Neil Irwin generally has insightful economic analysis in his NYT Upshot pieces, however he strikes out in his turn to power politics today. He tells readers:
“German leaders genuinely believe that a new deal along those lines would be bad economic policy for Greece. Many economists at the International Monetary Fund and American officials would argue it is entirely sensible. The fact is that the time for those debates is over for now; we’re in a realm of power politics, not substantive economic policy debates.
“The choice for leaders of Germany, France and the rest of Europe will look something like this:
“If they tolerate the Greek government’s demands, they will be setting a bad example for every other country that might wish to challenge the strictures of the European Union, telling voters in Portugal and Spain and Italy that if they make enough fuss, and elect extremist parties, they too will get a much sweeter deal. It would send the signal that a country can borrow all it likes, walk away from those debts and make the rest of Europe pay the bill, as long as it is intransigent enough.”
Actually, the choice for leaders of France and the rest of Europe does not look like this.
It may be true that, “German leaders genuinely believe that a new deal along those lines would be bad economic policy for Greece.” German leaders do show considerable evidence of having no understanding of economics. This is why they are taking positions that put them at odds with economists at the I.M.F. and just about everywhere else. The evidence of the last five years contradicts their claims about the economy as completely as possible, but it appears that many people in top positions in Germany are genuinely flat-earthers who simply can’t accept that the world is round and that the euro zone economy is suffering from a shortfall of demand and need not worry about debt.
However, there is no reason to believe that leaders in France and the rest of Europe suffer from the same learning disability. Therefore, they may recognize that the main reason Greece has been forced to borrow large amounts of money over the last five years and run up its debt has not been its profligate spending, but rather the strangling of its economy.
Sharp cutbacks in government spending led to a huge reduction in demand. Since Greece is in the euro, there was little possibility for much increase net exports through a reduction in the value of its currency. Also, since the other euro zone countries were also pursuing austerity, they would not provide growing markets for Greek exports. In this context, it was virtually inevitable that Greece’s economy would contract sharply. This means bringing in less tax revenue. It also leads to more spending for things like pensions, as workers who are unable to find jobs opt to retire earlier than they would have otherwise and start collecting their pension.
The leaders of France and the rest of Europe may understand the basic economics here. This means that rather than blessing profligate spending, a turn to favor Greece means rejecting failed economic theories that have devastated the euro zone’s economy. This would mean pushing for higher spending in the core countries, especially Germany, and pursuing other mechanisms for increasing demand.
Neil Irwin generally has insightful economic analysis in his NYT Upshot pieces, however he strikes out in his turn to power politics today. He tells readers:
“German leaders genuinely believe that a new deal along those lines would be bad economic policy for Greece. Many economists at the International Monetary Fund and American officials would argue it is entirely sensible. The fact is that the time for those debates is over for now; we’re in a realm of power politics, not substantive economic policy debates.
“The choice for leaders of Germany, France and the rest of Europe will look something like this:
“If they tolerate the Greek government’s demands, they will be setting a bad example for every other country that might wish to challenge the strictures of the European Union, telling voters in Portugal and Spain and Italy that if they make enough fuss, and elect extremist parties, they too will get a much sweeter deal. It would send the signal that a country can borrow all it likes, walk away from those debts and make the rest of Europe pay the bill, as long as it is intransigent enough.”
Actually, the choice for leaders of France and the rest of Europe does not look like this.
It may be true that, “German leaders genuinely believe that a new deal along those lines would be bad economic policy for Greece.” German leaders do show considerable evidence of having no understanding of economics. This is why they are taking positions that put them at odds with economists at the I.M.F. and just about everywhere else. The evidence of the last five years contradicts their claims about the economy as completely as possible, but it appears that many people in top positions in Germany are genuinely flat-earthers who simply can’t accept that the world is round and that the euro zone economy is suffering from a shortfall of demand and need not worry about debt.
However, there is no reason to believe that leaders in France and the rest of Europe suffer from the same learning disability. Therefore, they may recognize that the main reason Greece has been forced to borrow large amounts of money over the last five years and run up its debt has not been its profligate spending, but rather the strangling of its economy.
