October 16, 2012
Yes, that is absurd and even offensive, but since the NYT is going in for gross exaggeration to scare its readers about the budget, I thought I would play along. A NYT piece on the budget deficit told readers that:
“But even if Democrats and the financial markets go along with the delay [a decision to put off any longer term plans on taxes and spending if Romney wins the election], the months before Mr. Romney’s swearing-in could be as crucial to his presidency as the transition period was for Mr. Obama four years ago, when the economic crisis led him to draft a big stimulus package while President George W. Bush still occupied the White House.”
This is wrong. The economy was losing 700,000 jobs a month in the period between the election and when President Obama took office. His decision to push a stimulus, which in the context should not be called “big,” kept several million more people from losing their job. His decision shortly after the passage of the stimulus to “pivot to deficit reduction,” has likely ensured that millions of people will be needlessly unemployed for much of a decade.
It is difficult to imagine the set of events in a transition to a Romney administration that could have anywhere near the same consequence.
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