Krugman and the Dismal Science: You gotta accentuate the negative

There’s no doubt in my mind that Paul Krugman believes that the articles he provides to the NY Times constitutes “work.” In some foppish and fanciful rationalization, he must stare at his paycheck and decide he performed “labor.” Nobody gets a nice haircut from Paul or takes a Krugman-made product home from the market. He’s selling his thoughts and opinions – he pronounces, the NY Times pays. Nice work if you can get it.

And I think that’s what makes him maddening to bloggers. There are so many great web logs, updated daily with a week’s worth of Krugman’s contribution, most with far better research and quality. No self-respecting blogger would make a statement without a link to back it up. Not so for the Professor, who gets away with slovenly prose like this:

So is a real, unambiguous recovery just around the corner? Recent economic reports have had a "good news"-"bad news" feel to them. Businesses are starting to buy some equipment; that's good. But they seem to be engaging in replacement investment, not capacity expansion; that's bad. Consumers are spending; that's good. But rising interest rates seem to have ended the refinancing boom that put cash in consumers' pockets; that's bad. And so on. [Emphasis added]

“And so on” – yadda yadda yadda – you know what I mean. Everything seems better, but not really, because there’s bad news too.

Well, no shit, Sherlock. There’s always two sides to economic data. To wit:

- The dollar is trading weaker with foreign currency – that’s bad. But a weaker dollar helps to narrow the trade deficit – that’s good. (Reuters: “June US Trade data belatedly reflect weaker dollar”)

- Interest rates are low – that’s good if you’re taking a loan. Sucks if you’re trying to earn interest income on a savings account.

- Productivity shot up last quarter – that’s good. But when workers are more productive, companies don’t need to hire as many people – that’s bad. (USA Today: “Companies do more with less”)

Strange how Krugman failed to mention the productivity jump since it’s a critical component of his thesis that joblessness is intolerable (take note that the Comrade Professor wants nothing less than “full employment!”) But then the productivity data is “good” news that must be ignored. Next time PK, to borrow a phrase: do your homework.