erb has two method to evaluate inline ruby expressions. The <%
which evaluates the expression and the <%=
which evaluates and prints. There is no global object to print to within the binding context.
As mentioned by Omar, there is a concat method, which is part of ActionView. This will do what you want.
Unlike a scripting language escape, there is no default output for erb. Since erb is simply a function, and given a template and binding will return a variable, it returns the values of text and functions recursively.
There is hot debate as to how much logic should be allowed in a view, but as little as possible is what most people aim for. If you are putting more code than text in the view, you may want to consider refactoring your code.