Bashing Paul Krugmann

Economist Paul Krugmann is generally labeled  a leftist liberal over here in the K-land because he writes a lot in the New York Times.

Poor guy.

In his blog of 28 May 2013, he writes "We have a competitiveness gap between the periphery and the core that must be closed through some combination of falling wages in Portugal, Spain, etc. and rising wages in Germany. The idea is to shift the balance of that adjustment somewhat away from the deflationary countries — overheating in Germany isn’t a bug, it’s a feature, and indeed the crucial feature."

Falling wages don't make him seem very liberal, maybe rising wages in Germany do. Or maybe his own use of "liberal" does it.

We don't know, but we have to extend some protection to the man.

After all, he did provide a counterpoint to the austerity freaks and the famous Rogoff study much of it was based on.

TheEditor at this here newsy blog hates debt and has gone through an admittedly short life without debts. Except for a small student loan, paid back in full before the first interest payment was due.

The German media, with their constant eye on all things American -- the good, the bad, as well as the ugly -- seem to fall into the trap of using "leftist liberal" in its European sense, which is some way off to the left compared to America.

Any economist of Paul Krugmann's caliber knows how to work with numbers and concepts and more numbers.

Instead of using the label liberal, we at the news decided to call him "a nice economist" because, despite being a nobel prize winner, he had not written off the fate of the 99 or so percent.

Unlike some German economists, who claim that basic welfare recipients here are not that poor because welfare payment to a family over 20 years adds up to around 134 000 euros, or who ignore that even welfare recipients here pay VAT tax (a sales tax on 'roids).