Economist Krugman Says World Avoided Second Great Depression

If they really wanted to do a stimulus package that helped both banks and the people they'd set up a system that would reward people for paying down credit card debt. Say for fiscal year XX we'll have a stimulas package worth X amount and you'll get a tax refund/credit for however much debt you pay off. The banks get some cash, people drop debt and then have more money in their pocket to spend on the economy. If you're going to spend/lose 24 trillion dollars then why not do something like that? Oh yeah, it'd help the people. Just an idea that's far from perfect.

Originally posted by Sestias


Well, here goes. Threads with economists in them tend to die very early here on ATS (they're just not sexy or exciting like talk show personalities) but I'm posting this article because I think the subject is worth attention.

Paul Krugman is a Nobel Prize-winning economist and on the faculty at Princeton University, so he really can't be dismissed all that easily.

Krugman, like many other economists, is once again reminding us that though a larger-scale catastrophe has been averted, it will take at least until 2010 before the whole economy rebounds.

Instead of griping that miracles haven't happened in 8 months (and therefore there has been no good at all from the stimulus packages) it is wise to look at the bigger, longer-term picture.

It seems counterintuitive to argue that more spending will get us out of a worldwide depression, but that's what many responsible economists have been saying and it appears they were right.

www.azcentral.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

Sestia, Thanks for this.


It's pretty amazing the horrors we have avoided. And although many will be clamoring for these horrors to still occur (buncha sado-masochists if you ask me), I've already seen signs of the recovery in my neck of the woods.

It really feels good to have the worst behind us even if it will take a couple of more years of the doom sayers before we are out totally.

In my business our worst month was May. But since then I'm going to have to start hiring in order to keep up with the demand.

GREAT ARTICLE

Didn't Krugman say Obama was wrong in his plan. Looks like it's working fine considering. I used to like this guy but lately he's turned into an attention seeking media whore.

Well, let us not forget too..WEBOT is prediciting august 15 to 22 something big is supopsed to happen..nto sure if its economy or anything.
People will go back to buying useless garbage they dont need, landfills will be back in overflow buisness full of plastics, microchips, ceramics,paper in all assortments, and in antjher 7 to 8 years we wil be back trying to avoid a 3rd depression.

Youde think people would have ogtten smart this time around..giving money or taking loans form a cut throat bankk or buisness, that couldnt even manage thier own money, and almost 1/3 fo them mind yuo, caught red handed speding bail out money on thier lavendish homes and cars!!
how quickly we all forget amd easily give in and back.

Originally posted by RolandBrichter
These parasites that are held up as trusted experts know very well how close they are to losing everything...

They will literally say anything to prolong Ponzinomics.

Very soon, smug asshats like this will be running for their very lives..

Oh so I assume that Celente is a Genius then because he supports the theory of complete meltdown eh?

Well guess what. It ain't gonna happen. No complete meltdown, no internal US revolution or civil war... no food riots.

How will so much of the doom sayers on ATS go on?

reply to post by HunkaHunka

How will so much of the doom sayers on ATS go on?

News Flash. ATS is a CONSPIRACY website.If all you want is happy news, with everything always going well under an Obama administration, just turn on MSNBC, and listen to Chris "Tingle going up his leg over Obama" Matthews, and Madman Keith Olbermann.

Making a statement that a 2nd Depression has been avoided is one of those things that CAN'T be proven or dis-proven. It's very similar to Obama's claims that he will SAVE millions of jobs. There is no way to prove or dis-prove that either.

Furthermore, the Nobel Prize Committees lost all credibility when they awarded Al Gore the Nobel Peace Prize.

[edit on 10-8-2009 by ProfEmeritus]

I absolutley think we are in a depression.

Forget recession, depression sounds more like it.

reply to post by ProfEmeritus


Really? What does Conspiracy have to do with doom and gloom?

I don't get the comparison.

reply to post by HunkaHunka

Haven't you checked the board lately for popular threads?
Here are the things you cite as gloom and doom:

No complete meltdown, no internal US revolution or civil war... no food riots.

There are dozens of threads on each of those topics. In addition, there are thousands of members that believe those things are/will happen.

Another gov't shill practicing management of perception economics, not even news worthy. Since ponzi schemes are based on confidence, why would it be surprising that they would use every possible gov't stooge to try and prop it one last time?

The debt limit needs to be jacked up again, that's like the third time in a year or two. Deficit grew by 181 Billion in JULY! Fed and Treasury issueing debt at unbelievable levels. People are losing their unemployment benefits. But yeah, everythings great, disaster averted.

avoided a depression? i don't recall our debt or deficit being reduced. i've never seen anyone spend themselves out of debt. can't say as i believe word one of this gentleman.

Originally posted by ProfEmeritus
reply to post by HunkaHunka

 

Haven't you checked the board lately for popular threads?
Here are the things you cite as gloom and doom:

No complete meltdown, no internal US revolution or civil war... no food riots.

There are dozens of threads on each of those topics. In addition, there are thousands of members that believe those things are/will happen.

Yep, and there are millions of Americans who believe in the rapture too..

Ain't gonna happen!



