It took more than “markets” to wreck Detroit:
Krugman is right that Detroit is essentially Ground Zero of the disruptive changes wrought by an economy in transition. But as this story and others like it show, it’s difficult not to conclude that the city is also the victim of rampant fraud and stupidity on the part of an all-Democratic political machine. Officials decided time and again not to fund the promises they made to city pensioners, and feds and regulators just as often declined to do anything about it. If something this egregious and destructive were happening in the private sector, Mr. Krugman would (rightly, in our view) be all over it, demanding that people go to jail and regulations be tightened. He would want to investigate the ties of influence that allowed serious financial wrongdoing to go on for years without serious oversight. He’d name names and pin shame on the wrongdoers and their political allies.
But Krugman is a hack who hates markets, so everything looks like a nail to his socialist hammer.
I don’t think he’s a hack, he’s smart and he knows exactly what he’s doing. The man is a liar.
I heard some female info twit on the CBS radio news Monday afternoon say the financial problems in Detroit go “all the way back, to the beginning of the business downturn that started under George Bush’s Presidency…”
I damned near drove off the freeway!
I later heard the SAME line, word for word on a local news program. I am continually amazed that these kinds of statements exist as they do. I am dumbfounded that anyone would believe them. So I guess I’ll continue to be dumbfounded, given how often this kind of re-writing, and muddying, of history happens.
What do you want to bet Krugman doesn’t even drive an American car?
Seek and you will find:
“…an old Jeep Cherokee, and a very old Volvo…”
Don’t know how dated this is, but at any rate, does not appear he has been an active supporter of Detroit. But, then, he makes no connection between economic well-being and providing value to society anyway.
Volvo Cars was owned by the Ford Motor Company between 1999 and 2010. It is a Chinese owned company now.
1999 would not qualify as “very old” in my book even today. And, either way, buying old cars or failing to buy a new one doesn’t help Detroit.
Come on. We all know what killed Detroit: crappy cars nobody wanted to buy and ingrained corruption in city government. Nothing Krugman has ever advocated could help with either of those.
If you really read it you would have seen it was posted in 2003, so his old Volvo would be even older 🙂
Oh it is fairly well known that crappy cars were the main issue. I mean one of the business studies we had to do when I was still an undergraduate was about General Motors and the missed opportunity with their Saturn division.
When the businesses go the people go. Corruption in the city government IMO only had a minor part to play here. If that was the only problem the company could have moved business elsewhere.
“I don’t think he’s a hack, he’s smart and he knows exactly what he’s doing. The man is a liar.”
Socialism exists because it provides quick and easy and desirable answers to people who are uneducated.
Socialism is based on appealing to emotion. Having emotions doesn’t require an education; whereas critical thought and reasoning requires some effort.
Socialism is all about blaming others for whatever difficulties one experiences, and for such mindlessness, believers require “experts” or people who in authority to constantly confirm their prejudices.
Krugman is smart because requires little effort to write about socialist ideas and he gets paid to be a socialist, and readers of Times want to read his endless dribble.
It is smart to get paid for doing little work.
And one say it would dumb for him to express ideas which may conflict
with view of the paper and it’s public.
Krugman is NYTimes and NYTimes is Detroit.
And to get a Detroit, you need abundant and constant stupid.
Though there are lot’s people in Detriot [thousands] are doing quite well financially and is Krugman doing quite well financially and these people have had a major role in causing Detroit’s ruin.
But the people of Detroit did vote for the stupid. They voted
for a fantasy. They got everything, they paid for: Forward! Hope and Change.
Detroit was changed and went forward, and now all they have left is hope. Everything else is completed.
And perhaps someday, Detroit may be wildness area, it’s already a zoo.
That’s is the progress hoped for. Think of the reduction of CO2 emission which has already been achieved.
Liberals don’t want development. They would like any city to get a smaller population- it’s dream come true.