235 Comments

I enjoy your matter-of-fact approach to topics related to the economy. It's a difficult topic to understand, let alone master, and I have come to rely on your insights.

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The grafts are particularly helpful. Kevin Drum also provides data analysis at his jabberwocking.com blog

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We are where we are because of 40 years of trickle down aka voodoo economics that functioned exactly as planned (not as sold). This scheme has transferred the wealth of the country from the middle class to obscenely rich, who continue, by the day, to get more obscenely rich. Democrats stopped talking about this 30 years ago when the Reagan hagiographers shouted them down. Even when David Stockman, implementer of the scheme, told the world it was bullshit, Republicans continued to declare fealty and Democrats shut up. Now, with Democrats captured by almost as many obscenely rich assholes as the Republicans, only a few lone voices cry out in the wilderness - Bernie, Liz Warren, AOC, maybe a few more. And until Democrats get a clue, grow a spine, and really address the issue, we are lost to Republican lies, Trump's tariffs, and right win propaganda...

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I couldn't agree more. Year after year I have watched this disaster unfold. Somehow Reagan is still revered and Democrats are the bad guys who have destroyed the economy. Each Democrat who has followed a Republican since Reagan has done their best to clean up the economic mess of their predecessor and Republicans succeed in blaming everything on them. No clue, no spine.

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Very true.

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Legitimate journalism is not reaching the majority of citizens in their isolated circles; or it is out-shouted by a brainwashing amount of lies & propaganda from Trump and his accomplices. Most citizens are completely unaware that our democracy is in peril (along with our economy). There is an entire digital media universe that Democrats seem to be unaware of or ineffective in reaching.

We need to increase the reach of factual information - subscribe, share, like, comment, everyone will need to do what we can to help spread factual information and protect our journalists who bravely continue to tell truth to power. A rough guess is that factually balanced media and progressive sources were outnumbered in views by a factor of over 100 times by Trump campaign propaganda machine.

Additionally, organizations, and local communities and governments will be of critical importance. Please find ways to connect and have impact in communities - it may be the only way to retain the community values, and way of life we hold dear.

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There are sprouts of sensible media counters to US Pravda. Check out the new Bulwark, Robert Reich, Heather Cox Richardson and read 'From the Middle Out'. The message is clear and available.

Spread the word.

Continue to publish Professor. The wave is small but building.

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I read and like Reich, but his analyses sometimes seem too black or white, and most of the commenters never contradict him, as there seems to be a lot of group think found in replies to his posts.

An example to me was comparing his response to musks’s comments about the visa program vs. Krugman’s.

And his constant demonization of the Democratic Party doesn’t seem to be helpful to getting democrats elected. It’s as if only Bernie, AOC or Warren are worth supporting, when I read about very good measures pushed by many other democrats in Congress, also. A lot is not implemented because of obstruction from the other side and that fact is not given enough attention when demonizing electeds.

He concerns me because I think his stance is going to keep getting democrats defeated, and we need to figure out how to wrest control from maga.

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Reich has the wisdom of experience. He may be extreme, but he is willing to compromise. The US worker has been made into a serf by the royalty of the republican cult and Reich's rhetoric represents this fact. His voice is important and his facts are true. republicans only express lies and are intrantient in their actions. One needs this information in order to message against the theocrats.

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I agree with everything you say.

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Just because the message is available doesn't mean it'll land: how many people actively PREFER right-wing propaganda because it makes them feel good?

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I agree but it's hard to infiltrate the right wing media.

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Right wing media lies are what MAGAts insist on. If Fox switched to reporting facts and honest analysis, their viewers would watch something else, probably something even worse. It’s not Fox, and it’s not Trump. It’s 77 million Americans, each of whom the world would be better off without.

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Hard core MAGA may be impenetrable, but polls continue to indicate that most citizens do not agree with the Trump/MAGA agenda - other than reducing food and basic cost of living; not allowing criminal immigrants and combating inflation. Most of this is basically accomplished already. To understand why so many people voted the way they did - you have to see the relentless lies and propaganda that some groups of citizens were bombarded with. Harris was absolutely demonized even though there was next to nothing to criticize - they just made stuff up - everything Trump was doing wrong, his campaign accused the Democrats of doing - it had nothing to do with Democrats!

A significant portion of the 77 M are Terribly misinformed! But it is getting worse, because Democrats do not have sufficient reach- Trump still dominates the narrative. Fox is the tip of the iceberg - there was massive digital media & social media imbalance I am guessing about 100 to one in Trump's favor.

