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Eminentoes
Hot Flash From Paul Krugman: Obamanomics Is Toast
And his solution is to insist on more of it.
Paul Krugman — who shares the distinction of being a Nobel Laureate with Al Gore, aka the “crazed sex poodle,” and President “Plug” Obama — is warning us of the dangers of a third great depression.
Third? Do you wonder when we had the second?
That was my reaction, too.
To show off the erudition that so amazed the judges in Stockholm, the Joseph Stalin professor of economics at Princeton University counts the Panic of 1873 as the start of an earlier depression. But why stop there? Why not include the Panic of 1857? Or the still more severe Panic of 1837? Most of all, why not include the most devastating depression of them all — the one that wiped out 80% of first two waves of settlers at Jamestown, mostly from famine, despite fertile soil, plenty of game and an abundance of seafood? Now there was a real depression — like the Great Depression of the 1930s — that tells us a lot about the disastrous consequences of collectivism.
Krugman fears that an outbreak of common sense will lead to the downfall of Western civilization. It pains him to think that people are losing their faith in funny money and the time-tested (i.e. repeatedly falsified) idea that the best way to get out of an economic mess created by excessive government spending is to spend your way out with more government spending. This is Krugman’s heart-rending lament in the New York Times:
Unemployment — especially long-term unemployment — remains at levels that would have been considered catastrophic not long ago, and shows no signs of coming down rapidly. And both the United States and Europe are well on their way toward Japan-style deflationary traps.
In the face of this grim picture, you might have expected policy makers to realize they haven’t done enough to promote recovery. But no: over the last few months there has been a stunning resurgence of hard-money and balanced-budget orthodoxy.
If Krugman is right — and let’s hope he is this once — the western world is now prepared to stop believing in the tooth fairy. Or perhaps that is too gentle an image. Substitute riots, fire-bombings and other strong-armed tactics for the tooth fairy. It’s getting hard even for people in “old Europe” to see how any amount of violence and agitation by public sector unions in Athens and other cities is going to produce the wealth that is needed to give people more and more pay for less and less work.
If Krugman is right (somehow the wild improbability of this construction makes me want to repeat it), then the Age of Obama is already toast. Says Krugman:
As far as rhetoric is concerned, the revival of the old-time religion is most evident in Europe, where officials seem to be getting their talking points from the collected speeches of Herbert Hoover, up to and including the claim that raising taxes and cutting spending will actually expand the economy, by improving business confidence.
In fact, in all essentials, Hoover, like Krugman himself, was a Keynesian. It was Hoover, not Franklin D. Roosevelt, who initiated the practice of piling up big federal deficits to support huge public-works projects intended to create jobs and reflate the economy. After declining or holding steady through most of the 1920s, federal spending soared between 1929 and 1932 — increasing by more than 50%, the largest increase in federal spending ever recorded during peacetime. In a memo to Britain’s Labour Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald, John Maynard Keynes himself praised Hoover for jawboning the business sector to maintain high wages. He also described Hoover’s credit-expansion policy as “thoroughly satisfactory.”
Again, in what might be called Keynesian style, Hoover began by cutting taxes — quite deeply — even though, later on, he was obliged to increase taxes in order to pay for some of the huge run-up in federal spending. In just the same way, the Obama administration has cranked up federal spending to a degree that will require new taxes — and plenty of them — to enable the government to keep the federal deficit (already up threefold from the Bush years) from spiraling totally out of control. Hence the talk of European-style value-added tax; hence the cap-and-tax legislation; hence a raft of smaller taxes; and hence the way the Obama administration is now backing away from its pledge of no new income taxes for people earning less than $250,000. And all that is not even including the hidden taxes that will come in the form of rapidly rising health insurance premiums to pick up the cost of new mandates and a vast new system of subsidies under Obamacare.
For those who want to know more about what happened that almost caused the total extermination of the Pilgrims at Jamestown, I recommend Thomas J. DiLorenzo’s How Capitalism Saved America: The Untold History of Our Country, From the Pilgrims to the Present. No fewer than 486 out of the 604 settlers who came in 1607 and 1609 died within a year of so setting foot in Jamestown, despite the bounty of their surroundings. As DiLorenzo explains, the problem was a lack of motivation:
How could there be a lack of “industrie.” After all, the Virginia Company had not chosen a group of indolent and lazy people to settle the Virginia colony. The problem was that all of the men were indentured servants who had no financial stake in the fruits of their own labor. For seven years, all that they produced was to go into a common pool to be used, supposedly, to support the colony and to generate profits for the Virginia Company. Working harder or longer was of no benefit to them, and they responded as anyone would, by shirking. Having been given free passage to the new world, these settlers were supposed to compensate the Virginia Company through their labor, so they were effectively reneging on their contracts.
In 1611, the British government sent a new administrator to Jamestown who quickly identified the problem as the system of communal ownership. “He determined, therefore, that each man in the colony would be given three acres of land and be required to work no more than one month per year, and not at planting or at harvest time, to contribute to the treasury of the colony. The farmers would be required to pay the colony a lump-sum tax of two and a half barrels of corn.”
And so it was that capitalism saved the Pilgrims.
And so, it is to be hoped, it will save us again in our own time.
About the Author
Andrew B. Wilson, a frequent contributor to The American Spectator, writes from St. Louis.
Letter to the Editor View all comments (111) | Leave a comment
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k962| 6.30.10 @ 6:22AM
Krugman tries to wash away that the 787 Billion dollar stimulus package was an utter failure. @ million jobs were lost after it was signed into law. The fact remains that the stimulus did nothing to stimulate the private sector economy. It sure as heck boosted Federal jobs, a lot of them being "temporary".
vtwin| 6.30.10 @ 8:27AM
"The $800 billion U.S. stimulus package has had a slightly bigger effect on the U.S. economy than was projected when it was passed more than a year ago, the Congressional Budget Office estimated Tuesday.