Sharp cutbacks in government spending led to a huge reduction in demand. Since Greece is in the euro, there was little possibility for much increase net exports through a reduction in the value of its currency. Also, since the other euro zone countries were also pursuing austerity, they would not provide growing markets for Greek exports. In this context, it was virtually inevitable that Greece’s economy would contract sharply. This means bringing in less tax revenue. It also leads to more spending for things like pensions, as workers who are unable to find jobs opt to retire earlier than they would have otherwise and start collecting their pension.
The leaders of France and the rest of Europe may understand the basic economics here. This means that rather than blessing profligate spending, a turn to favor Greece means rejecting failed economic theories that have devastated the euro zone’s economy. This would mean pushing for higher spending in the core countries, especially Germany, and pursuing other mechanisms for increasing demand.
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Philosophers have debated the nature of knowledge for millenniums, but it turns out that the Washington Post has the secret. In a mostly useful article on the high and rising prices of prescription drugs it told readers:
“Patents are necessary to encourage companies to innovate, but they also slow the progress of cheaper generic versions of drugs to market, and allow drug companies to charge much more in the interim than they could if they had more competition.”
Hmm, patents are necessary to encourage companies to innovate? There is no other mechanism? Do U.S. defense contractors innovate? They may get patents, but they are mostly paid on contract. If there is a reason that people will refuse to innovate for money, but will only innovate with the incentive of a patent monopoly, it would be interesting to know what it is.
As a practical matter, patents are an incredibly inefficient mechanism for financing drug research for reasons mentioned in this article and others. If the research costs were paid upfront all of these amazing new drugs would be cheap to patients and we would not have to waste time fighting over who would pay the tab. (At the point the drug has been developed, the costs have already been paid. Why not make the drug available at the marginal cost? That is the economist’s approach.)
Paying for research upfront would also have the advantage that all the findings would be in the public domain. This means that doctors would be better informed about which drug might be best for their patients. It would also mean that money would not be wasted pursuing paths that had already been shown to be dead ends. In addition, since no one is getting huge patent rents from having people use their drugs, upfront funding would take away the incentive to deceive the public about the safety and effectiveness of drugs, which has led to so much needless suffering.
Rather than trying to tell people that we need patents to finance research, a lengthy piece like this could at least have noted that many economists, such as Nobel laureate Joe Stiglitz, have argued for more efficient alternatives to the patent system. This is exactly the sort of article where this issue should be raised.
Philosophers have debated the nature of knowledge for millenniums, but it turns out that the Washington Post has the secret. In a mostly useful article on the high and rising prices of prescription drugs it told readers:
“Patents are necessary to encourage companies to innovate, but they also slow the progress of cheaper generic versions of drugs to market, and allow drug companies to charge much more in the interim than they could if they had more competition.”
Hmm, patents are necessary to encourage companies to innovate? There is no other mechanism? Do U.S. defense contractors innovate? They may get patents, but they are mostly paid on contract. If there is a reason that people will refuse to innovate for money, but will only innovate with the incentive of a patent monopoly, it would be interesting to know what it is.
As a practical matter, patents are an incredibly inefficient mechanism for financing drug research for reasons mentioned in this article and others. If the research costs were paid upfront all of these amazing new drugs would be cheap to patients and we would not have to waste time fighting over who would pay the tab. (At the point the drug has been developed, the costs have already been paid. Why not make the drug available at the marginal cost? That is the economist’s approach.)
Paying for research upfront would also have the advantage that all the findings would be in the public domain. This means that doctors would be better informed about which drug might be best for their patients. It would also mean that money would not be wasted pursuing paths that had already been shown to be dead ends. In addition, since no one is getting huge patent rents from having people use their drugs, upfront funding would take away the incentive to deceive the public about the safety and effectiveness of drugs, which has led to so much needless suffering.
Rather than trying to tell people that we need patents to finance research, a lengthy piece like this could at least have noted that many economists, such as Nobel laureate Joe Stiglitz, have argued for more efficient alternatives to the patent system. This is exactly the sort of article where this issue should be raised.
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The NYT headlined a front page piece, “health insurance companies seek big rate increases for 2016.” The piece told readers insurance companies “are seeking rate increases of 20 percent to 40 percent or more, saying their new customers under the Affordable Care Act turned out to be sicker than expected.” It then goes on to list specific instances where insurers are seeking large rate increases.
