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Stephen Brady's avatar

Nobody in other countries is going to put up with his tantrum. We are rapidly becoming an international pariah. The days when people came from afar to vacation and study here are evaporating. We won't be an important market anymore because no business can plan with a madman in the WH. It is becoming unsafe for our own citizens... in 6 months, he is slaughtering the goose that laid the golden egg.

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Jack Craypo's avatar

Multiple golden egg laying geese are being slaughtered. America’s universities were engines of innovation and huge attractors of foreign talent and foreign money. The religious and ideological jihad against universities combined with abusive visa policies has killed that goose.

Much of the trade deficit came flowing back to America in investments in bonds because of the world’s trust in our status as the world’s premiere stable democracy. That goose is now dead.

America was a popular tourist destination. Abusive border agents, ICE detention of tourists and the staggering unpopularity of Trump throughout the non-Russian world have killed that goose.

Immigrants have provided demographic growth that had helped America economically out-perform other countries with negative demographic growth. Immigrants provided cheap, dependable labor for many industries that would struggle without them. At the same time, immigrants paid taxes for services they often could not or simply did not use. That goose is dead.

Cities are the engines of GDP. Most of America’s wealth is produced in cities. By targeting cities with ICE raids, trying to withhold infrastructure and other money, and vilifying cities as crime-infested shitholes, Trump is trying to kill the most important goose of all.

I’m sure there are more dead or dying geese that I have overlooked…

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Stephen Brady's avatar

tRump is a berserker at the top of the American political pyramid. What he is doing is nothing less than treasonous.

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Fred WI's avatar

Important that you named the geese. Once the flock it gone, how likely will we again spawn such goldmaking treasures?

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Stefan Paskell's avatar

You don't suppose he's constructively acting on behalf of Vladimir, do you? It's either something like that, or something more obvious: the Executive Branch has become a clown car. Literally. They have no idea of how they come across to the rest of the world or what history will record of them: that they were a gaggle of actual idiots. The pathology is a defect or corruption of ToM, theory of mind.

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Simon Kepp Nielsen's avatar

In 10 years or so, the US will be just another mid-sized country among the herd of such, but isolated, without friends or allies.

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KS's avatar

And all his minions and supporters are, just like him, happy to destroy civilization and the lives of everyone else on earth -- out of nothing more than spite. To them the world doesn't deserve to exist without them, and they see no reason to leave behind anything but smoldering ruins.

We're not going to escape this situation unless we find a way to outlaw the Lies for Power and Profit industry and it's fictions sold as facts. Rupert Murdoch and his GOP client are worms in America's brain and must be excised for our survival.

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SunnySideUp's avatar

Spite is just what the cynical give to the foolish to support their short-term get-richer quick attempts and build dynastic power. It is essential to wing-nut politics but not a principle. It requires a tactic of constant misdirection, and, although endemic and persistent it will be difficult to pursue as a strategy. Patience is not a strength here, but it does triumph over partiality. Democrats can learn to play rock/paper/scissors in the meantime

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Chenda's avatar

There is a real risk I think the US could start to resemble a second world society like Latin America. These nations are still relatively wealthy but with rampant inequality, corruption, violence and political instability. But maybe hitting rock bottom might lead to a turnaround.

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Phil's avatar

A number of experts have been saying how easily Trump's policies could turn us into Mexico: Lots of poverty with a few middle class families and very few extremely wealthy oligarchs.

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WinstonSmithLondonOceania's avatar

That's the whole idea.

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WinstonSmithLondonOceania's avatar

That's not a mere risk - it's their goal. Between Project 2025 and the "Dark Enlightenment" neo-reactionary crowd, we're already nearly a banana republic.

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ElderlyLoudCatWomyn's avatar

trump has also become an international laughing stock. His supposed buddies, the Russians, put out widely viewed memes about the parade and the TACO tag was issued by the financial times.

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NSAlito's avatar

"We won't be an important market anymore because no business can plan with a madman in the WH."

After the Trump tsunami recedes, the value of the US market will still be high, if only because we are shared interstate commerce with 300 million consumers that all speak the same language, and we have abundant natural resources.

Other than that, the only model that looks plausible to me is the US becoming like the UK: a remnant of a vast global power. It's China's turn next.

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Richard Thornton's avatar

My only hope for the future is that Trump dies in prison, penniless.

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Bob D's avatar

Along with every person who took an oath to support the constitution and HAVE NOT

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Steve Beckwith's avatar

I would accept a simple "home in bed" death for him. As long as it's near term. I don't want to be greedy.