Through the first quarter of 2010, the stimulus boosted employment by an estimated 1.3 million to 2.8 million jobs, about a quarter or half million more than projected. Gross domestic product was 1.7 to 4.1 percentage points higher than it would have been without the stimulus, the nonpartisan budget office said." -- wall street journal
skip| 6.30.10 @ 9:09AM
Do the math. 862 bil for 2.8 mil jobs is $308,000 per JOB. 2.8 mil out of 307 mil americans comes to less than one percent of the population. Now find the CBO definition of a 'job'. One hour of employment per month? Oh, the 862 billion hasn't been paid for yet, 'not one dime', to quote a very stupid and dishonest idiot.
vtwin| 6.30.10 @ 12:25PM
"The Bush administration created about three million jobs (net) over its eight years, a fraction of the 23 million jobs created under President Bill Clinton’s administration..." -- wall street journal
http://blogs.wsj.com/economics.....on-record/
Ned| 6.30.10 @ 12:52PM
What G.W. did or did not do is simply obfuscation, and irrelevant to whether or not the Obummer stimulus is a failure - which it has been.
vtwin| 6.30.10 @ 5:13PM
You offer an opinion, "stimulus is a failure, " but not an argument.
Really?| 7.1.10 @ 7:10AM
And yet you continue to overlook several factors including the "trickle down economics" that were put in place in the 80s creating the job growth that people (wrongfully attributed) to Pres. Clinton.
Further, you've yet to refute the lack-luster performance of the CBO's "non-partisanship" and their constant manipulation of skewed and normally over/under inflated numbers depending on how the administration wants the story to go.
We're currently at record levels of Debt/GDP, and somehow when annual taxes are only amounting to 2-3T annually we think that spending anywhere from 33-50% of actual revenues somehow equates to "saving the economy"?
Time as it always does will prove who was incorrect although my money is on a massive dive in and flat economic confidence over the next 6 months. All we did was borrow money we're now paying interest for, offload State debts to Federal taxpayers and push economic and market normalization to the right.
The BEST thing that the government can do now is to STOP everything they've done over the last year and let the market work it's self out.
vtwin| 7.1.10 @ 11:52AM
I agree, you can attribute the economic boom, job creation included, that we experienced in the eighties and nineties to Reagan because his economic philosophy extended far beyond his presidency.
But, it is intellectually dishonest to credit the positive, job creation of the eighties and nineties, while ignoring the negative, the concurrently rising NATIONAL DEBT.
Really?| 7.1.10 @ 1:07PM
I don't discount the fact that the national debt during, before, and after Reagan's time in office were and are there. Reagan spent a lot of money on the military and also instituted tax cuts galore yet, Federal spending in entitlements has ballooned out of control and even during the Clinton years the debt was at or around $5.5T. I'm very concerned about the deficit and admittedly became more concerned about it during TARP Round 1.
As I've watched what has been going on in Washington I keep asking myself if the typical American taxpayer ran their personal finances the way the government does would they be thrown in prision? Have any available means of credit? Hold any form of public trust? I'm guessing the answer to most of these would be no...
SeattleBruce| 7.2.10 @ 5:25AM
"But, it is intellectually dishonest to credit the positive, job creation of the eighties and nineties, while ignoring the negative, the concurrently rising NATIONAL DEBT. "
Reagan was not Superman, nor could he derail and insanely spending Democrat Congress that he battled throughout his adminstration. The Democrats controlled both houses of Congress about 2/3 of the 20th Century - but they complain about Republican policies? Conservative policies saved this nation from the insane fiscal/economic/socialism debacle we see unfolding now. The Republican party has barely been able to stave off the big spending liberals, even within its own ranks.
This is the crap Reagan had to cut through when he went to DC.
PNACMAn| 7.5.10 @ 8:31PM
Raygun was the worst President ever. It is his ghosts - illegal wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and dead spending to make his financial backers, the military industrial complex, happy - that have ruined this country.
PNACMAn| 7.5.10 @ 8:31PM
Raygun was the worst President ever. It is his ghosts - illegal wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and dead spending to make his financial backers, the military industrial complex, happy - that have ruined this country.
PNACMAn| 7.5.10 @ 8:31PM
Raygun was the worst President ever. It is his ghosts - illegal wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and dead spending to make his financial backers, the military industrial complex, happy - that have ruined this country.
Chris| 7.3.10 @ 9:05AM
My Proof for the failure of the stimulus is the FACT of millions on jobs lost after it was enacted. Despite Obama's assertion you can't measure "jobs saved". Put down the cool aid and wake up!
Clinton nee Publius| 6.30.10 @ 1:03PM
I don't know where they are getting their numbers, but the U.S. Bureau of the Census recorded 92,825,797 employees at the start of 1993 and 114,064,976 employees at the end of 2000. That's a 2.86% per annum rate of net job growth for President Clinton.
You might want to check your facts...
J.O.H.N. | 7.3.10 @ 6:28PM
Funny how Bill Clinton never did a thing while in office except LIE, CHEAT, AND STEAL! Sounds like a thief to me! Back in the day horse thieves were hung for doing what he got away with! If that boils your blood you check your facts! From Abraham Lincoln to now they all except maybe Reagan have some way or another have broke their oath to this country and abandoned our Constitution! Even Reagan had his faults but, as his predecessors before they were meer mortal men. Now let's all get together and expunge this tyranny like Americans should. take back our country now!!!
jge| 6.30.10 @ 2:07PM
Graph of the Day for June 30, 2010
Randall Hoven
"In fact, in the last six months more jobs were created than Bush was able to generate in eight years, Chris. People don't understand that, the economy has recovered." Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA), June 26, 2010.
"There's no possibility to restore 8 million jobs lost in the Great Recession." Vice President Joe Biden, June 25, 2010.
Source: St. Louis Fed/FRED.
Hoven's Index for June 30, 2010
Changes in number of jobs:
In last six months (Nov. 2009 to May 2010): +873,000
In Bush's eight years (Jan. 2001 to Jan. 2009): +1,080,000
In Obama's 17 months: -2,979,000
When Republicans controlled House and Senate, Jan. 95 to Jan. 2001: +16,107,000
When Congress/Senate were split, Jan. 01 to Jan. 03: -2,203,000
When Republicans controlled House and Senate, Jan. 03 to Jan. 07: +6,801,000
When Democrats controlled House and Senate, Jan. 07 to present (May): -6,497,000
Since December 2007 (peak): -7,381,000
Source: St. Louis Fed/FRED. (Also see Senate website for party control.)
