I’m not kidding. That was in a front page “news” story on the November jobs report. The piece told readers:
“Some economists are forecasting growth as high as 3 percent next year. New data released Friday showing robust hiring in November suggested that the private sector already is gaining momentum.
“The only thing that has to happen is that lawmakers have to do nothing,’ said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics. ‘It’s a pretty low bar.'”
According to the Congressional Budget Office the economy is currently operating at a level of output that is approximately 6 percent below its potential. The rate of growth of potential GDP is in the range of 2.2-2.4 percent annually. This means that if the economy sustains the 3.0 percent growth rate that has the Post so excited, it will close this gap at the rate of 0.6-0.8 percentage points a year. That means it will take between 7.5-10.0 years to close the gap, if the Congress follows Zandi’s prescription.
It probably would have been worth including the views of an economist who would have pointed out that this path would imply the loss of between $4.0 trillion and $5.5 trillion in potential output, an amount that is between 100 and 140 times the size of the proposed cuts to SNAP that has been filling public debates. The overwhelming majority of this lost potential output is coming out of the pockets of low and moderate income workers.
I’m not kidding. That was in a front page “news” story on the November jobs report. The piece told readers:
“Some economists are forecasting growth as high as 3 percent next year. New data released Friday showing robust hiring in November suggested that the private sector already is gaining momentum.
“The only thing that has to happen is that lawmakers have to do nothing,’ said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics. ‘It’s a pretty low bar.'”
According to the Congressional Budget Office the economy is currently operating at a level of output that is approximately 6 percent below its potential. The rate of growth of potential GDP is in the range of 2.2-2.4 percent annually. This means that if the economy sustains the 3.0 percent growth rate that has the Post so excited, it will close this gap at the rate of 0.6-0.8 percentage points a year. That means it will take between 7.5-10.0 years to close the gap, if the Congress follows Zandi’s prescription.
It probably would have been worth including the views of an economist who would have pointed out that this path would imply the loss of between $4.0 trillion and $5.5 trillion in potential output, an amount that is between 100 and 140 times the size of the proposed cuts to SNAP that has been filling public debates. The overwhelming majority of this lost potential output is coming out of the pockets of low and moderate income workers.
Read More Leer más Join the discussion Participa en la discusión
Couldn’t resist this one. No the WaPo columnist isn’t complaining about too much money going to big banks. He is once again complaining about money going to seniors, or more specifically the idea pushed by Senators Tom Harkin and Elizabeth Warren that we might want to increase the money going to seniors.
Harkin proposed a bill, which Warren has now endorsed, which will base the annual cost of living adjustment on a price index that more closely tracks the consumption patterns of seniors than the current index. It would also raise benefits by an average of about $70 a month.
This makes Lane unhappy since he thinks seniors are doing just fine. Ironically he cites a study showing that the share of 70-year olds who won’t be able to replace 75 percent of the income will rise from 25 percent for those born between 1940-1944 to 30 percent from 1970-1974.
This actually is a low bar for two reasons. First weak wage growth over this period means that 75 percent of working income is much less relative to the economy’s average productivity for this later age cohort. The other reason is that at age 70 the later born cohort will have on average have about 2.5 more years of life expectancy (12.6 year versus 10.2 years). This means that they will likely have more wealth and will more likely still be working.
The real value of Social Security benefits do increase through time and therefore are projected to be a considerably larger share of retirees’ income in future decades. This shows the importance of Social Security, but hardly describes a scenario of a thriving population of wealthy seniors.
But getting back to the issue of the size of this transfer that Lane terms “vast.” The increase in benefits of $70 a month would cost around $50 billion a year. We don’t know exactly how much the elderly CPI will differ from the currently used index, but if we lift the numbers in the other direction that the Congressional Budget Office estimates for the chained CPI, the additional expense will be around $10 billion a year over the next decade, bringing the total cost to $60 billion, a bit less than 0.4 percent of GDP.
By comparison, Bloomberg News estimated the size of the implicit taxpayer subsidy to the big banks at $83 billion a year, a bit more than 0.5 percent of GDP. For some reason the vast subsidy to the big banks, and implicitly their top executives and shareholders, doesn’t draw the same attention in the Washington Post’s pages (news and opinion) as money going to seniors.
Couldn’t resist this one. No the WaPo columnist isn’t complaining about too much money going to big banks. He is once again complaining about money going to seniors, or more specifically the idea pushed by Senators Tom Harkin and Elizabeth Warren that we might want to increase the money going to seniors.
