JW Mason
@jwmason.bsky.social
Associate professor of economics, John Jay College-CUNY, senior fellow at the Groundwork Collaborative. Blog and other writing: jwmason.org. Study economics with me: https://johnjayeconomics.org. Anti-war Keynesian, liberal socialist, Brooklyn dad.
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JW Mason
@jwmason.bsky.social
· Sep 30
Against Money
A powerful deconstruction of humanity’s most influential invention, from the acclaimed economists J. W. Mason and Arjun Jayadev. Money is unavoidably fundamental to our daily lives. It lurks behind ...
press.uchicago.edu
Coming this spring. press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...
I am pleasantly surprised.
November 20, 2025 at 2:14 AM
I am pleasantly surprised.
Jeff Nichols. Not Mike.
The weird thing is that Mike Nichols made two brilliant low budget movies that took conventional movie situations - violently feuding families of countryfolk in this, a person who senses a supernatural danger no one else does in Take Shelter - but lets them play out as they would in the real world…
Shotgun Stories.
November 20, 2025 at 2:13 AM
Jeff Nichols. Not Mike.
The weird thing is that Mike Nichols made two brilliant low budget movies that took conventional movie situations - violently feuding families of countryfolk in this, a person who senses a supernatural danger no one else does in Take Shelter - but lets them play out as they would in the real world…
Shotgun Stories.
November 20, 2025 at 1:57 AM
The weird thing is that Mike Nichols made two brilliant low budget movies that took conventional movie situations - violently feuding families of countryfolk in this, a person who senses a supernatural danger no one else does in Take Shelter - but lets them play out as they would in the real world…
If you’ve gotten tired of Ed Zitron yelling at you, here’s David Dayen telling much the same story, but in an inside voice. prospect.org/2025/11/19/a...
The AI Bubble Is Bigger Than You Think - The American Prospect
It’s not just OpenAI that looks overhyped. There’s a whole mountain of sketchy financial engineering underneath.
prospect.org
November 19, 2025 at 2:58 PM
If you’ve gotten tired of Ed Zitron yelling at you, here’s David Dayen telling much the same story, but in an inside voice. prospect.org/2025/11/19/a...
November 19, 2025 at 2:27 PM
Reposted by JW Mason
High interest rates and rising foreign reserves signal Sri Lanka’s willingness to place the interests of outside actors ahead of the country’s own people and businesses, argue Arjun Jayadev, Ahilan Kadirgamar, and @jwmason.bsky.social. bit.ly/3XIgTlX
Sri Lanka’s Interest-Rate Trap
Arjun Jayadev, Ahilan Kadirgamar and J.W. Mason urge the central bank to ease monetary policy as soon as possible, while keeping an eye on capital flight.
bit.ly
November 19, 2025 at 11:45 AM
High interest rates and rising foreign reserves signal Sri Lanka’s willingness to place the interests of outside actors ahead of the country’s own people and businesses, argue Arjun Jayadev, Ahilan Kadirgamar, and @jwmason.bsky.social. bit.ly/3XIgTlX
Reposted by JW Mason
I'm struck by this clip of former Obama speechwriter Sarah Hurwitz saying Holocaust education has backfired in part because people Palestinians as victims: "They think the lesson of the Holocaust is…you fight the big powerful people hurting the weak people."
www.reddit.com/r/JewsOfCons...
www.reddit.com/r/JewsOfCons...
From the JewsOfConscience community on Reddit: Former Obama speechwriter Sarah Hurwitz speaking to the Jewish Federation and lamenting that young people are learning the wrong lessons from Holocaust e...
Explore this post and more from the JewsOfConscience community
www.reddit.com
November 18, 2025 at 7:24 PM
I'm struck by this clip of former Obama speechwriter Sarah Hurwitz saying Holocaust education has backfired in part because people Palestinians as victims: "They think the lesson of the Holocaust is…you fight the big powerful people hurting the weak people."
www.reddit.com/r/JewsOfCons...
www.reddit.com/r/JewsOfCons...
Had a great talk last night with Chris Hughes about his new book Marketcrafters.
November 18, 2025 at 3:11 PM
Had a great talk last night with Chris Hughes about his new book Marketcrafters.
Reposted by JW Mason
Mason makes the arg below against Hickel’s claim that capitalists cannot address climate crisis because it is not profitable for them. For M, it is not that decarbonisation can’t be profitable, but rather capitalists don’t want to cede their power to the kind of central planning this requires. /1
To put it another way, *capital* is perfectly capable of organizing decarbonization. The problem is *capital-owners*, who are political actors and not just the embodiments of the accumulation process. Elon Musk is symptomatic here.
November 17, 2025 at 3:37 PM
Mason makes the arg below against Hickel’s claim that capitalists cannot address climate crisis because it is not profitable for them. For M, it is not that decarbonisation can’t be profitable, but rather capitalists don’t want to cede their power to the kind of central planning this requires. /1
Happening tonight! If you are in New York and don’t have other plans, why not stop by?
Happening 6pm this Monday, at John Jay: I will be talking with Chris Hughes about his new book, Marketcrafters.
November 17, 2025 at 4:30 PM
Happening tonight! If you are in New York and don’t have other plans, why not stop by?
Good use of this medium. More book summary threads please!
Starting with a chapter-by-chapter summary of Kevin Anderson's The Late Marx's Revolutionary Roads pbulished by @versobooks.bsky.social earlier this year. First up: the introduction, where Anderson lays out the reception history of Marx's late notebooks.
November 17, 2025 at 2:14 PM
Good use of this medium. More book summary threads please!
