Krugman: Conservative rants against his articles always "basically Capitalism Roolz."

[pampango]

Real Americans and Real Economics

... the notion that the true essence of the nation is white people living in small towns, associated these days with Sarah Palin but also invoked by whatshisname, the guy who lived in the White House between Clinton and Obama and misled us into war. But I’m sure that’s still how a lot of people on the right see it.

What made me think about that concept is something sort of parallel I’ve noticed about the reaction to my writings. Often, I find, the most rage-filled emails and voice mails come after I’ve written something fairly economistic, like today’s piece. And typically, part of the rant is something along the lines of “You call yourself an economist?” You see, the person delivering the rant has a notion of what economics is; he (it’s almost always a he) believes that “real economics” is about singing the praises of free markets — basically Capitalism Roolz. It’s inconceivable to him that you could have a more nuanced view without being a Marxist. And he’s outraged both that I have the temerity to claim that I’m doing economics and that other people seem to take me seriously.

What’s really odd about this view is that you could hardly imagine a time when the evidence was less supportive. We’re just coming off a dramatic economic collapse that had nothing to do with any obvious supply-side factors, but seemed obviously connected to malfunctioning markets. And in the aftermath of the collapse, the supposed real economists made a lot of predictions about runaway inflation, soaring interest rates, and so on that proved notably wrong, while the unreal types like me have done more or less OK.

So, in my mind the real America is the diverse America we actually live in, and real economics is the eclectic mix of ideas and techniques that seem to be useful, whether or not they have rigorous microfoundations. And I say that as both a real American and a real economist.

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/08/25/real-americans-and-real-economics/

[daleanime]

1. K&R....

[Laelth]

2. k&r for Paul Krugman. n/t

-Laelth

[hifiguy]

3. Always a kick for Professor Krugman!

[Populist_Prole]

4. Astute observation

I've noticed conservatives tend to get really testy really fast whenever the mile-wide but an inch deep supply-side meme is questioned. They get ultra parochial about in even in the increasing empirical evidence mounting against it. That's why I described it as a mile wide but an inch deep: It's slathered everywhere across the economist landscape, but there's not much substance to it and can fracture easily. For all but the super wealthy, It might work shitty in practice but it works great in theory.

Hence, it is vigorously defended.