Harkin proposed a bill, which Warren has now endorsed, which will base the annual cost of living adjustment on a price index that more closely tracks the consumption patterns of seniors than the current index. It would also raise benefits by an average of about $70 a month.
This makes Lane unhappy since he thinks seniors are doing just fine. Ironically he cites a study showing that the share of 70-year olds who won’t be able to replace 75 percent of the income will rise from 25 percent for those born between 1940-1944 to 30 percent from 1970-1974.
This actually is a low bar for two reasons. First weak wage growth over this period means that 75 percent of working income is much less relative to the economy’s average productivity for this later age cohort. The other reason is that at age 70 the later born cohort will have on average have about 2.5 more years of life expectancy (12.6 year versus 10.2 years). This means that they will likely have more wealth and will more likely still be working.
The real value of Social Security benefits do increase through time and therefore are projected to be a considerably larger share of retirees’ income in future decades. This shows the importance of Social Security, but hardly describes a scenario of a thriving population of wealthy seniors.
But getting back to the issue of the size of this transfer that Lane terms “vast.” The increase in benefits of $70 a month would cost around $50 billion a year. We don’t know exactly how much the elderly CPI will differ from the currently used index, but if we lift the numbers in the other direction that the Congressional Budget Office estimates for the chained CPI, the additional expense will be around $10 billion a year over the next decade, bringing the total cost to $60 billion, a bit less than 0.4 percent of GDP.
By comparison, Bloomberg News estimated the size of the implicit taxpayer subsidy to the big banks at $83 billion a year, a bit more than 0.5 percent of GDP. For some reason the vast subsidy to the big banks, and implicitly their top executives and shareholders, doesn’t draw the same attention in the Washington Post’s pages (news and opinion) as money going to seniors.
Read More Leer más Join the discussion Participa en la discusión
Interesting piece on the prospects of a doctor shortage by Scott Gottlieb and Ezekiel Emanual in the NYT. Interestingly they never discuss the possibility of bringing in more qualified doctors from other countries. It’s much cheaper to train doctors (to U.S. standards) in other countries than in the United States. If the political system were not so completely dominated by protectionist Neanderthals, opening up our system to foreign trained doctors would be a central item on the trade agenda. The potential gains to the economy from reducing doctors’ wages to the level paid in other wealthy countries would be close to $100 billion a year (@ $800 a year for a family of four).
Interesting piece on the prospects of a doctor shortage by Scott Gottlieb and Ezekiel Emanual in the NYT. Interestingly they never discuss the possibility of bringing in more qualified doctors from other countries. It’s much cheaper to train doctors (to U.S. standards) in other countries than in the United States. If the political system were not so completely dominated by protectionist Neanderthals, opening up our system to foreign trained doctors would be a central item on the trade agenda. The potential gains to the economy from reducing doctors’ wages to the level paid in other wealthy countries would be close to $100 billion a year (@ $800 a year for a family of four).
Read More Leer más Join the discussion Participa en la discusión
The NYT had a piece discussing the situation with Chicago’s underfunded pensions. It could have used some additional context.
First it would have been useful to point out how the pensions became badly underfunded. The problem goes back to the late 1990s when Chicago, like many other state and local governments, largely stopped contributing to their pensions because they thought the run-up in the stock market made it unnecessary. They made projections, with the blessing of bond-rating agencies like Moody’s and Standard and Poor’s, that essentially assumed that the stock bubble would grow ever larger for decades in the future.
After the bubble burst, Chicago continued to make contributions at the same levels. This was a conscious decision by the city’s political leaders, most importantly its mayor Richard M. Daley. Any city that goes a decade without making required contributions to its pensions will have a seriously underfunded pension system. This is the legacy of Mayor Daley, who remarkably is still a respected figure in public life.
While the shortfall is substantial it would be helpful to put in the context of the size of the city and its projected revenue. Its pension shortfalls are in the neighborhood of $28 billion. This is equal to approximately 0.5 percent of its projected income over the next three decades and 15 percent of projected revenue. This is far from trivial, but also not a crushing burden for a city with an otherwise healthy economy.
The article also highlights the decision of a federal judge to allow Detroit to declare bankruptcy. Given its much healthier finances it is unlikely that Chicago’s current mayor, Rahm Emanuel, would opt to go the bankruptcy route.