Graph of the Day Archive.
SeattleBruce| 7.2.10 @ 5:36AM
Graph of the Day:
http://www.americanthinker.com....._30_2.html
Forever Marine| 6.30.10 @ 6:20PM
George didn't create jobs and neither did Bill. It's that "promote the general welfare" thing in the Preamble. The free market creates jobs in an environment that government stays the heck out of. We have to keep thinking this way up to the November elections and never forget it. The ever diminishing role of government in all our lives will eventually get us back. History proves this.
SeattleBruce| 7.2.10 @ 5:20AM
"The Bush administration created about three million jobs (net) over its eight years, a fraction of the 23 million jobs created under President Bill Clinton’s administration..." --
Who was in charge of Congress from 1994 to 2006 and forced Clinton to balance the federal budget and even run surpluses! Get real with your selective facts!
vtwin| 7.7.10 @ 8:25PM
“Who was in charge of Congress from 1994 to 2006 and forced Clinton to balance the federal budget and even run surpluses!”
Tell us and please explain what happen to this “Who… force” in 2001. Because Bush ran annual budget deficits every year of his presidency. Just like Bush Sr. and Reagan did. In fact since 1981 Clinton is the only president who balanced a budget.
Really?| 6.30.10 @ 9:10AM
Taking the CBO at its word is a slippery slope . When the "non-partisan" CBO can't honestly release factual numbers for something like the "Health care reform bill". You failed to mention the last byline from the CBO: "The impact of the stimulus is expected to increase through the middle of the year, then fade, the CBO said."
Here we are in June and yesterday the DOW lost several hundred points, consumer spending is flat, unemployment is still at 9.7%, job "creation/saved" metrics are being skewed by poor reporting and hiring of temporary Census Workers, while true Job creation is lackluster... I can't wait to see what January 2011 will be like once taxes go through the roof, can you?
ShortNSweet| 6.30.10 @ 2:16PM
Really? - Amen Brother! Couldn't have said it better myself! And, no I can't wait to see Jan2011 either! Just saying.
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$| 6.30.10 @ 10:03AM
Excuse me if I’m not overly impressed by numbers from the Communist Bullcrap Orifice. If employment has been boosted, why has the unemployment rate remained above the 8% the stimulus plan was to keep it below? Hmmm. Why are there thousands of new unemployment claims every week? Hmmm. If there are all these fabulous jobs out there, don’t you think at least one of these numbers would be showing significant improvement? Hmmm. I monitor the data available to anyone at http://www.usdebtclock.org. To assure accuracy I began keeping daily screenshots of that website last April 21. According to the data I mined, something happened over the June 5-6 weekend. On June 4th, 140,658,480 Americans were employed. On June 7 this number had dropped by 1,247,416 workers to 139,411,064 Americans. Since then, an additional 25,656 jobs have been lost. Not one day since has the job count increased. Not one day since. However the population of the United States has increased steadily from 309,422,558 to 309,618,857. Gee, what are the implications of a growing population and a declining job market? Hmmm. In the meantime, the number of federal employees has increased from 4,259,152 to 4,262,026. Gee, what happens to on economy lacking private sector jobs yet being required to support more and more government sector workers? Hmmm. The number of people getting food stamps has increased from 40,604,900 to 41,570,128. Gee, sure sounds swell to me. As the stock market fall yesterday indicates, obummer’s whole house of cards may not long stand against the economic cyclone headed our way. The truth is, the won with all his psychophantic remoras attached firmly to his buff butt, are no more capable of fixing OUR economy than they are at plugging a leak.
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$
gill.Oteen07041776@gmail.com
“Anybody who has any doubt about the ingenuity or the resourcefulness of a plumber never got a bill from one.” - George Meany
Only 935 days to go.
Spoonman| 6.30.10 @ 12:07PM
EXCELLENT summary! These are the facts and only the facts! Obamaslimy is inept!
vtwin| 6.30.10 @ 12:15PM
On Jan. 7, 2009, two weeks before Obama took office, the Congressional Budget Office reported that the deficit for fiscal year 2009 was projected to be $1.2 trillion.
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/99x.....earing.pdf
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$| 6.30.10 @ 1:02PM
Yesterday, it was $13,116,984,770,444, so what’s your point? Don’t forget that no truly fiscal conservative is a great fan of junior. Wasn’t beavisbud hired to put out the fire, not throw gasoline on it?
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$
gill.Oteen07041776@gmail.com
“They think they can make fuel from horse manure - Now, I don't know if your car will be able to get 30 miles to the gallon, but it's sure gonna put a stop to siphoning.” - Billie Holiday
Only 935 days to go.
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$| 6.30.10 @ 4:14PM
Silly me, but I have my age and stroke as an excuse. OUR Constitution assigns the keeping of the gum’mint purse to kongrrs. No president, no matter how brilliant, can lawfully spend a penny without kongrrsional approval. The 2006 federal election gave control of both houses to the dumb-ocrats. They took over in January 2007. This means that every budget since that time could not have become law without their approval. Instead of naming budgets after the president, whose role is limited to proposing, signing and maybe vetoing, it would be more correct to call them after the leaders of each house of ill-repute. Thus the 2009 budget, in fact every budget since fiscal 2008 should be called the hairy redd - nunny botoxic budget. While it is fair to dump on THE EVIL BUSH since he signed it, do not pile on too much unless you can defend obummer’s votes on every budget during his time in the sin-8.
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$
gill.Oteen07041776@gmail.com
“All bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with Amendments as on other Bills.” The Constitution of the United States, Article. I., Section 7
Only 935 days to go.
