk. 

"Consumer price inflation peaked at 9 percent during the summer of 2022. Central bankers were late to the game to tighten, even adopting the modern monetary theory talking point about “transitory” inflation for a brief but critical moment in early 2021. Elected Democrats scrambled to minimize the role their profligacy had played in forcibly raising the cost of living, culminating in Harris’s grocery store price control proposal as the centerpiece of her economic platform....

"Fed officials should have predicted the consequences of keeping money growth above economic growth for so long. President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris should have recognized that continued fiscal follies would pressure the Fed to embrace money mischief, and that price controls simply made the administration look economically illiterate and out of touch. This rhetoric began as a convenient political argument for stimulus spending, then morphed into an act of self-deception on the part of the Harris campaign.

"As election day exit polling revealed, the electorate repudiated the modern monetary theory narrative. Americans are fed up with over-credentialed experts inventing new reasons to ignore basic economics. The laptop class has only itself to blame for elevating these fringe theories, thereby facilitating Trump’s electoral comeback."

Read more: https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/4996296-modern-monetary-theory-inflation/ 

Modern Monetary Theory explained | Economics Understood | April 25, 2021:

Federal Reserve taking extraordinary measures

Will Coronavirus End the Fed? | Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity - Ron Paul:

March 30, 2020 - "September 17, 2019 was a significant day in American economic history. On that day, the New York Federal Reserve began emergency cash infusions into the repurchasing (repo) market ... the market banks use to make short-term loans to each other.... The New York Fed ... has not stopped pumping money into the repo market since September. Also, the Federal Reserve has been expanding its balance sheet since September. Investment advisor Michael Pento called the balance sheet expansion quantitative easing (QE) 'on steroids.'

"I mention these interventions to show that the Fed was taking extraordinary measures to prop up the economy months before anyone in China showed the first symptoms of coronavirus.

"Now the Fed is using the historic stock market downturn and the (hopefully) temporary closure of businesses in the coronavirus panic to dramatically increase its interventions in the economy. Not only has the Fed increased the amount it is pumping into the repo market, it is purchasing unlimited amounts of Treasury securities and mortgage-backed securities. This was welcome news to Congress and the president, as it came as they were working on setting up trillions of dollars in spending in coronavirus aid/economic stimulus bills.

"This month the Fed announced it would start purchasing municipal bonds, thus ensuring the state and local government debt bubble will keep growing for a few more months. The Fed has also created three new loan facilities to provide hundreds of billions of dollars in credit to businesses. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has stated that the Fed will lend out as much as it takes to revive the economy.

"The Fed is also reducing interest rates to zero. We likely already have negative real interest rates because of inflation. Negative real interest rates are a tax on savings and thus lead to a lack of private funds available for investment, giving the Fed another excuse to expand its lending activities.

"The Fed’s actions may appear to mitigate some of the damage of the coronavirus panic. However, by flooding the economy with new money, expanding asset purchases, and facilitating Congress and the president’s spending sprees, the Fed is exacerbating America’s long-term economic problems.

"The Federal Reserve is unlikely to end these emergency measures after the government declares it is safe to resume normal life. Consumers, businesses, and (especially) the federal government are so addicted to low interest rates, quantitative easing, and other Federal Reserve interventions that any effort by the Fed to allow rates to rise or to stop creating new money will cause a severe recession.

"Eventually the Federal Reserve-created consumer, business, and government debt bubbles will explode, leading to a major crisis that will dwarf the current coronavirus shutdown. The silver lining is that this next crisis could finally demolish the Keynesian welfare-warfare state and the fiat money system.

"The Federal Reserve’s unprecedented interventions in the marketplace make it more urgent than ever that Congress pass, and President Trump sign, the Audit the Fed bill. This would finally allow the American people to learn the truth about the Fed’s conduct of monetary policy. Audit the Fed is a step toward restoring health to our economic system by ending the fiat money pandemic that facilitates the welfare-warfare state and the unstable, debt-based economy."

Read more: http://ronpaulinstitute.org/archives/featured-articles/2020/march/30/will-coronavirus-end-the-fed/

Copyright © 2020 by RonPaul Institute. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit and a live link are given.

US House committee passes Audit the Fed bill

House panel passes bill to audit the Fed - MarketWatch - Greg Robb:

March 28, 2017 - "A House panel on Tuesday approved legislation that would let a government watchdog audit the Federal Reserve’s monetary policy decisions, a move bitterly opposed by the central bank.

"The House Committee on oversight and government reform passed the measure by voice vote after roughly 30 minutes of debate.

"The bill was the brainchild of Ron Paul, the former House Republican and libertarian presidential candidate and sharp critic of the U.S. monetary policy. Versions of the bill have twice passed the House by wide margins but then stalled due to lack of support from Democrats in the Senate and the Obama administration.

"Analysts said the measure has a better chance to become law now that Republicans control both houses of Congress and the White House. Paul’s son, Rand, the Republican senator from Kentucky, has introduced a similar measure in the Senate.

"Democrats in the committee were firmly against the bill.... Republicans said the measure was needed to rein in the Fed.