The NYT had a piece discussing the situation with Chicago’s underfunded pensions. It could have used some additional context.
First it would have been useful to point out how the pensions became badly underfunded. The problem goes back to the late 1990s when Chicago, like many other state and local governments, largely stopped contributing to their pensions because they thought the run-up in the stock market made it unnecessary. They made projections, with the blessing of bond-rating agencies like Moody’s and Standard and Poor’s, that essentially assumed that the stock bubble would grow ever larger for decades in the future.
After the bubble burst, Chicago continued to make contributions at the same levels. This was a conscious decision by the city’s political leaders, most importantly its mayor Richard M. Daley. Any city that goes a decade without making required contributions to its pensions will have a seriously underfunded pension system. This is the legacy of Mayor Daley, who remarkably is still a respected figure in public life.
While the shortfall is substantial it would be helpful to put in the context of the size of the city and its projected revenue. Its pension shortfalls are in the neighborhood of $28 billion. This is equal to approximately 0.5 percent of its projected income over the next three decades and 15 percent of projected revenue. This is far from trivial, but also not a crushing burden for a city with an otherwise healthy economy.
The article also highlights the decision of a federal judge to allow Detroit to declare bankruptcy. Given its much healthier finances it is unlikely that Chicago’s current mayor, Rahm Emanuel, would opt to go the bankruptcy route.
Read More Leer más Join the discussion Participa en la discusión
The Washington Post should have found someone who would have pointed out President Obama’s misrepresentation when it quoted him saying:
“Government can’t stand on the sidelines in our efforts [to reduce inequality and increase mobility], because government is us. It can and should reflect our deepest values and commitments.”
Of course government has not been on sidelines, it has pursued policies that increase inequality. There are a long list that fall into this category including the bank bailouts of 2008-2010, too big to fail insurance for large banks, stronger and longer patent and copyright protection, and a trade policy that puts less educated workers in direct competition with low paid workers in the developing world, while largely protecting the most highly paid professionals, like doctors, from the same sort of competition.
However the biggest way in which the government has promoted inequality is by running budgets that lead to large scale unemployment and underemployment. Just as the decision to deliberately use fiscal policy to stimulate the economy and create jobs is a policy choice so is the decision to run smaller budget deficits, thereby reducing growth and employment. The government is currently following the latter policy denying work to millions of people. Also, since the bargaining power of workers in the bottom third of the labor market depends hugely on the level of unemployment, the high unemployment policy is also reducing their wages.
The Washington Post should have found someone who would have pointed out President Obama’s misrepresentation when it quoted him saying:
“Government can’t stand on the sidelines in our efforts [to reduce inequality and increase mobility], because government is us. It can and should reflect our deepest values and commitments.”
Of course government has not been on sidelines, it has pursued policies that increase inequality. There are a long list that fall into this category including the bank bailouts of 2008-2010, too big to fail insurance for large banks, stronger and longer patent and copyright protection, and a trade policy that puts less educated workers in direct competition with low paid workers in the developing world, while largely protecting the most highly paid professionals, like doctors, from the same sort of competition.
However the biggest way in which the government has promoted inequality is by running budgets that lead to large scale unemployment and underemployment. Just as the decision to deliberately use fiscal policy to stimulate the economy and create jobs is a policy choice so is the decision to run smaller budget deficits, thereby reducing growth and employment. The government is currently following the latter policy denying work to millions of people. Also, since the bargaining power of workers in the bottom third of the labor market depends hugely on the level of unemployment, the high unemployment policy is also reducing their wages.
Read More Leer más Join the discussion Participa en la discusión
Binyamin Appelbaum had an interesting post about how many economists would like to see a higher rate of inflation to help recover from the downturn. The piece emphasizes the role of inflation in lowering real wages, with the argument that lower real wages are necessary to increase employment.
While there may be some truth to this point, it is worth fleshing out the argument more fully. At any point in time, there are sectors in which demand is increasing and we would expect to see rising real wages and also sectors where demand is falling and we would expect to see real wages do the same (e.g. Wall Street traders — okay, that was a dream).
Anyhow, when inflation is very low, the only way to bring about declines in real wages in these sectors is by having lower nominal wages. Since workers resist nominal pay cuts, we end up not having this adjustment and therefore we end up with fewer jobs than would otherwise be the case. However it is an important qualification in this story that it is not about reducing real wages for all workers, only for some subset.