Rogan's views of Trump/Vance/ then Musk interviews literally reached hundreds of Millions of views all in the last week prior to the election! That was enough to tip the election across the nation.

I know it seems insane that the vote was even closely in favor of Trump - but he did lie, cheat and steal the entire time - all the while telling his followers that it was the Democrats who were lying, cheating and stealing. A lot of people are genuinely convinced that Trump/Musk are going to save them.

Democrats infighting and capitulation does not help. It seems like none of this has even been studied yet - most Democrats still seem pretty clueless regarding the media imbalance. I do suspect that much of the Trump campaign actions were criminal (threats, bribes, interference with the press, foreign interference, lies & defamation of character...).

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No doubt there are many factors, but only one rises above level of noise: the Republican promise to continue the systemic oppression black Americans and other marginalized groups. That’s what clinches the deal for 60% of white voters, 70% of white working class voters, and 80% of white evangelical voters. Yes, they prefer, by and large, Democratic policies, but they cannot bring themselves to vote for a party that won’t pursue white supremacism.

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Peter, keep posting and questioning here, but also out there in Trumps places. Thanks.

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The genius of the 0.1% was to pay off Congress to ignore white collar crime, and then blackmail Congress by threatening to divulge the pay off.

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Telling you didn't mention Joe Biden in the same breath as Bernie, Warren, and AOC. Joe "Milton Friedman's not running the show anymore" Biden. Who visited a UAW picket line, had its President as his guest at the SOTU, had him stand and be recognized, congratulating him on his successful strike. Fain spoke at the first night at the DNC, where Biden attacked "trickle down" and "corporate greed" for the nth time.

Biden was about nothing less than restoring the New Deal. The country ignored it. Why?

Go watch NABTU Biden endorsement on You Tube. Then note how few views it has.

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You said, it, RCT. Parts of the country that ignored what Biden was about were much of the media and most elected Democrats who need to thunder this truth when they are running for election, or thinking of running, or who are in office now and should use or make the opportunity to speak out now and from now on.

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You said it. Bought and paid for. You can name the culprits, so could I. All bought.

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Those old time tax rates didn't get there by accident. They were raised during the Great Depression and again during WW2. The last time a president significantly raised taxes was Clinton in 1993, and he got crushed in 1994 as a result.

The last time a presidential candidate promised to significantly raise taxes was Mondale in 1984. Reagan won 49 states.

We are not in a period where any candidate can raise taxes. Maybe during a catastrophic depression or total war, but otherwise forget it.

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Trump is Not constitutionally permitted to hold office as an adjudicated insurrectionist (unless there is a 2/3 vote by Congress to allow it). Please join citizens in Washington DC this weekend if you are able! And call/write representatives or help draw attention through gathering people in a local action!

https://nowmarch.org/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2Ds1PTEibU

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Another note to add re: David Stockman. He literally just released a book called Trump’s War on Capitalism with RFJ Jr. lending his brainwormed intellect to write a foreword.

A key tenet of Trumpism is the ability to think and act in nonsensical terms. 11 billionaires in his cabinet, but somehow he is the one who is concerned with the so called “working class.”

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The most ironic part of the Originalist judicial philosophy is that Robert Bork was a revisionist when it came to antitrust practices.

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We Democrats also have left the working class, those able people who make most things work, behind, and we need to get back to our roots. Each of us is a full human being, one just as worthy as the next. It's not us and them, it's all us. Trump got to that part of us in a most grotesque way. We need to get going now.

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There is always more to be done; but it is the Republicans who forgot the working class, not Democrats. Biden & Harris had working class front and center.

Trump caught the working class' attention and allegiance with his unending stories, fanciful promises, and entertainment; and he demonized Democrats accusing them of every terrible behavior he was actually guilty of! What I saw of his campaign was bizarre & infuriating. People in isolated circles never got Harris' message, or they heard Trump's lies so frequently they believed them. There is a huge media imbalance favoring Trump through FOX, right wing media, social media, and Bro media was the clincher. Harris could not break far enough from preaching to the choir. We did not have an impartial media or an equivalent progressive media network.

Trump only needed the votes from the working class - unfortunately, his plans will favor the rich and influential.

There is a huge need to build up good impartial journalism as well as some kind of progressive media that reaches hundreds of millions of people. It has to have far greater reach than thousands or millions.

No message will be good enough if hundreds of millions of voters never hear it!

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Maybe Biden and Harris had working class front and centre, but their predecessors did not nor do many Democrats in Congress or in State Houses. This is clear and has been written about for a long time.

