Paul Krugman

In an October 12th Post entitled "Foreigners and the Burden of Debt," Paul Krugman made the following comment.

. . . we'd all agree that deficits make us poorer if they crowd out investment spending, which they would if the economy were near full employment, but won't if we're deeply depressed. All we have to do is realize that net foreign investment purchases minus sales of assets from and to foreigners is also a form of investment. Or to put it a bit more simply, sure, budget deficits can make us poorer as a nation if they lead to bigger trade deficits.

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Who else thinks the President's speech didn't include any plans to create more »

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Last week the Republicans gathered under the hurricane skies of approaching autumn, their convocation punctuated by thunder and underlined by rain. But there are storm clouds over Charlotte, too: clouds of cynicism and despair, clouds of joblessness and fear, clouds charged with the ionized smell of burning hope and dying dreams. more »

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A well funded network of right-wing extremists wants to make it socially and politically impossible to express the ideals that made this country great. One of those extremists appeared on their billionaire-funded network this week to attack Elizabeth Warren, and anyone else who isn't on the far right, as a Communist. more »

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Ray Bradbury, whose death at the age of 91 was announced today, played an important role for an entire generation of kids like me. Important? You might even call it "lifesaving." When things around us seemed unbearable, or incomprehensible, or soul-killing, his books opened a doorway - an escape hatch - through which we could leave "real life" and enter other worlds. more »

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Everybody knows that Paul Krugman is a Nobel Prize-winning economist, a sometimes combative columnist and a liberal lion. But in a conversation which aired this weekend we learned more about his personal response to an ongoing crisis he describes as "really nasty," "very, very severe," and "gratuitious," and which he says "will not go away quickly or necessary at all" unless we do something. more »

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Although it's a bit early to know for sure, let's hope that 2012 is the year that the economic policies known as "austerity" finally crashed and burned. more »

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The other day I was asked what one single thing could do the most to save our economy. What one idea or tool might help us create a more just society? My answer was "shame." more »

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"If I had a world of my own," said Alice, "everything would be nonsense. Nothing would be what it is because everything would be what it isn't."

I can't take it anymore. I just can't. In fact I'm falling down the rabbit hole even as we speak. more »

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Conservatives say they want to "bring back" the old USA, the one that existed during those decades of the twentieth century they only seem to see through a gauzy golden haze. Whatever its problems, that country was a place where Republicans and Democrats agreed on two simple principles: That the most fortunate among us should pay their fair share, and that our government must invest in the nation and its future.

When Rick Perry says he wants to bring back "the America I where I grew up," he's talking about the era when Dwight D. Eisenhower, a Republican President, built the Federal highway system. One of the reasons Eisenhower was able to do that is that the top tax rate was much higher than it is today. While today's highest marginal today is 35% and capital gains are taxed at only 15%, the highest tax bracket was 91% the year Rick Perry was born.

Whenever I talk about tax brackets I'm attacked by right-wingers who say I don't understand, that high taxes discourage job creators. They'll say things like "You hippies just don't get it! If taxes are too high rich people will stop working and investing. The Job Creators will go away!"

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