SeattleBruce| 7.2.10 @ 5:54AM
vtwin| 6.30.10 @ 12:15PM
On Jan. 7, 2009, two weeks before Obama took office,
+++++++++++
And who was in charge of Congress and passing budgets for TWO years before Obama took office? Democrats in both Houses. Uh oh. They never met a tax they didn't like, nor a productive dollar they couldn't spend unproductively.
vtwin| 6.30.10 @ 12:29PM
In January 1981, when President Ronald Reagan took office the nation's debt was only $934.1 billion.
In January 1989, when President Ronald Reagan left office the nation's debt was over $2.7 trillion.
Ronald Reagan tripled the national debt!
In January 2001, when President George W Bush took office the nation's debt was only $5 trillion.
In January 2009, when President George W Bush left office the nation's debt was over $11 trillion.
George W Bush more than doubled the national debt!
A conservative concerned about deficits that's a joke right?
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$| 6.30.10 @ 1:15PM
For once we agree - the current regime’s economic policies are certainly no laughing matter.
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$
gill.Oteen07041776@gmail.com
“They think they can make fuel from horse manure - Now, I don't know if your car will be able to get 30 miles to the gallon, but it's sure gonna put a stop to siphoning.” - Billie Holiday
Only 935 days to go.
Tim*| 6.30.10 @ 1:23PM
From Jan. 20, 2001, to Jan. 20, 2009, the debt held by the public grew $3 trillion under Mr. Bush—to $6.3 trillion from $3.3 trillion at a time when the national economy grew as well.
By comparison, from the day Mr. Obama took office last year to the end of the current fiscal year, according to the Office of Management and Budget, the debt held by the public will grow by $3.3 trillion. In 20 months, Mr. Obama will add as much debt as Mr. Bush ran up in eight years."
vtwin| 6.30.10 @ 2:22PM
The U.S. Department of the Treasury Bureau of the Public Debt put the debt at $5.7 trillion in September of 2000, before Bush enterd office, and at $10 trillion in September of 2008, that was before the Bush's economic collapse, Bush's bank bailouts, Bush's auto bailouts, and Bush's ….
http://www.treasurydirect.gov/.....stdebt.htm
Tim*, you should be careful pulling numbers that big out of your b*tt, you could hurt yourself!
Tim*| 6.30.10 @ 2:47PM
Those are OMB figures ObamaBoy ,Not Mine.
Tim*| 6.30.10 @ 2:56PM
The National Debt today under 19 months of Obama is:
$ 13,046,375,308,234.59
That's Dwarfing any previous National Debt Rate Climb .
vtwin| 6.30.10 @ 6:22PM
"When George W. Bush took office, he inherited a budget surplus of $128 billion."
http://www.srwolf.com/reports/.....illion.pdf
On Jan. 7, 2009, two weeks before Obama took office, the Congressional Budget Office reported that the deficit for fiscal year 2009 was projected to be $1.2 trillion.
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/99x.....earing.pdf
From $128 Billion surplus to $1.2 trillion deficit in eight years!
Christy| 7.1.10 @ 10:01AM
Obama should be impeached. He is the worst president in the history of our country. He is a divider not a uniter, a community organizing rabblerouser who is out to destroy our country. He is doing this by design - and we should not let him get away with it. He circumvents and has disdain for the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights. His hope and change, which he did not explain or articulate during his campaigning, is transforming our country and not in a good or positive way. Impeach.
PNACMAn| 7.5.10 @ 8:38PM
Sorry stupid, but Raygun was the worst President in history. It is his ghosts that created the mess America is in.
PNACMAn| 7.5.10 @ 8:38PM
Sorry stupid, but Raygun was the worst President in history. It is his ghosts that created the mess America is in.
Chris| 7.3.10 @ 9:27AM
So you're saying liberals are concerned with deficits and debt? Have you checked the national debt lately? $13.1 trillion now. This does not count the future expenditures on the federal health care program. And don't quote CBO. Honest people know this program will never pay for itself!
vtwin| 6.30.10 @ 5:01PM
The cost of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistanhere another debt clock you can "monitor."
http://costofwar.com/
Tim*| 6.30.10 @ 6:04PM
Tell It To Field Marshall Obama , ObamaBoy.
He just appointed General Petraeus to carry on the War In Afghanistan ,while in Iraq ,we still are spending monthly - $7.3 billion as of Oct 2009 and have 90,000 troops.
vtwin| 6.30.10 @ 6:45PM
Hear, hear!
Tim*| 6.30.10 @ 7:12PM
Economic Buffoon .
JimE| 6.30.10 @ 6:39PM
Vtwin,
You are a moron.
PNACMAn| 7.5.10 @ 8:41PM
Then why does he have no problem making you look like your retarded?
JoshINHB| 6.30.10 @ 10:15AM
Through the first quarter of 2010, the stimulus boosted employment by an estimated 1.3 million to 2.8 million jobs, about a quarter or half million more than projected.
Does anyone trust that a government stat with more than 100% rnage variance is anything other than bullshit?
Warrior | 6.30.10 @ 2:32PM
Nice smoke and mirrors posting. Cite the WSJ and present numbers without context of the article they were presented in. This is worse than following weather reports for an NFL game being played in a domed stadium. The stimulus has temporarily saved and in some cases created temporary jobs. Employment was only boosted temporarily. Once that money runs out in the state coffers, they will be facing the same budget shortfalls that have been delayed for one year. Also, take into account in the first quarter that GDP numbers have been artificially inflated using borrowed money. Today's 3rd quarter reality is much bleaker than the rosy picture the left wants to paint with inflated 1st quarter numbers.
SeattleBruce| 7.2.10 @ 5:17AM
"the Congressional Budget Office"
The CBO which is beholden to the Democrat majority and which we know has done such a bang up job of estimating costs like Medicare, Medicaid and Obummercare. Our brilliant political leadership has us in over $100 Trillion of unfunded liabilities stretching as far into the future as the eye can see - yet we're to trust the CBO - uh huh.
I won't hold my breath that they were right on this one either. You should look at the real unemployment rate before harping about some supposed success for the porkulus package.
http://www.shadowstats.com/
Quote that to the Wall Street Journal.
