Keynesian economist Paul Krugman has said a lot of questionable and dubious things since the 1990s. He likes to chastize the likes of Ron Paul and Austrian economists because of their critiques of Federal Reserve monetary policy and governments’ market interventions. But what about Krugman? Krugman has uttered a lot of outlandish, and even contradictory (SEE: Paul Krugman on the minimum wage: 1998 vs. 2005), statements, many of which helped the United States fall into a near decade-long depression.
Anytime someone cites Krugman then just simply point to this article or these quotes to dispel anything the Nobel laureate says.
Here are eight Paul Krugman quotes to laugh at:
“As long as we borrow we’re not broke!”
“The growth of the Internet will slow drastically, as the flaw in ‘Metcalfe’s law’–which states that the number of potential connections in a network is proportional to the square of the number of participants–becomes apparent: most people have nothing to say to each other! By 2005 or so, it will become clear that the Internet’s impact on the economy has been no greater than the fax machine’s.”
“To fight this recession the Fed needs…soaring household spending to offset moribund business investment. [So] Alan Greenspan needs to create a housing bubble to replace the Nasdaq bubble.”
“Meanwhile, economic policy should encourage other spending to offset the temporary slump in business investment. Low interest rates, which promote spending on housing and other durable goods, are the main answer.”
“If we discovered that space aliens were planning to attack, and we needed a massive build-up to counter the space alien threat, and inflation and budget deficits took secondary place to that, this slump would be over in 18 months.”
“Now the question is what can replace the housing bubble… But the Fed does seem to be running out of bubbles.”
“And yes, this does mean that the nuclear catastrophe could end up being expansionary, if not for Japan then at least for the world as a whole. If this sounds crazy, well, liquidity-trap economics is like that — remember, World War II ended the Great Depression.”
“These aftershocks need not be major. Ghastly as it may seem to say this, the terror attack — like the original day of infamy, which brought an end to the Great Depression — could even do some economic good.…”
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