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2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumPaul Krugman losing credibility over relentless attacks of Bernie Sanders
We used to praise him here at DU for stating the obvious in affront to the Wall St's Disinformation Campaigns waged against the American Working Class and the Poorest Americans.
Now he is merely losing all credibility pulling out all the stops shilling for Hillary
Krugmans column this past Friday suggests that the former CEA chiefs letter puts Bernie in the same camp as the Republicans, whove been spouting voodoo economics such as trickle-down and the elixir of tax cuts for decades now, complete with magic asterisks designed to make nearly $6 trillion in deficits disappear.
Theres so much that is wrong with Krugmans column and with the letter from former CEA chiefs Alan Krueger, Austan Goolbee, Christina Romer, and Laura D'Andrea Tyson that its hard to know where to begin.
Lets Start With the Letter Criticizing Freidmans Analysis.
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/02/21/voodoo-journalism-dr-krugman-strikes-again-risking-his-credibility
Theres so much that is wrong with Krugmans column and with the letter from former CEA chiefs Alan Krueger, Austan Goolbee, Christina Romer, and Laura D'Andrea Tyson that its hard to know where to begin.
Lets Start With the Letter Criticizing Freidmans Analysis.
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/02/21/voodoo-journalism-dr-krugman-strikes-again-risking-his-credibility
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Paul Krugman losing credibility over relentless attacks of Bernie Sanders (Original Post)
FreakinDJ
Apr 2016
OP
The fact that bernie bros are upset with Krugman will have no effect on his reputation
Gothmog
Apr 2016
#4
Broward
(1,976 posts)1. That was written back in February. At this point, his credibility is shot.
msongs
(67,465 posts)2. OMG criticism of bernie sanders! what next, criticism of clinton? of trump? nt
JoePhilly
(27,787 posts)3. Krugman will never become President now!!!!
Gothmog
(145,752 posts)4. The fact that bernie bros are upset with Krugman will have no effect on his reputation
Skink
(10,122 posts)5. I think they should debate
Also put Robert Reich there and Bernie's S+L guy.
DanTex
(20,709 posts)6. Krugman's reputation is fine. It's Bernie and the Bros that are losing credibility.
bjo59
(1,166 posts)7. Oh man, Krugman never had any credibility for me.
bbgrunt
(5,281 posts)8. Krugman has shown his true colors and they are definitely not unbiased ones.
His shilling is shameful, and his credibility as an economist has combusted.
snowy owl
(2,145 posts)9. A Leading Economist Responds to His Colleagues’ Attack on Sanders Plan
Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs
The University of Texas at Austin
Austin, TX 78712
February 18, 2016
The Honorable Alan Krueger
The Honorable Austan Goolbee
The Honorable Christina Romer
The Honorable Laura D'Andrea Tyson
Dear Alan, Austan, Christina and Laura,
I was highly interested to see your letter of yesterday's date to Senator Sanders and Professor Gerald
Friedman. I respond here as a former Executive Director of the Joint Economic Committee the
congressional counterpart to the CEA.
You write that you have applied rigor to your analyses of economic proposals by Democrats and
Republicans. On reading this sentence I looked to the bottom of the page, to find a reference or link to your rigorous review of Professor Friedman's study. I found nothing there. You go on to state that Professor Friedman makes extreme claims that cannot be supported by the economic evidence. You object to the projection of "huge beneficial impacts on growth rates, income
and employment that exceed even the most grandiose predictions by Republicans about the impact of their tax cut proposals.
Matthew Yglesias makes an important point about your letter:It's noteworthy that the former CEA chairs criticizing Friedman
didn't bother to run through a detailed explanation of their problems with the paper. To them, the 5.3 percentfigure was simply absurd on its face, and it was good enough for them to say so, relying on their authority to generate media coverage.
So, let's first ask whether an economic growth rate, as projected, of 5.3 percent per year is, as you claim, grandiose. There are not many ambitious experiments in economic policy with which to compare it, so let's go back to the Reagan years. What was the
actual average real growth rate in 1983, 1984, and 1985, following the enactment of the Reagan tax cuts in 1981?
Just under 5.4 percent. That's a point of history, like it or not. You write that no credible economic research supports economic impacts of these magnitudes. But how did Professor Friedman make his estimates? The answer is in his paper. What Professor Friedman did, was to use the standard impact assumptions and forecasting methods of the mainstream economists
and institutions. For example, Professor Friedman starts with a fiscal multiplier of 1.25, and shades it down to the range of 0.8 by the mid 2020s. Is this not credible? If that's your claim, it's an indictment of the methods of (for instance) the CBO, the OMB, and the CEA.
To be sure, skepticism about standard forecasting methods is perfectly reasonable. I'm a skeptic myself.My 2014 book The End of Normal is all about problems with mainstream forecasting. In the specific case of this paper, one can quibble with the out-year multipliers, or with the productivity assumptions, or with the presumed impact of a higher minimum wage. One can invoke the trade deficit or the exchange rate. Professor Friedman makes all of these points himself. But those issues are well
within mainstream norms. There is no magic asterisk, no strange theory involved here. And the main effect of adjusting the
assumptions, which would be a perfectly reasonable thing to do, would be to curtail the growth rate
after a few years not at the beginning, when it would matter most. It is not fair or honest to claim that Professor Friedman's methods are extreme. On the contrary, with respect to forecasting method, they are largely mainstream. Nor is it fair or honest to imply that you have given Professor Friedman's paper a rigorous review. You have not. What you have done, is to light a fire under Paul Krugman, who is now using his high perch to airily dismiss the Friedman paper as nonsense. Paul is an immensely powerful figure, and many people rely on him for careful assessments. It seems clear that he has made no such assessment in this case.
Instead, Paul relies on you to impugn an economist with far less reach, whose work is far more careful, in point of fact, than your casual dismissal of it. He and you also imply that Professor Friedman did his work for an unprofessional motive. But let me point out, in case you missed it, that Professor Friedman is a political supporter of Secretary Clinton. His motives are, on the face of it, not political. For the record, in case you're curious, I'm not tied to Professor Friedman in any way. But the powerful such as Paul and yourselves should be careful where you step.Let's turn, finally, to the serious question. What does the Friedman paper really show? The answer is quite simple, and the exercise is while not perfect almost entirely ordinary. What the Friedman paper shows, is that under conventional assumptions, the projected impact of Senator Sanders' proposals stems from their scale and ambition. When you dare to do big things, big results should be expected. The Sanders program is big, and when you run it through a standard model,
you get a big result. That, by the way, is the lesson of the Reagan era like it or not. It is a lesson that, among today's
political leaders, only Senator Sanders has learned.
Yours,
(Jamie)
James K. Galbraith
Executive Director, Joint Economic Committee, 1981-2
http://big.assets.huffingtonpost.com/ResponsetoCEA.pdf
Fozzledick
(3,860 posts)10. I wish to withdraw my previous endorsement
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=812471
I'm very disappointed at how he's let his partisanship overcome his objectivity.
I'm very disappointed at how he's let his partisanship overcome his objectivity.