Even some of our best tv systems helped Trump by focussing on him and showing his pictures ad nauseam and not giving Biden and the Democrats and their programs at least equal time or calling out Trump's lies sufficiently.

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I am Norwegian who studied business administration and economics for 4 years at a Norwegian university. Just reading the name Milton Friedman makes me sick.

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He was not all bad. He was most active at a time when many smart but wrong-headed people were making excuses for the evils of communism and forgetting how much we owe to capitalism. He talked a lot of sense into such people but unfortunately became a bit of a religious zealot about the free market.

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FDR saved capitalism, not Friedman.

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A bit?

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Friedman and lutefisk go together.

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Lutefisk has never been my thing. For Christmas it has always been 'pinnekjøtt' (sheep ribs).

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Given the choice between Friedman and Lutefisk, I’ll take the lutefisk.

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..."So if you’re either an old-school conservative or a Trumpist, how do you deal with the challenge the great postwar boom poses to your economic doctrine?

Simple: you pretend it never happened." Sounds like a plan.

It is only the second day of the New Year, but already we have come to rely on your expertise, economic commonsense, and refusal to kow tow to the Chaos Monkeys! Thank you.

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It's the "concept of a plan"...

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Dear Prof Krugman, this is not ignorance, these are the foundations for Project 2025.

Seen from Europe: a complete disaster unfolding under our own eyes.

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I’m 77 years old right now a retired and widowed female and I very clearly remember the 50s the 60s the 70s and the 80s. I know how hard my parents worked to get themselves established after World War II and it was with the assistance of my grandparents. my grandfather was an architect and after World War II my dad went on the G.I. bill to print to study architecture and also became an architect. Nevertheless, things were not financially handed to them as a female in the 60s in college was very aware of the discrimination against women my dad could afford to send me to a private university and did with the caveat that I must major in a female field where I could be sure to get Employment. I completed a graduate degree in 1974 and made $11 an hour which was the most of anybody in my female class made, and it was equal to what a letter carrier made interest rates on household mortgages during the time that my husband and I were trying to buy went from 12 1/2% to 17 1/2% sure maybe the house was $150,000 but once you look at how much of that cost per month and you look at your combined family income of around $36,000 it was no easy ride yet so many of the GenZ today, believe that everything was handed to the boomers this was a time when labor unions were destroyed. We didn’t necessarily have pensions employers weren’t contributing to IRA accounts and the Roth didn’t exist. To open an account in Fidelity in the 70s if my recollection is correct you had to five $5000 well that was almost half of my income for the year. I struggled to do it. It’s never been an easy ride. Things have never been clear, but now hearing the craziness out there about Trump‘s various financial plans I’m just astounded that anybody would think that they could work. I try to listen to as many sides of the issues as possible, and when I listen to the right wing financial people, I get the distinct impression. The Trump is saying one thing to them and another thing to us. They are absolutely ecstatic about what he wants to doand I really don’t understand why what else is he saying and promising of course just because he promises something doesn’t mean it’s going to happen. We’re really living in a crazy making time.

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8dEdited

So true. The financial types today see what Trump’s proposed policies will do: hand our wealth over to the rich while workers continue to bear the expense. Trump has messaged loudly that his administration will reduce or eliminate taxation, regulation, and oversight and health protections (think consumer and environmental). That’s all a windfall for the oligarchs. Add in government support for legal free flow of Bitcoin, etc. and watch the oversight of bribes, trade in illegal goods, and tax evasion on all levels fall (uh, fail, if Trump’s stated dreams come true). The oligarchs and mob mindset are going to have a blast under Trump, and Trumps workers will think it’s all good because egg prices (already) came down.

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Yes, but egg prices are now going up again. Bird flu. Like before but worse. Probably this time, MAGAts will accept the bird flu explanation instead of blaming Dems. Oh… wait… they’ll blame Dems anyway.

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Your busting some myths regarding what boomers really faced is welcome.

The business about having a grandfather who was an architect (presumably before the war), and his having to still contribute to your parents so that your father could get a graduate education, echoes all the Gen Zers having to live with their parents after college, to start.

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Thanks Paul for setting the economic record straight for the incoming POtuS! His economic record of his first four year term is not something to replicate with 25% of the entire debt of the USA, over 8 trillion USD, accumulated under Herbert Hoover Trump. He was the only president since Hoover to have a net job loss in his four years. Yet, I saw the clip where he stated that Jimmy Carter was the worse president in American history but now Joe Biden was replacing him as the worst president! There will come a reckoning on our national debt of $35 trillion dollars and Trump’s misguided tariffs will start a trade war. Nobody wins a trade war and the MAGA nuts do not understand that a 25% tariff will be passed on to them and they believe the present 2.1% inflation rate is horrible!

