Trump and the Confidence Game
An MMT Parable
Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) has flipped our understanding of money: sovereign governments don’t spend like households. They don’t "run out" of dollars. They spend first, tax later. The only true constraint is inflation—not debt, not deficits, not bond markets.
In MMT, what keeps the system stable isn’t gold, savings, or exports. It’s trust. Confidence in the issuer. And in a fiat system, confidence isn’t tethered to virtue—it’s a performance.
No one performs confidence like Donald J. Trump.
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🧠 The Accidental MMT President
Trump doesn’t know MMT by name—but he governs as if he wrote the playbook. He blew past the deficit ceiling like it wasn’t there. He spent like a drunken admiral, passed massive tax cuts without blinking, and dared anyone to call it unsustainable. Bond yields yawned. Markets surged. The dollar held.
All the while, he mocked the preachers of “fiscal responsibility,” as if to say: you’re playing checkers in a casino run on bluffing.
And he’s right.
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🕶️ Confidence, Not Competence
Under Biden, the economy posts record job numbers, falling inflation, and stable growth. Yet public confidence lags. Why? Because Biden talks like an accountant. Trump talks like a casino boss.
Biden: “We’ve brought inflation down to 3.2%.” Trump: “It’s the greatest economy in the history of the world.”
Which one makes the crowd cheer?
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🎩 Theater of the Sovereign
Trump understands that the sovereign issuer of currency doesn’t just mint coins—it mints belief. So he never shows weakness. Never admits error. Never explains the machinery.
Tariffs? “Winning.”
Stock drop? “Temporary.”
Trade war? “Tremendous.”
To Trump, the economy isn’t a system to manage—it’s a stage to own. And if confidence is the constraint, then he who controls the confidence controls the capacity.
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🛤️ A Runaway Train?
Here’s the dark truth: maybe Trump is right. Maybe the train is a runaway—fueled by automation, financialization, and institutional inertia. The markets don’t punish you for lying. They punish you for blinking. As long as you never flinch, they’ll ride with you.
And that’s the real MMT parable:
> In a world where money is trust, the biggest liar wins—as long as the bond traders believe him.
Trump doesn’t fear inflation. He doesn’t fear deficits. He fears losing the room. So he never does.
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🔚 Final Thought
Maybe we don’t need better economics. Maybe we need better theater.