An excellent podcast, featuring Jeffrey Rogers Hummel. He argues that there is not enough tax revenue available from seignorage for governments to inflate their way out of their debts. Because of financial innovation and money substitutes, it would take hyperinflation to use money printing to finance large deficits. Hummel says that of all the bad choices the U.S. government would face in a financial crisis, a formal default will be preferable.

Toward the end, he says that the Fed has shifted from monetary policy to credit allocation, and that this is “the new central planning.” That sounds a bit strong to me, but listen for yourself.