Independent Sources’ Insider got a little crazy last week and mounted a debunking campaign against the New York Times‘ Paul Krugman. First, Insider beat down Krugman’s claim that the French really aren’t don’t have an unemployment problem; they just have a lot of working-age people spending happy quality time with their families. Then, he piggybacked on scrivener.net’s dissection of Krugman’s claim that today’s U.S. job market is in awful shape.

This leaves us wondering: does Krugman really believe the claptrap he writes? We think we’ve found an answer.

Krugman also appears to be writing for the site The People’s Cube in a column titled “The People’s Economist.” This work is even more brilliant than his NYT column. Tell us this doesn’t sound like a venue for the former Princeton prof:

Most people know that Americans benefit from high taxes, powerful unions, limited consumer choice, and strong government control. But most people lack the training to fully understand why we derive benefits from these policies, and why government control over public anything results in unsurpassable quality. … Professor Krugman will use his agile mind to clarify the otherwise intimidating field of economics.

For instance, one reader asks:

I am slow, but I am starting to see the outlines of a pattern of thought as though “seen through a glass, darkly.” I don’t want to feign your degree of prescience, but see if you agree with my vision. I will use the Sophistocratic method that you have made famous:

#1 Taxation is vital

#2. Things are too complicated nowadays for people to know what to do.

#3. Therefore people need economists to tell them what to do with money.

and the good Professor replies:

Ha ha, Sir, if I may be so glib! You are a very earnest pupil, and I would easily curve your grade to at least 100% were it not for a few errors in thought:
…

B) Of course this is hard for you to understand. My prose, though exquisite, does not even begin to reveal the complex ideas, abstractions, and most of all, formulas, that can intimidate any challenger. My mastery of jargon, my accumulation of degrees and awards, my implicit endorsement by The Economist (”By Invitation”…they invited me to speak!) gives even my slightest utterances a degree of credibility that almost defies comprehension.

C) You are very perceptive; things are far too difficult for anyone to understand. For example, did you know that the cyclical aggregate substitution of surplus floating cost can be approximated by a non-stationary hyperbolic gamma-curve? This is why people outside the field should only be concerned with simpler things, such as selecting the correct brand of detergent, choosing a color for their next car (although efficiencies dictate that only one optimal color be available to all), paying their taxes, voting for Democratic candidates, and reading my columns.

There are many more examples of Krugman’s intellectual fireworks at the site. We’re going to start reading him in The People’s Cube; it allows his unshielded brilliance to really come through.

Technorati Tags: New York Times, Paul Krugman

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 2nd, 2005 at 9:31 pm by A Senior Administration Official and is filed under I knew I'd use my Econ major, Funny ... to us, Media. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.