Paul| 6.30.10 @ 10:21AM
"It sure as heck boosted Federal jobs..." And state and local government jobs as well - at least for a year. Most of the early stimulus money went to states and municipalities, who used the money to save gov't jobs. That lasted about a year, and the money has been spent. Now the states, cities and towns are finally getting around to laying off employees. In essesnce this part of the stimulus did nothing more than transfer state and local budget deficts to the federal budget.
Purpleguy| 6.30.10 @ 10:37AM
So, you are denying that the loss of 750,000 jobs/month stopped shortly after Obama became President? In fact, in Nov 2009, 8 months after the Recovery Act was passed, the economy STOPPED losing jobs and started reversing and ADDING jobs.
Check the charts here for more info: http://www.washingtonpost.com/.....0060405006
The economy has added jobs each month since - not enough jobs yet, but the stimulus did work, and all economists that aren't employed by Fixed News agree. 8 months is not a long time to reverse 750,000 job loss/month to positive 1000's of job gains/month.
In fact the recession took a while to lose that many jobs/month, since the recession started in December 2007. It was more than a year before Bush's term ended, he did nothing to stem the recession - except TARP at the last minute.
"Mr. Bush boasted about 52 consecutive months of job growth during his presidency. What matters is the magnitude of growth, not ticks on a calendar. The economic expansion under Mr. Bush — which it is safe to assume is now over — produced job growth of 4.2 percent. That is the worst performance over a business cycle since the government started keeping track in 1945."
See:
http://usbudget.blogspot.com/2.....prior.html
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$| 6.30.10 @ 12:02PM
According to a CNBC story linked to by The Drudge Report just now, http://www.cnbc.com/id/38013729, with the headline ‘Jobs Market Barely Budges in June as Hiring Stays Weak’, “U.S. private employers added just 13,000 jobs in June, according to a report published Wednesday that suggested expectations of a big drop in the government's upcoming nonfarm payrolls report were on target.” Further, they stated that “...May's gain was revised marginally higher to 57,000 from the original estimate of 55,000.” The numbers from national Debt Clock state that through yesterday, after all June’s not quite over yet, show that 1,345,797 jobs were added in May. If both reports are true, that could only mean that 1,288,797 of the May Debt Clock jobs were from non-private sector sources - I do recall something being said about plenty enough census workers prowling the streets. The Debt Clock numbers for all of June, excluding today, show an actual decline of 1,144,757 for the month. Even if ‘The Washington Post’ story you cite is accurate, where are those jobs today? What good is incredibly mindless spending if its results are only temporary. By this standard the only way to make the stimulus impact permanent would be to make the overspending permanent. Only a total dunderhead like Paul “I have a Nobel Prize - and you don’t” Krookman would think this a good idea.
The above cited CNBC story goes on to state:
“(the report) also supported fears that the short and tepid recovery from the worst recession since the 1930s was fizzling.
"There is really no way to characterize this number other than disappointing," said Macroeconomic Advisers LLC chairman Joel Prakken, whose firm jointly developed the ADP report. "The overall number tells you that the recovery in the jobs market is very, very sluggish at this point."
The ADP figures come ahead of the government's much more comprehensive labor market report Friday.
“That report is expected to show a fall in nonfarm payrolls of 110,000 in June overall, as many temporary workers hired to complete the government's decennial census were let go.
"It is now generally expected that the peak level of census employment was in May and that in June there will be a decline in census hiring," Prakken said. "And for that reason I think it's very likely that the number reported Friday is going to be a negative number."
If that defines success, I’d hate to learn the gum’mint’s idea of failure
On a related note, vee pee joe bite-me said a few days ago that, “there's no possibility to restore 8 million jobs lost in the Great Recession." he was appearing at a fundraiser with Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisc.) in Milwaukee. Of course, it was all THE EVIL BUSH’s fault
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-50.....03544.html
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$
gill.Oteen07041776@gmail.com
“In the absence of justice, what is sovereignty but organized robbery?” - St. Augustine
Only 935 days to go.
Spoonman| 6.30.10 @ 12:11PM
SAs Gill O'Teen knows, gum mint jobs do not improve the economy - they only steal funds, either now or oin the future through higher taxes, from legitimate working taxpayers. This in turn reduces funds availabe for the private sector to use to grow the economy and generate real jobs!
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$| 6.30.10 @ 1:29PM
I am not now nor have I ever been SAs anything other than a reader of and occasional poster on their FREE internet magazine. And contrary to what you may think, I look forward to the day we all depend 100% on the same gum’mint that just exposed 18 hundred American veterans to serious infections through their friendly local VA hospital. http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/06/.....index.html
Yep, that will be "... the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal ..."
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$
gill.Oteen07041776@gmail.com
There is a very easy way to return from a casino with a small fortune: go there with a large one.” Jack Yelton
Only 935 days to go.
Texas| 6.30.10 @ 12:09PM
Yes, I am denying that the economy stopped losing jobs. It is still losing jobs. That chart from the Washington Post is garbage. The jobs that are shown on it are not real jobs. Most of them are temporary census jobs and government jobs. Private sector jobs are still negative. Obama and the democrats have a much worse job record that Bush.
danfromatlanta| 6.30.10 @ 12:53PM
It figures that Purpleguy gets his "facts" from the Washington Post. All the jobs "created" by stimulus money have been government jobs that have either been "saved" or actually created. Purpleguy can't seem to grasp that government jobs that create nothing are a burden paid for by taxes from the private sector that actually provides goods and services. That temporarily helps the guys that land those government jobs, a very small minority of the population, and the SEIU, but no one else! The obamanation is a sleezy commie that hates America, and wants to destroy the economy just so we'll know what it's like for all the deadbeats that supported him because he promised to spread the wealth we earned to them!
vtwin| 6.30.10 @ 4:37PM
The article in Washington Post links to U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data which support Purpleguy’s point of view. What do you offer in support of your point of view?