"'It is ironic that the arsonists that caused the financial collapse are now being given credit...for putting out the fire. Almost every macroeconomist concedes in retrospect that [the Fed’s] extended period of easy money led to the financial crisis,' said Rep. Thomas Massie, a Republican from Kentucky."

Read more: http://www.marketwatch.com/story/house-panel-passes-bill-to-audit-the-fed-2017-03-28
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Technology Trumps Politics

The Blockchain Matters More than the President | Foundation for Economic Education - Jeffrey A. Tucker:

January 19, 2017 - "After a wildly contentious election season, you might get the impression that the future of the country, if not the world, hinges on the quality and ideology of top-down leadership. That’s actually wrong. Very little was said during the entire election about digital technology; nothing ever came up concerning distributed ledgers and the remarkable invention of a fully private currency that lives on the Internet and works without third-party intermediaries....

"It’s a paradigmatic case of how the structure of technology in our time has flipped the traditional model of what makes societies tick and what drives history forward. As we are learning, presidents and parties come and go; what persists and what keeps advancing regardless of political trends are the tools we use to improve our lives....

"Bitcoin has matured beautifully since its release in 2009. It has long since moved past the incredulity stage, though apparently skeptics will always be with us. What we see now is the drive toward mass adoption and industry application in every area, from payment processing to enterprise-building to security titling and contracting....

"Bitcoin is a market-based money and payment system that operates on its own, without the need for regulators, central banks, or even financial intermediaries. It is not only a money and payment system, however; it is also a system for bundling, documenting, and trading immutable packets of any kind of information that can include contracts, property titles, or any other form of human agreement, regardless of geographic proximity. This means that the resulting currency and/or information system operates completely outside borders and outside the domain of the nation-state....

"And why does it matter? Everyone has his or her own opinion on this. My angle is monetary. If there can be a parallel currency to nationalized monies, developing in tandem, the world economy is granted a future beyond the current miasma. So many modern problems and horrors trace to government money: economic depressions, declining incomes, wars, government growth and debt, cultural destabilization, and so much more. Finding a solution to this problem, and a path for reform, is a priority for anyone who loves liberty....

"The Bitcoin system is being developed in the context of consensus from actual stakeholders and tested by market results. This is the right path forward. Whatever the results, they stand a much stronger chance of putting the world economy on a forward path than any legislation or executive order coming from any government or political party."

Read more: https://fee.org/articles/the-blockchain-matters-more-than-the-president/
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Ron Paul campaigning for Fed oversight board

Ron Paul Wants a Spot on Federal Reserve Board of Governors:

December 19, 2016 - "Ron Paul's group, Campaign for Liberty, is trying to get him a spot on the U.S. Federal Reserve's Board of Governors, a senior politics editor with the Huffington Post reports.

Sam Stein ‏@samsteinhp

Ron Paul’s group, Campaign for Liberty, is pushing to get Ron Paul nominated to the U.S. Federal Reserve's Board of Governors.

10:45 AM - 18 Dec 201

"Paul, a former GOP member of Congress from Texas, earlier this week criticized the Federal Reserve, saying it was manipulating the economy.

"'We do not work on a free-market principle, we do not have sound money, it's all manipulated,' he told Maria Bartiromo on Fox Business Network.

"'Prices are going to go up and the money's going to be so bent according to political reasons and not because of business decisions, so we want the government out of it. We want people to save money, create capital, but capital cannot come from the Federal Reserve working with a computer; that's the fallacy and that's why zero rates of interest didn't work because they weren't realistic.'

"The Board of Governors oversees the work of the Federal Reserve Banks and plays a major role in crafting U.S. monetary policy. There are seven members, all appointed by the president of the United States.

"Paul established Campaign for Liberty, his nonprofit political organization, during his presidential run in 2008 with the purpose of spreading his idea that the government should be limited in its role."

Read more: http://www.newsmax.com/Politics/ron-paul-federal-reserve-board-of-governors-campaign-for-liberty/2016/12/18/id/764560/
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How the Fed Is increasing economic inequality

Rand Paul Is Right: The Fed Is Increasing Inequality With Its Low Rates - Forbes - Jeffrey Dorfman: 

October 29, 2015 - "Last night’s Republican debate was supposed to be about economic policy, but instead it was, once again, more about moderators asking gotcha questions.... There was, however, a great moment of economic clarity, thanks to Rand Paul, on the surprisingly overlooked role the Fed has played in increasing economic inequality.

"Virtually all economists agree that the Fed’s low interest rates have been responsible for inflating stock market values. By reducing the returns to savings accounts, certificates of deposit and bonds, the Fed has intentionally driven ordinary investors to increase their investment allocation to the stock market, thereby boosting stock returns. Because people with more wealth tend to own more stock, those higher stock prices have led the rich to gain much more than the poor and middle class.

"Low interest rates have meant low borrowing costs for large corporations with direct access to capital markets. This low-cost borrowing has boosted corporate profits which also flow mostly to the wealthy.