Reposted by JW Mason
i don't think you need to get significantly more elaborate than this: in a world on fire, where multiple total wars are actively raging and the climate is getting more and more unstable, people will flee. you would flee. i would flee. accept this and fix your heart, or die
November 17, 2025 at 12:41 PM
i don't think you need to get significantly more elaborate than this: in a world on fire, where multiple total wars are actively raging and the climate is getting more and more unstable, people will flee. you would flee. i would flee. accept this and fix your heart, or die
Not for nothing, but I canceled my New York Times subscription today.
November 17, 2025 at 1:18 AM
Not for nothing, but I canceled my New York Times subscription today.
Besides the other ways this is silly, I’m always struck by the language of “cross-subsidization” in these contexts. The assumption is that profits are fixed (or nonexistent) so the only way for one customer to pay less is for another customer to pay more.
I’m the normie whisperer who believes that people who get belligerently drunk at sports games are getting drunk off stadium beer
November 15, 2025 at 3:02 PM
Besides the other ways this is silly, I’m always struck by the language of “cross-subsidization” in these contexts. The assumption is that profits are fixed (or nonexistent) so the only way for one customer to pay less is for another customer to pay more.
This is such a central milestone in parenting. Maybe not on a level with first words, but it's up there.
As a very particular kind of nerd, one of the things I've looked forward to most as a parent is having an in-house third for board game nights.
November 15, 2025 at 4:24 AM
This is such a central milestone in parenting. Maybe not on a level with first words, but it's up there.
Reposted by JW Mason
I think (and some conversations with civil service and Labour people I know) that for the Labour centre clique, operating "within the rules" is key to their self-understanding as sensible moderate technical government, and this kind of policy is how they exhibit this technique to each other
November 14, 2025 at 5:16 PM
I think (and some conversations with civil service and Labour people I know) that for the Labour centre clique, operating "within the rules" is key to their self-understanding as sensible moderate technical government, and this kind of policy is how they exhibit this technique to each other
Interestingly, this is not true. Nice example of one of the central analytic pitfalls in this area, confusing net flows with gross ones.
I cannot emphasize enough that increasing foreign investment in the US and shrinking US trade deficits are in direct, irreconcilable tension w/ one another.
*US TO LOWER TARIFF RATE ON SWISS GOODS TO 15%, GREER SAYS
*SWITZERLAND AGREED TO $200B INVESTMENT IN THE US, GREER SAYS
*US TO LOWER TARIFF RATE ON SWISS GOODS TO 15%, GREER SAYS
*SWITZERLAND AGREED TO $200B INVESTMENT IN THE US, GREER SAYS
November 14, 2025 at 4:59 PM
Interestingly, this is not true. Nice example of one of the central analytic pitfalls in this area, confusing net flows with gross ones.
Reposted by JW Mason
This is The Floor Is Lava of government economics. They created a stupid rule and, by god, they’re going to follow it…
November 14, 2025 at 4:43 PM
This is The Floor Is Lava of government economics. They created a stupid rule and, by god, they’re going to follow it…
I can't understand why anyone would make policy this way.
"Oh we're not raising income taxes rates, we're just making people more pay the higher rates." Why play these games to pretend to follow a rule that is just something you made up in the first place? www.ft.com/content/6cbb...
"Oh we're not raising income taxes rates, we're just making people more pay the higher rates." Why play these games to pretend to follow a rule that is just something you made up in the first place? www.ft.com/content/6cbb...
November 14, 2025 at 4:38 PM
I can't understand why anyone would make policy this way.
"Oh we're not raising income taxes rates, we're just making people more pay the higher rates." Why play these games to pretend to follow a rule that is just something you made up in the first place? www.ft.com/content/6cbb...
"Oh we're not raising income taxes rates, we're just making people more pay the higher rates." Why play these games to pretend to follow a rule that is just something you made up in the first place? www.ft.com/content/6cbb...
Was just at a fundraiser for Jabari Brisport and Phara Souffrant. And if you’re writing a novel or a screenplay about politics I feel sorry for you that you missed it, because Phara Souffrant’s speech, for two dozen people in a small apartment, was one of the best of the genre that I’ve ever heard.
November 14, 2025 at 2:05 AM
Was just at a fundraiser for Jabari Brisport and Phara Souffrant. And if you’re writing a novel or a screenplay about politics I feel sorry for you that you missed it, because Phara Souffrant’s speech, for two dozen people in a small apartment, was one of the best of the genre that I’ve ever heard.
Just a perfect fall day here at Tompkins Square. That is all.
November 13, 2025 at 8:33 PM
Just a perfect fall day here at Tompkins Square. That is all.
Remember the last time a candidate for New York City Mayor proposed eliminating fares on city buses? Yes, I am talking about Michael Bloomberg in 2009. archive.nytimes.com/cityroom.blo...
Bloomberg Calls for Free Crosstown Buses
The mayor appeared to be trying to assert a greater role for the city in mass transit as he seeks a third term in the November election, but he faces hurdles.
archive.nytimes.com
November 13, 2025 at 6:44 PM
Remember the last time a candidate for New York City Mayor proposed eliminating fares on city buses? Yes, I am talking about Michael Bloomberg in 2009. archive.nytimes.com/cityroom.blo...
As a fan of Graeber, Sahlins, Christopher Boehm and Rebecca Solnit, I'm very sympathetic to these ideas, and am now excited to read Goliath's Curse. www.noemamag.com/humanitys-en...
November 13, 2025 at 4:18 PM
As a fan of Graeber, Sahlins, Christopher Boehm and Rebecca Solnit, I'm very sympathetic to these ideas, and am now excited to read Goliath's Curse. www.noemamag.com/humanitys-en...
Happening 6pm this Monday, at John Jay: I will be talking with Chris Hughes about his new book, Marketcrafters.
November 13, 2025 at 3:18 PM
Happening 6pm this Monday, at John Jay: I will be talking with Chris Hughes about his new book, Marketcrafters.