Tim*| 6.30.10 @ 1:51PM
U-3 Unemployment Rate Forecast :
June 2010 : 9.7 %
July 2010 : 9.7%
August 2010 : 9.8%
September 2010 : 9.8 %
October 2010 : 9.7 %
November 2010 : 9.7 %
December 2010 : 9.7 %
January 2011 : 9.8 %
Old Soldier| 6.30.10 @ 2:28PM
No, I am saying it started shortly after Pelosi and Reid took over control of Congress.
Toolbag| 6.30.10 @ 9:30PM
Everyone needs to stop reading articles from websites that clearly have an agenda to spin. Numbers in this day and age are all about how you crunch them. I can crunch numbers that make say the sky is neon yellow, Elvis is alive, and Giraffes fly out of Nuclear Sub,arine Arseholes. If the economy is is recovering then look around your own corner of the world for the evidence. Lets here the first hand experience from your financial sector or neighborhood.
Dabby| 7.1.10 @ 2:57PM
Toolbag - well put, numbers are fudged to further an agenda.
Chris| 7.3.10 @ 9:52AM
I can easily make the case that job growth would have started without the stimulus package due to normal economic cycles. My concern now is that massive tax increases due in 2011 on small business owners as well as virtually every American will lead to a double dip recession. My other concern is that people like purpleguy and vtwin believe that a Democrat President can sprinkle fairy dust on America via new government spending programs to fix all problems.
Brian Mc| 6.30.10 @ 6:33AM
Federal job?
Sit on my hands, half the day?
Shuffle stuff about the desk?
Tell folks, "You can't do that...that won't work...you can't get there from here."?
Act smug, domineering, aloof and condescending?
Make 60+K a year?
Bitch about the lack of enough Holidays?
Watch the clock?
Where do I sign up?
Steven Wallace| 6.30.10 @ 6:43AM
As is typical with Krugman and his ilk, there is nothing empirical he can offer to support haphazard fiscal policy. The theory doesn't hold water, and there is a wealth of data to debunk the theory. To suggest that even more of the same is needed is hooey.
Carol| 6.30.10 @ 6:50AM
When Obama and Bite Me go around bragging about the economy doing better, THEY ARE NOT TALKING TO ALL OF AMERICA - THEY ARE TALKING TO THE PUBLIC UNION SECTOR, WELFARE RECIPIENTS AND GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES, INCLUDING THE BIG BANKS.
Why do you think Obama is ignoring the oil spill and all other crisis that have happened since taking office. BECAUSE THEY WERE STATES HELD BY REPUBLICAN GOVERNORS.
Wake up people - spread it around. Our country is at peril and if Obama is not removed from office we will be like the pilgrims who didn't know what they were doing when they were given the keys to the kingdom.
Kipling| 6.30.10 @ 7:39AM
Seems to me Urkel is pursuing a kind of "starve the beast" strategy in reverse. You might call it "feeding the beast." By having accumulated massive debt at the federal level, by encouraging state and local governments to accumulate debt, by trying to accumulate even more federal debt (this in the form of additional "stimulus" measures by other names--any other names), by encouraging the growth of federal, state, and local public payrolls, especially unionized public payrolls, by getting health care legislation passed that represents a massive expansion of entitlements, by promoting "comprehensive immigration reform" which is essentially an international welfare outreach, by promoting cap-and-trade legislation that will make energy prices "skyrocket" in a terrible economy, and in other ways, too, no doubt, Urkel and his enablers on the left seem determined to make government in this country so expensive that the only way to pay for it will be to return to the kind of marginal rates of individual federal income taxation that we had in the 1960s (about 90% at the top), but this time fewer than half of all able-bodied adults will be paying any federal income taxes and there will be fewer itemized deductions, and to remain there for decades. This isn't even remotely new. It's the 1960s all over again, in politics, in economics, in terms of who is meant to win and lose. Is Krugman right in arguing that more federal spending is needed, not less? I'm not enough of an economist to say. But it doesn't square with common sense, and Krugman does not inspire much confidence, since he is a leftist ideologue.
Jeff Lee| 6.30.10 @ 7:50AM
It's the worst economy since Obama.
Ret. Marine| 6.30.10 @ 8:04AM
Krugeman's way of thinking went out with the extinct animals, today we call them progressive's/marxist/mao mumblers, etc. etc. Is it any wonder there is half a brain between obumbler and him? The dem's and their pagen god obama made the mess so I say their wages are taxed at 110% until they pay it off.
jack| 6.30.10 @ 8:19AM
This guy appears delusional. His theories have been disproved over and over again by history. Why would the NY Times have someone so uneducated writing a column on economics? Fact,lower tax rates increase government revenues,the problem has always been on the sp ending side,the criminals and socialist grifters in our Congress derive all their power from their ability to spend our money without restraint. There in lies the problem. How do we control the crooks of both parties in Congress?
Melvin| 6.30.10 @ 8:32AM
White Collar crime at its finest. Where else can a politicans steal millions of dollars and not have to go to prison.
Once we really think about it there isn't too much of a difference btween a a person wearing a hoody and a Brooks Brothers wearing politician robbing you at gunpoint.
The guy with the hoody uses his own gun, the the Brooks Brothers politican uses the tax code as his weapon of choice.
confused| 6.30.10 @ 8:59AM
Ladies and gentleman, I do not mean to lecture, but I must. I was born in one of the PIIGS which was piss poor. My father went to England to work as they need all bodies to rebuild. He had also founght in the British Army during WW11. My Grandfather also fought in WW1.
We totally depended on the pay from the UK.. Believe me at that time there were still many preducies against my country of national origin. Did my Dad give a damn? Hell no it was money and it fed his family. Did he like the racism? Of course not, but family survived and that is what counted.
We were not victims, we made money and survived. Did we have hard times? Hell yes. My dad kept a roof over our heads and food on the table, no matter how meagre, we were lucky.
We are not bitter, but grateful that my Dad had a chance to work.
These elites have no idea how to survive, their goal is to teach the rest of us how to live as they gallivant around the world.
Keep the Faith, as they fall from skyscrapers we fall from the basement.
