Britain’s Success Story || Paul Krugman

Paul Krugman:

Simon Wren-Lewis asks how good British economic recovery — which is being touted as a wonderful success story — really has been. Not very, he says.

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But surely we’re also seeing the ideological bias of many in the news media. France is supposed to be a terrible failure, because it still believes in a strong welfare state — and so it is reported as a failure, never mind the numbers. Austerity in Britain is politically approved, so it is pronounced a success on the shakiest of grounds.


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The Austerian Mask Slips || Paul Krugman

Paul Krugman:

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But the larger point here, surely, is that Rehn has let the mask slip. It’s not about fiscal responsibility; it never was. It was always about using hyperbole about the dangers of debt to dismantle the welfare state. …

Simon Wren-Lewis’ France and the Commission