There are several problems with this story. First, it does not try to give any sort of weighting which would give a basis for the assessing the typical increase seen by people getting insurance through the exchanges. This matters both because some plans have more people enrolled than others and also because the percentage increase makes a much bigger difference for older people with high average premiums than for younger people. The average cost for a plan for people in the oldest age group (55–64) is three times as much as the average for people in the under 35 age group. If people in the latter age group see a 20 percent rise in their premiums it will imply a much smaller dollar increase than for the former group.
Since the article made no effort to assess the number of people in plans requesting large premium increases nor the amount of the premiums, there is no way to assess the increase in the premium for the typical person. The article does refer to a study by the Kaiser Family Foundation, and notes that it finds relatively small increases for the second lowest cost plan. However, it does not give readers the amount of increase found in this study and points out that to avoid a large increase it may be necessary to change plans, which could also mean changing doctors.
The Kaiser study found that the premium for the second lowest cost silver plan (the benchmark for subsidies in the exchanges) is projected to rise by 4.4 percent between 2015 and 2016 in the eleven cities it examined. It also is important to note that even staying in the same plan does not guarantee that a patient can continue to see their doctor, since doctors often leave plans.
The article also misrepresents the issue of the health of beneficiaries telling readers:
“Some say the marketplaces have not attracted enough healthy young people.”
Actually, it doesn’t matter whether people are young, it matters whether they are healthy. A healthy older person pays on average three times as much to insurers as a healthy young person and gets the same amount back in payments. Also, the losses described in this article would be largely offset by the backstops put in place in the ACA for insurers that enroll less healthy patients.
As the Kaiser report points out:
“Some of this remaining uncertainty is mitigated by the ACA’s “3 R’s” programs. These programs – risk adjustment, reinsurance, and risk corridors – redistribute risk among insurance carriers so that plans that enroll disproportionately sicker or higher-cost enrollees can be prevented from having to significantly raise premiums.”
There is a real issue here, since people should not have to be constantly changing plans to ensure that they have affordable insurance, however this article does little to indicate the extent to which this is actually a problem, although it is likely to scare many readers.
Thanks to Robert Salzberg for calling this article to my attention.
The NYT headlined a front page piece, “health insurance companies seek big rate increases for 2016.” The piece told readers insurance companies “are seeking rate increases of 20 percent to 40 percent or more, saying their new customers under the Affordable Care Act turned out to be sicker than expected.” It then goes on to list specific instances where insurers are seeking large rate increases.
There are several problems with this story. First, it does not try to give any sort of weighting which would give a basis for the assessing the typical increase seen by people getting insurance through the exchanges. This matters both because some plans have more people enrolled than others and also because the percentage increase makes a much bigger difference for older people with high average premiums than for younger people. The average cost for a plan for people in the oldest age group (55–64) is three times as much as the average for people in the under 35 age group. If people in the latter age group see a 20 percent rise in their premiums it will imply a much smaller dollar increase than for the former group.
Since the article made no effort to assess the number of people in plans requesting large premium increases nor the amount of the premiums, there is no way to assess the increase in the premium for the typical person. The article does refer to a study by the Kaiser Family Foundation, and notes that it finds relatively small increases for the second lowest cost plan. However, it does not give readers the amount of increase found in this study and points out that to avoid a large increase it may be necessary to change plans, which could also mean changing doctors.
The Kaiser study found that the premium for the second lowest cost silver plan (the benchmark for subsidies in the exchanges) is projected to rise by 4.4 percent between 2015 and 2016 in the eleven cities it examined. It also is important to note that even staying in the same plan does not guarantee that a patient can continue to see their doctor, since doctors often leave plans.
The article also misrepresents the issue of the health of beneficiaries telling readers:
“Some say the marketplaces have not attracted enough healthy young people.”
Actually, it doesn’t matter whether people are young, it matters whether they are healthy. A healthy older person pays on average three times as much to insurers as a healthy young person and gets the same amount back in payments. Also, the losses described in this article would be largely offset by the backstops put in place in the ACA for insurers that enroll less healthy patients.
As the Kaiser report points out:
“Some of this remaining uncertainty is mitigated by the ACA’s “3 R’s” programs. These programs – risk adjustment, reinsurance, and risk corridors – redistribute risk among insurance carriers so that plans that enroll disproportionately sicker or higher-cost enrollees can be prevented from having to significantly raise premiums.”