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Marlo's avatar

And SOON!

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Chenda's avatar

An ageing and senile Trump remaining in office might be a better option than being replaced by someone who is equally evil but more competent. OTOH, the MAGA movement would likely collapse with infighting and the lack of a unifying leader when Trump keels over.

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George Patterson's avatar

So we wind up with Vance as pres and Johnson as vice. I think Vance would probably be a bit of a wild card without Trump, and it would take Johnson out of the house. My bet is that things would improve a great deal.

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Daisymaeqqzz's avatar

Did you read Robert Reich today? If Vance takes over, that's like putting Thiel and Palantir in charge.

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Andan Casamajor's avatar

The line of succession doesn't simply step everyone in up one position. The Speaker doesn't automatically step up to VP. Vance would appoint someone, and Johnson has not shown the slightest aptitude for executive power, being a pathetic, lying weasel. Apologies to weasels...

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WinstonSmithLondonOceania's avatar

It's a thought experiment I wouldn't want to live through. We need to just extricate them all. By force if necessary.

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Ask Dr. Séance's avatar

Take heart, dear friends, for he already resides in a prison of insatiable greed, insecurity, and self-obsession.

Oh, and he abolished pennies?

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George Patterson's avatar

Not really. I have a few thousand downstairs. If I separate out the wheat pennies, I could get a good hunk of change for those.

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WinstonSmithLondonOceania's avatar

Although I wouldn't object to a guillotine or gallows.

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Dave Smith's avatar

Like the ending of You?

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Richard Thornton's avatar

No, you.

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Dave Smith's avatar

You know I'm referring to the Netflix show, right?

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rmreddicks's avatar

There's a netflix show? Why?

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Dave Smith's avatar

The Netflix show called You. It ends similarly to what Mr. Thornton wants to see happen to Trump.

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Pamela Marshall Ganné's avatar

Dr Krugman, it did my heart good to read your post for today and better to read "Tens of thousands of paid subscribers" at the bottom of your virtual page. Thank you for your humanity, your equanimity, and for educating us day-by-day.

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theeleaticstranger's avatar

Such a good line:

“when it comes to Trump, every accusation is actually a confession”

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George Patterson's avatar

I think it's called "projection" in psychology.

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Edwin Callahan's avatar

More like a brag.

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GrrlScientist 8647 🌮 🇺🇦's avatar

Professor Krugman: you said: "Would Trump say “This won’t raise prices, because businesses will absorb the tax”? Of course not. So why imagine that foreign businesses will absorb the cost of tariffs, which are nothing but sales taxes on goods made abroad?"

this is the nut of the punishment being imposed upon americans today. how can any MAGA successfully argue against this?

and where is the media in all this? why are they STILL SILENT? why are americans supposed to rely upon foreign news sources to learn anything substantial or true about our own government leaders??

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WinstonSmithLondonOceania's avatar

Now you know MAGA isn't interested in arguing anything, although they do like to bicker. If in their minds they "own the libs", they consider it a success. They need no logic, no rhyme or reason.

As for the lamestream media, they're owned by millionaires and billionaires who will do whatever it takes to maximize profitability. That means not getting into any battles with King Klown. Government leaders? Sold to the highest bidders.

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Renato's avatar

Can you imagine what the media would have done if Biden or Obama called the Fed Chair "Too Late" or had interfered with the Fed to the extent Trump has interefered?...

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Marlo's avatar

Or ANYTHING he has done: blatant coercion, threatening, grifting, impeding justice, treason, usurping our democracy, lawlessness, the list is endless. Trump is a mobster.

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Todd Dunn's avatar

Don't sugar coat it.

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WinstonSmithLondonOceania's avatar

The coverage would have been nonstop until after the next election.

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Stacy1946's avatar

The only reason we are in this pig's mickey is that "tariff" and "tax" are different words. If tariffs had been denominated "import taxes" ab initio, El Caudillo del Mar-y-Lago would never have fallen in love with them. If they were called "import taxes", nobody in the GOP would support them. It is a measure of the bottomless stupidity of Trump and his junta that the entire world economy has been jeopardized by this purely semantic distinction.

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WinstonSmithLondonOceania's avatar

Oh I wouldn't be so sure of that. The GOP doesn't really have a problem with sales taxes - because they're regressive. They're okay with taxing the poor. They just don't want to tax their biggest donors.

