Thursday, January 31, 2013

Pat Garofalo — Austerity Is Dead: Can Someone Please Tell Paul Ryan and His Deluded GOP Cohorts?

Republicans cling to a policy that pretty much everyone agrees is a total disaster.
I think he is premature in saying that pretty much everyone agrees austerity is a total disaster.

AlterNet
Austerity Is Dead: Can Someone Please Tell Paul Ryan and His Deluded GOP Cohorts?
Pat Garofalo | economic policy editor for ThinkProgress.org


3 comments:

Matt Franko said...

right I would point out Mike and Dan K. as early observers of post election Democrat advocacy for austerity and now headed right into the sequester...

Dan asserts the current debate is not about "whether" but rather about "how much".... not good....

rsp,

Anonymous said...

Yes, the liberal side of the media is now trying to wiggle slightly out of the austerity agenda, but so far it's still full steam ahead in Washington.

Notice how deafening the silence is on the Qtr 4 negative growth news. Campaign of total denial that this has anything to do with USG sucking trillions out of the economy via the fiscal cliff deal and the sequestration.

circuit said...

Premature all right. Austerity and other zombie ideas (nod to Quiggin) never die. They keep coming back.

Canada's economy took a similar hit in 2012Q3. Shrinking government spending was also the culprit. I wrote about it here:

http://fictionalbarking.blogspot.ca/2012/12/austerity-in-canada-then-and-now.html

The austerity enthusiasts think they can re-enact the austerity success stories of the 80s and 90s...

It's mind-boggling that people interpret these 'success' stories as a result of govt spending cuts, not increased foreign demand or currency depreciation.

The Belgium example in the 90s was exactly the same as Canada's: currency depreciation combined with strong external demand.