There is a real issue here, since people should not have to be constantly changing plans to ensure that they have affordable insurance, however this article does little to indicate the extent to which this is actually a problem, although it is likely to scare many readers.
Thanks to Robert Salzberg for calling this article to my attention.
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Since several commentators have raised questions about the similarities between the debt situations of Greece and Puerto Rico, it is worth pointing out some important ways in which they differ. Puerto Rico gets the benefit of several important federal government programs which will continue regardless of the finances of its own government. This means that if its own government ceases to exist due to financial paralysis, the people of Puerto Rico can still count on their monthly Social Security checks, their Medicare payments for their health care, and food stamps for low-income families. The people of Greece do not receive any comparable benefit from the European Union.
The banks and financial system in Puerto Rico is also supported by the FDIC, the Fed, and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. This means that if every bank in Puerto Rico goes belly up because its economy is a wreck, all the depositors can still count on getting their money back up to the FDIC limit. If the housing market collapses, people will still be able to buy homes because Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are prepared to buy up the mortgages.
The bulk of aid to Greece has taken the form of the I.M.F., the E.U., and the E.C.B. making payments to Greece’s creditors. This was initially the banks who were bailed out of their bad loans and more recently to themselves. It has not gone to help the Greek people. If the Syriza government were offered terms comparable to those Puerto Rico now has, the only fight would be over how quickly they could get a pen to sign the deal.
This doesn’t mean Puerto Rico doesn’t have very serious economic problems as a result of being tied to the U.S. dollar, but it has a range of supports that are beyond the dreams of the people of Greece.
Since several commentators have raised questions about the similarities between the debt situations of Greece and Puerto Rico, it is worth pointing out some important ways in which they differ. Puerto Rico gets the benefit of several important federal government programs which will continue regardless of the finances of its own government. This means that if its own government ceases to exist due to financial paralysis, the people of Puerto Rico can still count on their monthly Social Security checks, their Medicare payments for their health care, and food stamps for low-income families. The people of Greece do not receive any comparable benefit from the European Union.
The banks and financial system in Puerto Rico is also supported by the FDIC, the Fed, and Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. This means that if every bank in Puerto Rico goes belly up because its economy is a wreck, all the depositors can still count on getting their money back up to the FDIC limit. If the housing market collapses, people will still be able to buy homes because Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are prepared to buy up the mortgages.
The bulk of aid to Greece has taken the form of the I.M.F., the E.U., and the E.C.B. making payments to Greece’s creditors. This was initially the banks who were bailed out of their bad loans and more recently to themselves. It has not gone to help the Greek people. If the Syriza government were offered terms comparable to those Puerto Rico now has, the only fight would be over how quickly they could get a pen to sign the deal.
This doesn’t mean Puerto Rico doesn’t have very serious economic problems as a result of being tied to the U.S. dollar, but it has a range of supports that are beyond the dreams of the people of Greece.
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Remember the robots that are going to take all our jobs leaving us unemployed? Apparently they don’t have robots in Europe. That’s the story readers would get from a mostly useful set of charts in the Washington Post comparing Greece and Germany.
Underneath the chart comparing the populations of the two countries the article tells readers:
“Despite the difference, both countries share a troubling trend: a shrinking population. Europe is experiencing a demographic time bomb as the continent ages and birth rates fall, leading to questions about whether there will be enough workers to power a dynamic economy in the decades to come.”
This is of course 180 degrees at odds with the robots making us all unemployed story. That is a story of too many workers. The Post is telling us here a story of too few workers. It is possible for one or the other to be true, but not both. Only a D.C. policy wonk could possibly take both problems seriously.
As a practical matter, we are likely to see productivity growth in the future comparable to what we have seen in the past. At the low end, it would be around 1.5 percent a year. At the high end we could envision getting back to the Golden Age (1947–73) rates of growth of 3.0 percent. The low end would still leave us easily able to care for our aging population and enjoy rising standard of livings. (Guess what, we have always had an aging population.) The high end should allow for more rapid improvements in living standards but there is no more reason to think that it would lead to mass unemployment than did the Golden Age productivity growth.