"Poorer individuals, with smaller savings and few other assets, tend to be heavier users of credit cards for borrowing.... Unfortunately, while the Fed has pushed down interest rates for big corporations, average credit card interest rates have only dropped about 1.5 percentage points (from about 14.5 to 13%).... Wealthier individuals, with more savings and other assets, rarely need to carry a credit card balance, but they do borrow (tax-deductible) funds in the form of mortgage debt, often in large amounts. Thanks partly to the Fed’s many moves to lower interest rates, mortgage rates have fallen about 2.5 percentage points (roughly from 6.5 to 4% for 30 year fixed rate mortgages).... For example, somebody with a $400,000 mortgage could save ... $600 to $800 per month, way more than the $20 per month the poor are saving on credit card debt.

"Finally, the low interest rates set by the Fed combined with the additional labor costs thanks to the Obama Administration (Obamacare and its associated taxes) are changing the relative prices of labor and capital.... This also increases economic inequality because the poor and middle class earn most (or all) of their money from labor income, while the rich collect a significant share of their income in various forms of returns to capital.... Purposely tilting the economy in favor of capital and against labor is pretty close to taking from the poor and giving to the rich, the exact reverse of normal government attempts to redistribute income.

"[While] the left is consumed with economic inequality, nary a voice on the left is complaining about the Fed’s role in making it worse. Rand Paul is correct that the Fed is causing a widening of economic inequality....If you want less economic inequality, we should begin by stopping policies that make it worse."

Read more: http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffreydorfman/2015/10/29/rand-paul-is-right-the-fed-is-increasing-inequality/
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Ron Paul: Yellen is dangerous for the economy

Ron Paul: Yellen Dangerous For The Economy - Forbes - (Kitco News):

November 26, 2013 - "The Federal Reserve will not be able to revive the economy under the leadership of Janet Yellen, said Dr. Ron Paul.

"The former U.S. congressman, and former Republican presidential candidate spoke with Kitco News during the Metals & Minerals Conference in San Francisco and said he does not expect Yellen to change the monetary policy that is currently in place. In fact he expects that she could be even more aggressive than current chairman Ben Bernanke.

"'She is a very aggressive inflator. She really believes in quantitative easing and that is the only thing they know,' Paul said. 'I think she is very dangerous. I think she will be dangerous to the U.S. dollar.'

"On Thursday the U.S. Senate Banking Committee approved the nomination of Janet Yellen as the next chief of the central bank; it was approved by a vote of 14 to eight. Her nomination will now be sent to the full Senate for a final vote, which according to some media reports will take place in December.

Read more: http://www.forbes.com/sites/kitconews/2013/11/26/ron-paul-yellen-is-dangerous-for-the-economy/
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Movie Silver Circle a libertarian love story

Silver Circle: A libertarian love story where the bad guys work at the Federal Reserve - The Washington Post - Monica Hesse:

April 14, 2013 - "Silver Circle is an animated love story/hyperinflation dystopia set at the Federal Reserve. It had its Washington-area premiere this weekend: one screen, one theater, a one-week run at the Regal theater in the Ballston Common mall....

"Made for around $2 million, funded primarily by Roberts’s production company, Two Lanterns, it has become a small symbol for a passionate cohort that believes in tiny government.... Ron Paul endorsed it. Paul inadvertently advertised it in Congress, actually, in 2012 when he whipped one of the film’s promotional silver pieces out of his pocket during a hearing of the House Committee on Financial Services and used it as an object lesson on inflation....

"The story is set in 2019, a mere six years from now, a span of time during which the cost of a loaf of bread has risen to $52 and bars have begun to advertise $90 beer specials. The villainous Federal Reserve’s Department of Housing Stability now evicts the hard-working middle class from their homes in order to regulate market demand."

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/silver-circle-a-libertarian-love-story-where-the-bad-guys-work-at-the-federal-reserve/2013/04/14/7ff894d2-a451-11e2-82bc-511538ae90a4_story.html
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Ron Paul Tells Bernanke He Killed The Dollar, Silver Coin In Hand - Forbes

Ron Paul Tells Bernanke He Killed The Dollar, Silver Coin In Hand - Forbes - Agustinho Fontevecchia:

Feb. 29, 2012 - "Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke had an interesting morning over on Capitol Hill.... Bernanke ... was put on the spot by Ron Paul who pulled out a silver eagle and accused him of debasing the currency and destroying America’s wealth.

"Ron Paul first asked Bernanke if he did his own grocery shopping, to which the Fed Chairman responded with a 'yes.' Paul immediately cut him off and said 'no one believes the 2% inflation rate,' claiming it was actually closer to 9%. 'Someone is stealing wealth,' said Ron Paul, in full campaign mode.

He then pulled out a silver eagle, a silver coin that has nominal face value of one dollar that is legal tender. Ron Paul told Bernanke that in 2006, as he took the top spot at the Federal Reserve, an ounce of silver bought about 4 gallons of gas. Today, said Paul, it buys about 11."

Read more: http://www.forbes.com/sites/afontevecchia/2012/02/29/ron-paul-tells-bernanke-he-killed-the-dollar-silver-coin-in-hand/
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