Ask commonsense questions, ask commonsense solutions and we THE PEOPLE can DEFEAT these Snobs.
bill carson| 6.30.10 @ 9:40AM
This writer is criticizing Obama! That means he is a racist who does not want to see a black man succeed. He must support Obama's economic "plan" or he will be forever known as a racist!
Howard| 6.30.10 @ 9:48AM
Krugman like most neo-Keynesians, has it only partially correct. While there may ber some credence to deficit spending resulting in an increase in overall demand; this only goes so far. Because funds are borrowed from the private sector, this reduces capital available for traditionally more effective uses. Certainly the idea that a dollar of deficit spending will result in $1.50 of new economic activity is full bull****. But this is one of the premises made by Krugman and Co. to justify the Stimulus.
However, an even great brake on the economy is attributed to Keynes. That is what he called "animal spirits", optimism, the desire to grow a business, invest, etc. This spirit is being severely stunted by Obama, Pelosi, Reid and the like. They, through their words and deeds act as a huge headwind slowing the natural growth after a steep recession. So, while Krugman worships part of Keynes nostrums, he ignores or minimizes the other. Hence our current stagnation.
Melvin| 6.30.10 @ 9:59AM
Its official people, yet to be unamed source within the Halls of Capitol Hill, it is being seriously been brought up to raise the retirement age to 70 years old.
And if you make too much money in your retirement or you planned your retirement smartly through the years and if it is brining in a significant amount, you won't get Social Security either.
Ya just got to love this hope and change.
McCawber| 6.30.10 @ 10:22AM
If we all believe in fairies Tinkerbelle will live.
If you believe applaud--applaud louder!!!!
owyheewine| 6.30.10 @ 10:47AM
Krugman is easy to figure out. Just remember the Einstein definition of insanity. "Do the same thing over and over again and expect different results".
At least Algor has gone from shoving his idiocy down our throats to "rubbing it in".
Shamus| 6.30.10 @ 11:18AM
Asked to comment about oil spills, Al Gore said he disliked them because they made the sheets slippery.
Louis Jenkins| 6.30.10 @ 11:41AM
http://www.cnbc.com/id/38013729
Go to the link above. While it only supports data from June '10, it shows that job creation or re-hiring has pretty much collapsed.
dw| 6.30.10 @ 12:24PM
We are swimming in the evidence of Krugman"s Obamanomics failure. It is drowning us and was the inevitable result of this approach. Krugman is the perfect example of too much education in the wrong hands. He has no idea of what he spouts. He has based his whole career on expousing liberal economics in the face of its proven failure (Soviet Union, Cuba etc.) and must now grab it even harder, as does the obamination, or risk intellectual suicide in admitting they have based their whole academic approach on an idiotic policy that even most elementary school children would find fault with. Its the double down mentality in the face of mounting gambling loses leading to even worse loses.
They have no understanding of human psychology or of the simple fact that if an individual continues to pile on ever increasing debt to pay off more debt the inevitable result is a horrendous crash sooner or later. That same principle applies to our government. It is totally unsustainable and flies in the face of minimal common sense. If this is what the Ivy League is teaching then, truely, questions need arise as to the real quality of that education.
That principle of denial in the face of their failure shows the limited ability these types have for honest evaluation and is what makes all committed collectivist dangerous. Purpleidiot is a prime example of that every time it post.
BD| 6.30.10 @ 1:49PM
Great article, but I'm surprised no one picked up on the reference to Pilgrims in Jamestown. The Pilgrims were in Plymouth, Massachusetts, not Jamestown, Virginia.
Really?| 7.1.10 @ 8:35AM
The reference wasn't to the Pilgrims at Plymouth. Jamestown had a settlement (near Williamsburg, VA) after the Pilgrims in Plymouth had already settled. They were sent there as a farming Co-Op to send crops back to Europe as endentured servants working off their trips paid for by the company sponsor.
Really?| 7.2.10 @ 1:14PM
I need to correct my prior statement - I had flipped time lines on when the Jamestown settlement was established (1607) as it was before MA (1620) and was largely downplayed.
Big Elk| 6.30.10 @ 2:13PM
So Krugman got a discredited Nobel prize from a gaggle of Norwegian bohunks along with sex pervert Crazy Al Gore; so?
historychick| 6.30.10 @ 2:26PM
Uh... the Pilgrims had nothing to do with Jamestown. The Pilgrims were Puritans who came to new England in the 1620's, while Jamestown was settled by an independent investment company in Virginia in 1607. Rather than being too "indentured" part of the problem with the initial Jamestown group was that it included too many "gentlemen" who didn't want to work.
Liberal Reader| 6.30.10 @ 7:41PM
"...included too many "gentlemen" who didn't want to work."
Except the gentlemen part it sounds like the Democratic Party.
David| 6.30.10 @ 2:55PM
Vtwin, Bush inherited a the beginning of a recession from Clinton. Clinton inherited from Bush the Elder an economy that had juest fully recovered from a recession.
The repub congress pulled Clinton kicking and screaming into passing an immediate balance budget, which gave tremendous confidence to the markets and investors and employers wanting to expand and hire new employees.
vtwin| 6.30.10 @ 5:25PM
Interesting points but I have two questions.
What did Obama inherit?
Why didn’t the “repub congress [2001-2006] pull [Bush] kicking and screaming into passing an immediate balance budget?”
Liberal Reader| 6.30.10 @ 7:09PM
I know that vtwit and purplegay are becoming more and more ineffective at making some kind of case for Obama regime. You can smell their fear and it brings joy to those here. These corporatist fascists know what is ahead and they are despondent. All their great plans are coming to ruin and they are forced into the ultimate bad argument, "It could be a lot worse". We must not become over confident because a couple dimwitted trolls are losing it. Believe it or not, the Obama regime is filled with people that are much smarter. Well they are not that smart but smarter than a couple of worn out trolls. Be ready for the fight ahead. Democrats are not sustainable but like all parasites they will attempt to cling to the host. They need to be removed.
Tim*| 6.30.10 @ 7:19PM
What Did Ozero Inherit ?
A Democrat Controlled House And A Democrat Controlled Senate.
JmsA| 7.1.10 @ 4:11AM
Another inconvenient truth. Thank you, David.