Remember the robots that are going to take all our jobs leaving us unemployed? Apparently they don’t have robots in Europe. That’s the story readers would get from a mostly useful set of charts in the Washington Post comparing Greece and Germany.
Underneath the chart comparing the populations of the two countries the article tells readers:
“Despite the difference, both countries share a troubling trend: a shrinking population. Europe is experiencing a demographic time bomb as the continent ages and birth rates fall, leading to questions about whether there will be enough workers to power a dynamic economy in the decades to come.”
This is of course 180 degrees at odds with the robots making us all unemployed story. That is a story of too many workers. The Post is telling us here a story of too few workers. It is possible for one or the other to be true, but not both. Only a D.C. policy wonk could possibly take both problems seriously.
As a practical matter, we are likely to see productivity growth in the future comparable to what we have seen in the past. At the low end, it would be around 1.5 percent a year. At the high end we could envision getting back to the Golden Age (1947–73) rates of growth of 3.0 percent. The low end would still leave us easily able to care for our aging population and enjoy rising standard of livings. (Guess what, we have always had an aging population.) The high end should allow for more rapid improvements in living standards but there is no more reason to think that it would lead to mass unemployment than did the Golden Age productivity growth.
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The introduction to a Morning Edition segment on the response in Spain (sorry, no link) told listeners that Spain was undergoing austerity to pay down its “massive debt.” This is inaccurate. Spain did not have anything that can be remotely described as massive debt before the austerity policies imposed on the country by its creditors.
Prior to the collapse of the country’s housing bubble, Spain’s debt to GDP ratio was 26 percent, just over one-third of the U.S. level. It was running surpluses of more than 2.0 percent of GDP, the equivalent of a budget surplus of roughly $350 billion a year in the United States. (Its worth noting that Greece’s debt to GDP ratio was a much more manageable 107 percent of GDP before the crisis and austerity pushed it to 170 percent of GDP.)
The segment also is a bit out of line with reality in touting Spain’s economic success under austerity. It boasted that Spain had the strongest growth in the euro zone. This is an extremely low bar. Spain’s growth rate did not cross 3.0 percent last year and is not projected to do so this year. By contrast, it averaged almost 4.0 percent in the last two years before the crash. Countries recovering from steep downturns are expected to have faster than normal growth.
According to the I.M.F.’s growth projections (which have consistently proven to be overly optimistic) Spain’s per capita income will not surpass its 2007 level until 2018. This is a considerably worse than the situation faced by the United States in the Great Depression. The OECD puts Spain’s unemployment rate at 22.7 percent as of April.
The introduction to a Morning Edition segment on the response in Spain (sorry, no link) told listeners that Spain was undergoing austerity to pay down its “massive debt.” This is inaccurate. Spain did not have anything that can be remotely described as massive debt before the austerity policies imposed on the country by its creditors.
Prior to the collapse of the country’s housing bubble, Spain’s debt to GDP ratio was 26 percent, just over one-third of the U.S. level. It was running surpluses of more than 2.0 percent of GDP, the equivalent of a budget surplus of roughly $350 billion a year in the United States. (Its worth noting that Greece’s debt to GDP ratio was a much more manageable 107 percent of GDP before the crisis and austerity pushed it to 170 percent of GDP.)
The segment also is a bit out of line with reality in touting Spain’s economic success under austerity. It boasted that Spain had the strongest growth in the euro zone. This is an extremely low bar. Spain’s growth rate did not cross 3.0 percent last year and is not projected to do so this year. By contrast, it averaged almost 4.0 percent in the last two years before the crash. Countries recovering from steep downturns are expected to have faster than normal growth.
According to the I.M.F.’s growth projections (which have consistently proven to be overly optimistic) Spain’s per capita income will not surpass its 2007 level until 2018. This is a considerably worse than the situation faced by the United States in the Great Depression. The OECD puts Spain’s unemployment rate at 22.7 percent as of April.
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It is always cute when a major news outlet decides to blame problems on a policy it doesn’t like in a new story. That is what the Wall Street Journal did today in a news story that told readers Puerto Rico’s main problem is having the same minimum wage as the rest of the United States.