[edit on 10-8-2009 by HunkaHunka]

Originally posted by HunkaHunka
reply to post by ProfEmeritus

 

Really? What does Conspiracy have to do with doom and gloom?

I don't get the comparison.

But it's not necessarily doom and gloom.

To me, what would be doomy and gloomy is if everything went back to normal, because to me, the economy as it was was scary.

reply to post by Donnie Darko


Fair enough, one mans end of the world is another mans beginning.

Why was the previous one scary to you? Although I agree it was unsustainable as so many regulations were being pealed away from it.

Originally posted by HunkaHunka
reply to post by Donnie Darko

 

Fair enough, one mans end of the world is another mans beginning.

Why was the previous one scary to you? Although I agree it was unsustainable as so many regulations were being pealed away from it.

It's scary, yes, because of its un-sustainability. Also because I think it is part of why people are so depressed these days.

I will not miss it, and it would be scary to me if somehow they kept it going a couple more decades. The collapse that would inevitably follow along the road in 2025, 2030, etc. really could be the end of the world. We need a brand new system, a system that does not reward callousness, a system that does not make people spend recklessly, a system that does not enslave the masses, etc.

reply to post by yellowcard


Thanks for posting that, it pretty much sums him up. Well one word could as well: Tool.

It is also further evidence of corruption with Nobel Prize winners. Though, Gore winning was the final straw for that.

The economy avoided a total collapse. It is in a depression, and will remain so. Our depression will not be as bad as what could have happened....

In a few months the real state of the economy should be seen. (Ps any economist that encourages bubbles is a bufoon.)

Originally posted by contemplator
Didn't Krugman say Obama was wrong in his plan. Looks like it's working fine considering. I used to like this guy but lately he's turned into an attention seeking media whore.

Why would you EVER like Paul Krugman? This man deserves no respect at all, he wrote his book "The Return of Depression Economics" in the year 2000 during the .com bust. Then he re-released the book in 2008 with a new title "and the crash of 2007" to cover his tracks. He said we were in a liquidity trap in 2002...we weren't, he said we needed a housing bubble to restabalize the economy...we did that, it bust and now we are where we are now. If you read what he says about this he said: "Averting the Worst - So it seems that we aren't going to have a second Great Depression after all. What saved us? The answer, basically, is Big Government."

He is an intellectual fraud, and his getting a Nobel prize was no more prestigious than Al Gore or Yasser Arafat winning one...PURELY political. Why anyone would believe this man or take him seriously is beyond me.

Did anyone read my quotes from Paul Krugman's own mouth?

[edit on 10-8-2009 by yellowcard]

To the OP:

You cant do this man. You can only post threads with quotes by someone who is either bashing the gov, predicting doom and gloom, or has just witnessed a UFO. Nobody wants to hear anything positive on here LOL.

Nice try but im going back to my bunker to count my cans of tuna fish and bottles of water and im gonna wait for WW3, the EMP, or the Alien Invasion.

Thanks.

[edit on 10-8-2009 by princeofpeace]

reply to post by Rockpuck


Is not as bad because we are in a more complex economy, one that is very much Dependant on global output and input.

That is why numbers can be played with things changed a lot since the last great depression but the pattern is the same.

While our economy is more complex is also more predictable specially for people that keep and eye on what is going on and follow the numbers given and those hidden.

But Occurs my friend you know what we are talking about that is why when people comes around claiming exactly the same rhetoric and chanting that government is claiming all we can do is let it go, is hard to and to confusing to explain something that many do not understand by choice.

Even I that follow the numbers and statistics closely need help from people like you and others to be able to understand the deceptions.

Like I said a week ago, government is using contraction right now to bust confidence in the numbers been thrown out there.

We know better.

This Recession Isn't Over by a Long Shot

The “happy talk” campaign in the US media and coming from the White House is just that: Happy Talk.

To get a real picture of what is happening with this economy, here are a few things to keep in mind.

Yes, the huge layoffs that saw the number of new unemployed jumping by 6-700,000 per month in the early part of this year seem to be over, and now new unemployment is rising by “just” 500,000 a month or so, but that’s because all the major employers have already shut down or shut down entire shifts. There are not that many people who can be laid off any more, at least in large groups. This gets painted as “the pace of layoffs is slowing” as if that’s good news, but it is the opposite.


But there is more trickery and misinformation regarding unemployment statistics, too. One has to do with the oft-noted claim that the number of people collecting unemployment benefits is declining especially the long-term unemployed. But the reason for this is not that people are finally finding jobs. It’s that unemployment benefits are being exhausted. The upper limit for collecting unemployment benefits in the US is 79 weeks, and that’s only in some states where unemployment is particularly high. In other states it is 72 weeks or even as low as 59 weeks.

To add more injury to the wound only half of American workers are Receiving unemployment benefits, 1 half million is running of benefits, 9 million are still receiving benefits, and the numbers of those that never qualify to begin with is not even in the statistics, (how convenient) that will account with more of the numbers given.

It only takes simple math skills to figure the deception.

www.economyincrisis.org...

[edit on 11-8-2009 by marg6043]