David| 6.30.10 @ 3:00PM
That correct, HistoryChick. Jamestown failed because everything was collectively owned and shared, thus creating the climate in which no one wanted to work. Only when colonists settling here allowed for private ownership did they began to take care of themselves and their families.
Anthony| 6.30.10 @ 3:55PM
John Keynes renounced most of his inane theories prior to his death. Unfortunately, the Left never got the memo.
Fortunately for Krugman, he's taken an earlier path to sanity, rather than waiting on death's door step to do so. Of course, this might be a bit charitable on my part, afterall, he's still the same insufferable Paul Krugman.
The elite Left; seldom correct yet never in doubt; ah, well, at least, until hit upside the head for the 1000th time. Maybe fellow Princetonian, Paul Erlich will be next.
Hey! We have a mass movement on our hands!!!
aware| 6.30.10 @ 5:17PM
Paul Krugman...the High Priest of Voodoo Economics and the Grand Shaman in the Cult of the State. No wonder he got a Nobel!
Nick| 7.1.10 @ 1:44PM
Aware,
I would call Krudman the Grand Kleagle in the Cult of the State.
brian| 6.30.10 @ 7:38PM
The supposed stimulus package is nothing more than a slush fund meant to payback democrat constituencies.
By the way, how does one calculate a "saved job?"
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$| 6.30.10 @ 8:49PM
Before I say good night, I just wanted to point out that at about 4:41 PM ET today, since about the same time yesterday, according to National Debt Clock, an additional 1,180 Americans lost their jobs, another 117 began working for the feds, another 7,859 were added to the population count, 15,768 more folks are getting food stamps and the Debt:GDP ratio reached either 90.9343096%, 94.3596033% or 90.9343188% depending on which figure is correct. Choice A is my Excel calculation based on the formula -(Debt/GDP) expressed as a percent. Choice C is on the Debt Clock Screen near the GDP and Choice B is also on the Debt Clock Screen in the list of Debt:GDP ratios for 10 selected nations. Every loonie lefty should be thrilled by these numbers.
Gill O’Teen ✝✡$
gill.Oteen07041776@gmail.com
""Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pound ought and six, result misery." - Charles Dickens
Only 935 days to go.
Blacque Jacques Shellacque| 6.30.10 @ 9:37PM
...then the Age of Obama is already toast.
November is coming...
tedh754| 6.30.10 @ 10:17PM
I always laugh when someone blames Bush and Reagan for increases of the debt. They don't care about the debt, they care about where the money went. If Reagan came into office and said "I want to give everyone on welfare a billion dollars!" and plunged the nation into default, he would have been a liberal icon.
jwpegler | 7.1.10 @ 10:32AM
Krugman is a blithering idiot who cares more about his pitiful little ideology than facts, evidence, and history.
jaime dandy| 7.1.10 @ 11:10AM
"officials seem to be getting their talking points from the collected speeches of Herbert Hoover, up to and including the claim that raising taxes and cutting spending will actually expand the economy" ... Is there an ombudsman at the NYT? If someone can find the link, I urge everyone to email this ombudsman and make a formal complaint that their Nobel-laureate economics egghead is telling weasely lies about the history of the 1929 depression. Who gives a cr@p if Hoover made a speech about cutting taxes and spending - he taxed and spent like a freaking Democrat on crack cocaine. If they have an ombudsman and if enough people complain then they MUST address these complaints and Krugman will be exposed for the pathetic, ignorant, partisan shill that he is - or the NYT will become an even bigger disgrace than it is now.
DannyTheGun| 7.1.10 @ 2:46PM
The problem with Obamanomics. If I take $500 from VTwin and $500 from PurpleGuy, and then run it through the government bureaucracy, I end up with $300 to give to some deserving soul. Net result, I have destroyed $700 of job creating wealth. You can argue that it went to someone's pocket, but that creates no wealth. May as well go break some windows.
Now about the Reagan deficits garbage. Reagan doubled revenues, but had a Democratic house and senate that tripled spending. He still had remarkable growth in jobs, despite being handed an economy a lot worse off than the one today. But then again, Reagan was a leader and a statesman, Obama is just another politician.
RCV| 7.2.10 @ 5:12PM
Let's review some other basics of Economics 101. Money circulates. The problem in a severe repression or depression is often credit availability. When credit is very tight, money circulation is choked off. Government stimulus, most economists agree, can serve to help restart an economy stalled by credit stagnation. The credit crisis that Obama inherited when he took over in February 2009 was the most severe since the Great Depression; indeed, the financial credit system was close to collapse. The need for government stimulus, even in a time of large deficit, was immediate and critical.
To use your example, if the government takes $500, and gives it to someone (say a temporary census taker, or someone filling potholes), that $500 begins to circulate. It goes to the grocer, to the doctor, to the bank for a mortgage. The grocer and the doctor in turn spend their portion at the car dealer, the tire shop, the movie theater. The bank has its portion to lend. The cycle repeats itself over and over. Yes, the government has incurred a $500 debt which must be repaid. But in the interim, that $500 will have circulated through society many times over, creating income, providing credit, stimulating the economy and creating jobs.
If the stimulus spigot is turned off too quickly, as happended in the late 1930s, the recovery will falter.
RCV| 7.2.10 @ 5:13PM
that should be "severe recession".
stmichrick| 7.1.10 @ 4:01PM
Wilson's confusion between the Jamestown, VA example and who the PILGRIMS IN MASSACHUSETTS are brings us to another issue:
The correct teaching of American history.
Really?| 7.2.10 @ 1:10PM
No, the term pilgrim is almost always associated with Plymouth. The Jamestown settlement however did occur prior to the arrival of the Plymouth, MA Pilgrims.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/.....-coop.html
weddingdress | 7.1.11 @ 1:10AM
Now about the Reagan deficits garbage. Reagan doubled revenues, but had a Democratic house and senate that tripled spending. He still had remarkable growth in jobs, despite being handed an economy a lot worse off than the one today. But then again, Reagan was a leader and a statesman, Obama is just another politician.