Dean Baker's Blog, page 246

The Federal Reserve Board Is Much More Likely to Take Your Job Than a Robot, so Naturally the Media Are Talking About Robots

Today's culprit is National Public Radio. The point here is extremely simple. We know how fast robots and other technologies are replacing workers. In fact the Bureau of Labor Statistics measures it quarterly, it's called "productivity growth."

Productivity growth has actually been very slow in the last decade, as in the opposite of robots stealing out jobs. But hey, why should news outlets be limited by data?

By contrast, if the Fed starts raising interest rates, it can prevent millions of p...

Deficit Falls by $20 Trillion and NPR Doesn't Even Notice

Given the obsession with the government budget deficit that NPR shares with most major news outlets, you would think they would find some room to mention a drop in the defcit of $20 trillion (yes, that's "trillion" with a "t"), but no, apparently they didn't think it was important.

If this sounds very strange to you, it's because the decline is in a bizarre measure of the deficit known as the "infinite horizon" budget deficit. It's originator was Boston University professor Lawrence Kotlikoff...

National Public Radio Tries to Scare People About the Deficit

Billionaire Peter Peterson is spending lots of money to get people to worry about the debt and deficits rather than focus on the issues that will affect their lives. National Public Radio is doing its part to try to promote Peterson's cause with a Morning Edition piece that began by telling people that the next president "will have to wrestle with the federal debt." This is not true, but it is the hope of Peter Peterson that he can distract the public from the factors that will affect their l...

All For Free Trade, Except When it Comes to Subsidizing TBTF Banks

Last week I noted the gift from the gods that the re-authorization of the Export-Import Bank is coming up at the same time as the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). The great fun here is that the TPP proponents are running around being sanctimonious supporters of free trade. However the main purpose of the Export-Import Bank is to subsidize U.S. exports (mostly those of large corporations). Subsidizing exports is 180 degrees at odds with free trade, it's sort of like having sex to promote virgi...

Paul Krugman Argues for a Vacant Property Tax

Well, he implicitly made the argument. I'm not sure why there is little interest in this idea, except the traditional resistance of intellectuals to new ideas.

Addendum

There are two additional reasons that a vacant property tax is a neat idea. First, we already have a tax assessment on file for properties, so it doesn't require additional work. Second, even if people try to game the system by claiming a vacant property is actually occupied, we still have succeeded in imposing higher costs on...

Bernie Sanders, Income Distribution, and Deodorant

Washington Post economics writer Jim Tankersley took it upon himself to explain to Bernie Sanders, the senator from Vermont and candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination that "deodorant is not starving America's children." My guess is that Senator Sanders is aware of this fact.

The context for Sanders' deodorant comment was a statement about the irrelevance of GDP growth as a measure of well-being when the bulk of the gains go to the wealthy. Tankersley was good enough to include t...

WaPo Takes Another Shot at Senator Warren on Behalf of the TPP

The fast-track authority needed to get the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) through Congress must be in real trouble. Why else would the Washington Post devote so much space to pushing the deal and attacking its critics?

The latest was a diatribe by editorial board member Jonathan Capehart which is directed largely at Senator Elizabeth Warren. The piece starts by basically calling Senator Warren a liar for describing the TPP as "secret." As Capehart tells us:

"Yes, it is secret from you and me...

Max Fisher Applies the "It's Hard to Get Good Help" Story for China

It is remarkable how many people seem unfamiliar with the idea of productivity growth. It's a fairly simple concept. It means that workers can produce more output in each hour of work. The world economy has been seeing consistent productivity growth for more than two hundred years. That is why we have seen rising living standards. We live longer and better than our ancestors.

When we hear people running around saying that the robots will take all the jobs, that is a story of productivity grow...

Free Trade and the Export-Import Bank

The gods must have a great a sense of humor. Why else would they arrange to have the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and the reauthorization of the Export-Import Bank both come up as great national issues at the same time?

If anyone is missing the irony, the TPP is being sold as "free trade." This is a great holy principle enshrined in intro econ textbooks everywhere. Since the TPP is called a "free-trade" agreement, those who opposed to it are ignorant Neanderthals who should not be taken se...

Thomas Friedman Warns of Dire Disruptions to the Economy, Again

Thomas Friedman, the man who told us the world is flat and told us about "hyperconnectivity," is again raising the alarm about economic disruptions ahead. He tells readers about a new study which finds that 47 percent of the jobs in the United States are at risk of being taken over by smart machines and software in the next two decades. Wow!

Economists have a technical term for smart machines and software displacing workers. It's called "productivity growth." Back in the old days, when people...