For a while now i have been trying to figure out if "experts" (or at least those who follow experts discussion on a daily basis) were just too incompetent to understand or knowingly disingenuous when presenting the "facts." And maybe an even more important question. Which would be worse?
Seriously which is scarier, that all these "important people" who control the direction of our country are just too STUPID to understand these things? Or are so cynical and morally bankrupt they without question actively mislead so many?
I Completely unerstand the irony on calling someone a liar who is calling me a liar so its a hard conversation to have. I mean where do you start. How do you have the conversation without falling into the same trap?
But today i read a Blog post that JUST embodies the dilemma so beautifully that i had to talk about it!
I am going to post the whole blog post that includes his quotes from today's Krugman OPed, and then my response. (that has NOT been cleared by the moderator)
I read Krugman’s latest NYT op ed in amazement. It seems this notion that “it’s a myth Obama is trying to expand government” is catching on. Look at this excerpt:
Here’s the narrative you hear everywhere: President Obama has presided over a huge expansion of government, but unemployment has remained high. And this proves that government spending can’t create jobs.
Here’s what you need to know: The whole story is a myth. There never was a big expansion of government spending.
OK, so at this part you think we’re just quibbling over “big expansion,” right? In other words, you expect Krugman to go on to argue that yes, government spending went way up when Obama came into office, but it was too little, too late.
But no, that’s not what Krugman says. Look:
Ask yourself: What major new federal programs have started up since Mr. Obama took office? Health care reform, for the most part, hasn’t kicked in yet, so that can’t be it. So are there giant infrastructure projects under way? No. Are there huge new benefits for low-income workers or the poor? No. Where’s all that spending we keep hearing about? It never happened.
To be fair, spending on safety-net programs, mainly unemployment insurance and Medicaid, has risen — because, in case you haven’t noticed, there has been a surge in the number of Americans without jobs and badly in need of help. And there were also substantial outlays to rescue troubled financial institutions, although it appears that the government will get most of its money back. But when people denounce big government, they usually have in mind the creation of big bureaucracies and major new programs. And that just hasn’t taken place.
Consider, in particular, one fact that might surprise you: The total number of government workers in America has been falling, not rising, under Mr. Obama. A small increase in federal employment was swamped by sharp declines at the state and local level — most notably, by layoffs of schoolteachers. Total government payrolls have fallen by more than 350,000 since January 2009.
Now, direct employment isn’t a perfect measure of the government’s size, since the government also employs workers indirectly when it buys goods and services from the private sector. And government purchases of goods and services have gone up. But adjusted for inflation, they rose only 3 percent over the last two years — a pace slower than that of the previous two years, and slower than the economy’s normal rate of growth.
So as I said, the big government expansion everyone talks about never happened. This fact, however, raises two questions. First, we know that Congress enacted a stimulus bill in early 2009; why didn’t that translate into a big rise in government spending? Second, if the expansion never happened, why does everyone think it did?
Part of the answer to the first question is that the stimulus wasn’t actually all that big compared with the size of the economy. Furthermore, it wasn’t mainly focused on increasing government spending. Of the roughly $600 billion cost of the Recovery Act in 2009 and 2010, more than 40 percent came from tax cuts, while another large chunk consisted of aid to state and local governments. Only the remainder involved direct federal spending.
And federal aid to state and local governments wasn’t enough to make up for plunging tax receipts in the face of the economic slump. So states and cities, which can’t run large deficits, were forced into drastic spending cuts, more than offsetting the modest increase at the federal level.
…
But if they won’t say it, I will: if job-creating government spending has failed to bring down unemployment in the Obama era, it’s not because it doesn’t work; it’s because it wasn’t tried.
OK upon my second reading, I think I see his escape hatch. But c’mon, a casual reader would surely conclude from the above that total government spending had actually dropped because of the recession, right? That yes, federal spending went up a bit, but it was more than offset by the decline in state & local spending.
Except, that’s not what happened, at any point in this recessionsince Obama was elected, at least according to the seasonally-adjusted quarterly figures put out by the trusty bureaucrats:
graph
A few things JUST JUMPED OUT AT ME.
The Irony Abounds. He puts for the thesis "that krugman is just lying" and then his conclusion is akin to "well maybe he's not"
What's the point of the Blog post?... he acts as if he's at a cocktail party: he calls krugman a liar (the actual posting). Krugman slowly explains his point (quoting the OPed) and then he concludes "yea ok you might have a point"
but who cares the only thing anyone remembers is this Moron calling a nobel laureate a liar! We've all been in these situations where someone rudely makes a point and then the other guy just utterly decimates him logically and he still cant admit he was wrong.
But this isn't a cocktail party, this is the internet where you write something check it over and post it. When your conclusion admits you're thesis might be wrong go back and fix your thesis OR HELL just dont post it!!!
well ok thats my pissed off rant that i KNOW wouldnt be posted on his blog... (but i can on MINE!!! hehe) Anyways here is my response to him: (again still not "OKed by the "moderator" while other comments have been)
a casual reader would surely conclude ”
whatever they want to conclude because a casual reader is not an economist. Like a “casual architect” will not be employed to build my house.
“Except, that’s not what happened, at any point in this recessionsince Obama was elected, at least according to the seasonally-adjusted quarterly figures put out by the trusty bureaucrats:”
Then you site a graph that shows a STEADY increase for the past decade (ya know the population hasn’t changed or anything) with the ONLY plunge (on both lines btw) in 2009. Frankly I dont know where you learned to read graphs. ‘A casual reader would surely conclude’ the only decrease in GOV spending (both federal & Local) was under OBAMA…. So what’s your point again?
That big bump in 2009 is clearly the stimulus and tarp, at the same time when the similar decrease is happening on the “local” blue line. then federal spending goes right back to the standard trend. At the same time Local spending pops back up on of the whole to its trend line. (that would be the state rescue funds Krugman was talking about) And then you can see it flattening as we approach 2010 (State Aid ending).
In the last paragraph YOU YOURSELF point out the “escape hatch” (the whole bloody point of his argument). That ANY federal expansion in spending has been OFF SET by the reductions in LOCAL gov. spending (state, county, city etc.)
So….. who’s being disingenuous here? Or do you just not UNDERSTAND?..
Here to make it simpler.. you should ADD THE TWO LINES UP!!! that would be “total government spending” (yea know the total of the two numbers). After that, if you see a “HUGE EXPANSION” (other then the standard trend) you can call the nobel Lariat a liar.
PB