Not only is Krugman reliably wrong, now he’s perverting the very subject in which he is supposed to be an expert:
Economist and New York Times opinion writer Paul Krugman has been ruthlessly criticized after claiming the US was not in a recession and that the term ‘didn’t matter’ in a CNN interview Sunday. Krugman, 69, appeared on the network’s Reliable Sources talk show to discuss the state of the American economy, and was asked almost immediately by host Brian Stelter: ‘Are we in a recession and does the term matter?’
‘No we aren’t, and no it doesn’t,’ Krugman responded curtly. ‘None of the usual criteria that real experts use says we’re in a recession right now. And what does it matter? You know, the state of the economy is what it is.’
The response prompted a hail of criticism, particularly as it transpired late last week that US GDP shrank for the second quarter in a row – a popular marker of recession. A recession is defined as a ‘widespread and prolonged downturn in economic activity’, and was described in 2000 by former president Bill Clinton as ‘two quarters in a row of negative growth’.
At this point, I’m almost willing to believe that he’s just an actor, spouting off inane lines that have been written for him in support of the Narrative.
What criteria don’t indicate an economic contraction? The fact is that every economics metric has been so completely converged and redefined that they are no longer capable of providing any meaningful information whatsoever. For example, what use is an “employment rate” that eliminates people who aren’t working from the equation?