Sunday, March 07, 2010

Will the Real Paul Krugman Please Stand Up?

Paul Krugman:

...was not impressed with Kyl's argument that extending unemployment benefits created an incentive that could actually increase unemployment. --(NYT link)

Macroeconomics textbook:

Public policy designed to help workers who lose their jobs can lead to structural unemployment as an unintended side effect. . . . In other countries, particularly in Europe, benefits are more generous and last longer. The drawback to this generosity is that it reduces a worker's incentive to quickly find a new job. Generous unemployment benefits in some European countries are widely believed to be one of the main causes of "Eurosclerosis," the persistent high unemployment that affects a number of European countries

You guessed it. Paul Krugman was the author.

HT: AOSHQ/Drew

4 comments:

neomom said...

Please - you don't really expect Progressives to be consistent or intellectually honest (or even honest) do you?

J. Strupp said...

Krugman's argument was made during a time period of relative prosperity, where the labor market was stabile and jobs were more accessible to all classes here in the U.S. and Europe.

This is not the case in today's labor market.

If you know anything about Krugman, the last thing he is is inconsistant. Secondly, he has been very specific regarding the difference between economics in normal times and depression economics. Keynes was too. Most conservatives have a difficult time understanding the ideas of either guy.


As is the case here.......

Dad29 said...

It's not hard to understand him.

It's hard to take him too seriously.

While 'times were good,' I didn't see him advocating bringing Fed debt to zero, for example.

J. Strupp said...

I actually had another comment here. Did it get bounced?