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Stacy1946's avatar

Comrade O'Brien advises: The GOP maybe alright with "sales taxes" in principle, but none of them, especially not Trump, would make "sales taxes" the centerpiece of their economic program.

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WinstonSmithLondonOceania's avatar

That's true, they would try to hide it - albeit in plain sight. You know, it'll show up in the party paper in the morning, then disappear in the evening when we switch from being at war with Eurasia to being at war with Eastasia. All written in Newspeak.

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Stacy1946's avatar

Doubleplusungood verging crimethink.

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WinstonSmithLondonOceania's avatar

Ok , that's getting creepy now.

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Jenn Borgesen's avatar

Wonk away Prof Krugman. I've become more impressed with Jerome Powell as time passes, standing firm in this miasma of chaos.

One thing I'm worried might further shock the economy ... or maybe a slow bleed is the 3000 a day deportation goal. What happens when fresh food is no longer available? I doubt those college grads we talked about yesterday will be all in for picking fruit and veggies.

And the soft dollar ... and now three major armed conflict in the world and our despot playing out a two week bluff that he may throw our collective hat in the ring? That gives me chills for those jobless college graduates.

Would THAT be enough to stir Congress into action? Doubtful. And the TACO will taco and these rest of the world already knows his game. Imagine being predictable in unpredictability!

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Thomas Reiland's avatar

After all the illegal deportations I thought all these tough-talking MAGAs would be ready to jump right in and pick all the fruit and veggies that will otherwise rot in the fields and man all the home/apartment and infrastructure construction sites. Their daily Trump kool-aid consumption leads to their noticeable brain rot.

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rmreddicks's avatar

We've noticed that the Big Taco chickened out on that bit. Or so he says. yesterday. Today? Who knows. stephen miller still hates everyone, though and wants them to pay for it. trump's a non-entity except that he's got some powers everyday folks don't have.

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Richard Class's avatar

Cherries are going unpicked in central Washington state right now. One orchard has already lost over 100 thousand pounds of cherries.

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Jenn Borgesen's avatar

The same is likely true in Traverse City, peaches in Romeo .. potatoes, apples ...

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George Patterson's avatar

Much fresh food sold in the US is grown elsewhere. It will be available, but at much higher prices than today.

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WinstonSmithLondonOceania's avatar

That's true. A lot of our produce comes from Mexico.

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Miss Anne Thrope's avatar

Let's see -

1. Jerome Powell?

2. The 6X bankruptee who swallowed the silver spoon that was in his mouth at birth?

It's just so hard to choose?

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George Patterson's avatar

Come, come, now. It was a golden spoon.

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Andan Casamajor's avatar

Given his lifelong history of brain dysfunction, my guess would be a lead spoon...

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Sherry H's avatar

Every morning I look forward to your post on econ-related topics. You are the place I hang my sanity hat.

I guess a little bit of me forgot 4 yrs ago when we 1st had to cope with the trump circus, how difficult it was. And this time it is on steroids having zero "sane" people in the cabinet and othe position in govt. It's a free fall.

I haven't a clue how this all will"end" but I will do everything in my power on God's green earth to turn the ship around. It won't be much but when I think of all the people on No Kings day, the sum of effort will be great. Thank you again Paul, we all appreciate you more than u know.:-)

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Theodora30's avatar

Like you I read this column every morning and then Dean Baker’s. I highly recommend reading his columns, too. They are both great for substantive, fact-based and very relevant information. Lately he has been taking the media, especially the NYT — aka the “newspaper of record” — to the woodshed for lying about the size of the No Kings protests and for wildly exaggerating the decline of Iran’s economy. But the best one IMO was this:

“ Yes, the Media Lied About the Pre-Election Economy”

https://deanbaker22.substack.com/p/yes-the-media-lied-about-the-pre?utm_source=%2Finbox%2Fsaved&utm_medium=reader2

Honest and relevant information about our economy is necessary for our democracy to function but for years we haven’t gotten that which is why so many Americans still believe Republicans care about the debt and are better for our economy. I am convinced the reason Harris lost the election was the dishonestly negative portrayal of our economy under Biden by our mainstream “liberal” media. I’m not the only one:

https://criticalread.substack.com/p/i-blame-the-media

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Joseph David Marsden's avatar

The traditional core of the Republican Party is wealthy people who want to become more wealthy. The racists, evangelical Christians, gun nuts, and other MAGA-types are just constituencies that have been courted in order to win elections. I suspect that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent is solidly part of the traditional core rather than anything else, mostly based on his disingenuous testimonies before Congress on matters he surely understands far better than he pretends.