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"Thanks Paul for setting the economic record straight for the incoming POtuS!"

Unfortunately, tRump has ZERO regard for "setting the economic record straight"...he has his beliefs no matter how erroneous or uncomprehending, and also has a self-serving claque comprised of people such as Navarro, Kudlow, the SV broligarchs, et al, who reinforce the eejit's manifest economic illiteracy and outright incompetencies...oy vey!

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I would add a comment (paraphrased) I saw recently (perhaps from you!) that during the Gilded Age, most of our cities’ populations lived in the abject poverty of slums/tenements, with a few islands of incredible and ostentatious wealth.

No wonder that appeals to folks like Trump.

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Yea we basically passed a million laws to protect us from the hazards of the gilded age. It was a horrific time. And Marc Andreeson is typical of these comp sci types that reads a few choice history books and suddenly thinks they have amazing expertise in all matters

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Haha - what Andreesen omits in his post that Trump quotes, is that during the Gilded Age the Federal government had few responsibilities outside postal service and its main revenues came from liquor taxes since income taxes were ruled unconstitutional first and then around 3% on average. Most of the US population lived in rural areas, a majority of 16 year olds were working, and over 50% of people in cities lived in slums.

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In addition if you were old you certainly had no health insurance and a large proportion of the elderly lived in squalor

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Please keep writing.

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Wasn’t the US at its peak but when the top tax rate for the highest income was about 90%?

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I say we abolish the income tax and institute all the insane tariffs that the lunatic billionaire class suggests.

Maybe after we have a massive depression- one that makes 1929-39 look like a bucolic walk in the park, intelligent people will once again get to make policy. Sadly, all of us would suffer catastrophically. It is too bad we can restrict the economic pain to just those who voted for this lunacy and the billionaires that keep pushing it on society.

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I know you don't truly want this for us, but you must know that that's what the majority of Trumpers actually want: to burn the place down to the ground.

They just don't want the inferno to affect them.

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Yes.. couldn't agree more. And of course, I don't want to see a repeat or worse of the economic catastrophe of the 1920s/30s. (I'm a retired history teacher, I know all too well how bad the Depression was.)

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I fear it may take that kind of catastrophe to break the back of MAGA/fascism just like it took the horrific destruction of WWII in Germany.

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My Dad died last April 21 days shy of his 95th birthday. He told me in the depths of the Great Depression his mother made him an onion sandwich because that was the only thing she could put between the two slices of bread. He did not consider it a hardship because he liked onions!

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When life gives you lemons, eat onions.

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Nothing like a depression to encourage fascism.

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Mostly, we need to get factual information to the masses who are only hearing Trump's lies and propaganda. This is clearly reflected in polling answers.

I am sure there is some causal relation to a Trump take-over after major isolation of a pandemic which interrupted face to face societal interactions. People were particularly susceptible to social media and online chatter in the absence of the usual wide range of interpersonal interactions.

Strengthening neighborhoods, communities, local governments will all be key to preserving and recovering our democracy. As well as doing what we can to share and magnify the rational voices online. Anytime we read good journalism or factual information - please remember to share, like, follow, subscribe, generously.

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Hard to do when outlets like CNN always balance real information with right wing propaganda. They never present just the truth.

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"Never let the facts get in the way of a good story."

— Mark Twain

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I want the comedy of hearing Trump repeat President Jimmy Carter’s words, “I will never lie to you.”

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And when I opened my email this morning, I received a shock. My Medicare RX plan payment jumped from $80 a month to $115. I have two regular prescription, a statin and blood pressure medicine. In two years, my monthly payment has nearly tripled. Oh, and it’s brought to you by United Healthcare via AARP. Happy New Year to me.

But great short piece Paul, which by now should be clear except to the chaos monkey crowd.

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The Gilded Age was great - especially if you were wealthy and your fortune rode on some kind of monopoly.

America’s early lead in aviation was squandered by the Wright Brothers. Instead of developing and innovating their technology, they put all their resources into litigation against everyone else trying to build airplanes, especially Glenn Curtis. The Wrights demanded everyone pay them royalties. The lead in aviation passed to Europe, where the Wrights were unable to prevail in the courts.

Anti-trust action is another one of those things that has been memory-holed. The modern equivalent of a monopoly power is the way digital technology allows a company to control what customers do with their products. Proprietary software forces users to only use company certified repair shops and parts - at company determined profits - but “right to repair” is a subject for another day.

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