While the minimum wage is clearly high relative to labor productivity in Puerto Rico, its economic performance over the last four decades cannot be reconciled with a story where the minimum wage is the main culprit. Puerto Rico’s minimum wage converged to the U.S. minimum wage over the period 1978 to 1983. In spite of this sharp increase in the minimum wage, Puerto Rico’s unemployment rate fell sharply from the 1970s to the 1980s as its economy experienced strong growth (figures 3 and 4). While the unemployment rate in Puerto Rico remained higher than in the United States, the general direction was downward until the recession hit in 2007.
This simple story suggests that the minimum wage cannot be the main culprit. It is certainly possible that the minimum wage may have led to somewhat higher unemployment than would otherwise be the case, but the cause of the Puerto Rico’s economic crisis must be elsewhere.
Note: An earlier version described the article as a front page story. The article did not run on the front page of the paper.
Further Note: The WSJ had a much fuller account of Puerto Rico’s economic problems earlier in the week.
It is always cute when a major news outlet decides to blame problems on a policy it doesn’t like in a new story. That is what the Wall Street Journal did today in a news story that told readers Puerto Rico’s main problem is having the same minimum wage as the rest of the United States.
While the minimum wage is clearly high relative to labor productivity in Puerto Rico, its economic performance over the last four decades cannot be reconciled with a story where the minimum wage is the main culprit. Puerto Rico’s minimum wage converged to the U.S. minimum wage over the period 1978 to 1983. In spite of this sharp increase in the minimum wage, Puerto Rico’s unemployment rate fell sharply from the 1970s to the 1980s as its economy experienced strong growth (figures 3 and 4). While the unemployment rate in Puerto Rico remained higher than in the United States, the general direction was downward until the recession hit in 2007.
This simple story suggests that the minimum wage cannot be the main culprit. It is certainly possible that the minimum wage may have led to somewhat higher unemployment than would otherwise be the case, but the cause of the Puerto Rico’s economic crisis must be elsewhere.
Note: An earlier version described the article as a front page story. The article did not run on the front page of the paper.
Further Note: The WSJ had a much fuller account of Puerto Rico’s economic problems earlier in the week.
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A NYT article reported on a new commitment by China to reduce its emissions of greenhouse gases. At one point it referred to China as the world’s second largest economy. Actually, using a purchasing power parity measure of GDP, which is the one most economists would use to measure an economy’s size, China passed the United States last year and is now close to 4 percent larger. (China’s economy would be about 6 percent larger if Hong Kong is included.)
In the context of GHG emissions it is important to note that a substantial portion of China’s emissions are associated with producing items for consumption in the United States and elsewhere. China has an overall trade surplus and a large surplus on manufactured goods.
A NYT article reported on a new commitment by China to reduce its emissions of greenhouse gases. At one point it referred to China as the world’s second largest economy. Actually, using a purchasing power parity measure of GDP, which is the one most economists would use to measure an economy’s size, China passed the United States last year and is now close to 4 percent larger. (China’s economy would be about 6 percent larger if Hong Kong is included.)
In the context of GHG emissions it is important to note that a substantial portion of China’s emissions are associated with producing items for consumption in the United States and elsewhere. China has an overall trade surplus and a large surplus on manufactured goods.
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The Washington Post ran a map showing which countries in Europe use the euro and which use other currencies. The map is wrong. It shows Montenegro and Kosovo as using currencies other than the euro. This is not accurate, both countries do use the euro as their official currency although they have not have been accepted into the euro zone.
This is important in the context of the discussions on Greece because it illustrates the point that Greece cannot be forced off the euro. The European Commission and the European Central Bank can impose incredibly onerous conditions on Greece, but they cannot prevent the country from using the euro if it so chooses. The decision to leave the euro could only be made by the Greek government, not its creditors.
The Washington Post ran a map showing which countries in Europe use the euro and which use other currencies. The map is wrong. It shows Montenegro and Kosovo as using currencies other than the euro. This is not accurate, both countries do use the euro as their official currency although they have not have been accepted into the euro zone.
This is important in the context of the discussions on Greece because it illustrates the point that Greece cannot be forced off the euro. The European Commission and the European Central Bank can impose incredibly onerous conditions on Greece, but they cannot prevent the country from using the euro if it so chooses. The decision to leave the euro could only be made by the Greek government, not its creditors.
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