Which makes me wonder: to what extent is the real intent of the tariffs, if rates on them ever get settled, moving the source of tax revenues from a relatively progressive income tax to a regressive sales tax in the form of tariffs?

It is very typical of red states, for example, to get most of their tax revenue from sales taxes rather than anything else.

And part of the beauty of tariffs, at least from the perspective of the traditional core of the Republican Party, is that domestic producers get to raise their prices to meet those of competing imports, the latter of which are subject to tariffs from which the former are exempt.

Thus, at least until they have to raise wages in line with tariff-caused inflation, they should have more profits.

So, more profits and lower taxes. And the only setback is that everyone -- including those who don't get to enjoy the extra profits and the lower taxes -- will have to pay higher prices for everything.

So much winning!

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EIM's avatar

That’s the game in a nutshell—shift the tax burden to the people who spend most of their income on the basics & away from those who can use their $ to make $. To the extent the tariffs decrease the deficit, they will be portrayed to justify the tax cuts for the wealthy.

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Megan Rothery's avatar

Thank you for all your work.

And my normal -

Call. Write. Email. Protest. Unrelentingly.

Use/share this spreadsheet as a resource to call/email/write members of Congress, the Cabinet and news organizations. Reach out to those in your own state, as well as those in others. Use your voice and make some “good trouble” ❤️‍🩹🤍💙

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/13lYafj0P-6owAJcH-5_xcpcRvMUZI7rkBPW-Ma9e7hw/edit?usp=drivesdk

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chris lemon's avatar

Powell, and every other responsible and competent person left in the government, are simply in a holding pattern, waiting to step in after whatever catastrophe Trump causes, to try and reassemble the pieces. This is under the extremely optimistic assumption that the pieces can be reassembled. A more apt description may get that Powell, et al, will have to triage whatever parts of the government and economy are left after Trump's depredations, saving the ones that are not mortality wounded, or dead.

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Stephen Cochran's avatar

Trump calling anyone “stupid” is a great example of the pot calling the kettle black.

Remember: every accusation is a confession.

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John Cook's avatar

Classic narcissism: Projection, belittling, gaslighting.

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Robin Stafford's avatar

The question I keep asking: why are US business leaders silent? Apart from finance, tech and fossil who are cheering Trump on, much of US business is being badly hurt by his actions and yet they say nothing.

Guilty by association…

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Robin Stafford's avatar

Be good to hear from US readers. Im a Brit but well travelled in USA for work and holiday, and with family living/working there.

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Robin Stafford's avatar

Plenty of likes … but no explanations!

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nome sane?'s avatar

I was under the impression that possible changes to the Fed Funds Rate were analyzed on a quarterly basis, and that any decision to change it or hold it steady were made by consensus of the Chairs of all the regional Feds, not unilaterally by Chairman Powell himself. I understand that the regional Feds vote on this critical issue each time they meet.

Is the mobster under the mistaken impression that Powell runs the Fed like a fiefdom? Perhaps Burns could do so back in the day but is that still the case?

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George Patterson's avatar

DonnyJon has to pick out one individual and make him or her the targeted devil. Fauci was it for Covid.

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Edmund Clingan's avatar

You are correct. All Regional Fed Presidents attend the meeting. The FOMC makes the actual decision.

From Wiki:

Members of the FOMC as of January 18, 2025:

Members

Jerome Powell, Board of Governors, Chairman

John C. Williams, New York, Vice Chairman

Michael S. Barr, Board of Governors (NB: Mr. Barr is Vice Chair of the Federal Reserve for Supervision)

Michelle Bowman, Board of Governors (NB: Ms. Bowman occupies the Community Bank seat on the Board)

Lisa D. Cook, Board of Governors

Philip N. Jefferson, Board of Governors (NB: Mr. Jefferson is the Vice Chairman of the Federal Reserve System, though not of the FOMC)

Adriana D. Kugler, Board of Governors

Christopher Waller, Board of Governors

Susan M. Collins, Boston

Austan Goolsbee, Chicago

Alberto Musalem, St. Louis

Jeffrey Schmid, Kansas City

Alternate members

Beth M. Hammack, Cleveland

Patrick Harker, Philadelphia

Neel Kashkari, Minneapolis

Lorie K. Logan, Dallas

Sushmita Shukla, First Vice President, New York

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