The other important point is that higher inflation promotes growth in other ways. First and foremost it makes investment more profitable by reducing real interest rates. Firms are considering spending money today to sell more output (e.g. software, computers, Twitter derivatives etc.) in the future. If they expect to sell this output for higher prices because of inflation, then they will find it more profitable to invest today. If we can keep interest rates more or less constant and raise the expected rate of inflation, then firms will have much more incentive to invest. This process seems to be working successfully in Japan at the moment.
Finally, inflation reduces debt burdens. Everyone who has debt in nominal dollars, such as homeowners, students, state and local governments, and the national government, will see the real value of its debt fall in response to inflation. This reduces their debt burden and makes it easier to spend. This would likely also be an important source of demand growth from higher inflation.
While many economists do emphasize the wage story, to my mind the other parts are likely more important. And, if higher inflation leads to more employment, this will increase workers’ bargaining power and allow them to achieve wage gains that are likely to quickly offset any losses due to inflation — although the Wall Street traders may not make up the lost ground.
Addendum:
Let me make a quick comment to clear up unnecessary confusion (can’t do much about the deliberate confusion). The notion of inflation being a way to lower wages in the U.S. refers to the wages of some workers, not all workers. There are always industries seeing increased demand and some seeing reduced demand. The response to the latter would be lower wages. That is difficult to bring about in a situation of near zero inflation and nominal wage rigidity. By having higher inflation so that real wages can fall in these industries, we can increase employment, output, and real wages more generally. That is the argument. Folks can say why that may not work, but it’s really not worth anyone’s time to deliberately misrepresent it so you can say it’s stupid.
Binyamin Appelbaum had an interesting post about how many economists would like to see a higher rate of inflation to help recover from the downturn. The piece emphasizes the role of inflation in lowering real wages, with the argument that lower real wages are necessary to increase employment.
While there may be some truth to this point, it is worth fleshing out the argument more fully. At any point in time, there are sectors in which demand is increasing and we would expect to see rising real wages and also sectors where demand is falling and we would expect to see real wages do the same (e.g. Wall Street traders — okay, that was a dream).
Anyhow, when inflation is very low, the only way to bring about declines in real wages in these sectors is by having lower nominal wages. Since workers resist nominal pay cuts, we end up not having this adjustment and therefore we end up with fewer jobs than would otherwise be the case. However it is an important qualification in this story that it is not about reducing real wages for all workers, only for some subset.
The other important point is that higher inflation promotes growth in other ways. First and foremost it makes investment more profitable by reducing real interest rates. Firms are considering spending money today to sell more output (e.g. software, computers, Twitter derivatives etc.) in the future. If they expect to sell this output for higher prices because of inflation, then they will find it more profitable to invest today. If we can keep interest rates more or less constant and raise the expected rate of inflation, then firms will have much more incentive to invest. This process seems to be working successfully in Japan at the moment.
Finally, inflation reduces debt burdens. Everyone who has debt in nominal dollars, such as homeowners, students, state and local governments, and the national government, will see the real value of its debt fall in response to inflation. This reduces their debt burden and makes it easier to spend. This would likely also be an important source of demand growth from higher inflation.
While many economists do emphasize the wage story, to my mind the other parts are likely more important. And, if higher inflation leads to more employment, this will increase workers’ bargaining power and allow them to achieve wage gains that are likely to quickly offset any losses due to inflation — although the Wall Street traders may not make up the lost ground.
Addendum:
Let me make a quick comment to clear up unnecessary confusion (can’t do much about the deliberate confusion). The notion of inflation being a way to lower wages in the U.S. refers to the wages of some workers, not all workers. There are always industries seeing increased demand and some seeing reduced demand. The response to the latter would be lower wages. That is difficult to bring about in a situation of near zero inflation and nominal wage rigidity. By having higher inflation so that real wages can fall in these industries, we can increase employment, output, and real wages more generally. That is the argument. Folks can say why that may not work, but it’s really not worth anyone’s time to deliberately misrepresent it so you can say it’s stupid.
Read More Leer más Join the discussion Participa en la discusión
Eduardo Porter has a good piece on efforts to use the economic crisis to make Europe’s labor market more like the U.S. market. One result is likely to be much higher levels of inequality.
Eduardo Porter has a good piece on efforts to use the economic crisis to make Europe’s labor market more like the U.S. market. One result is likely to be much higher levels of inequality.
Read More Leer más Join the discussion Participa en la discusión
My friend and co-author Jared Bernstein has a good post on the minimum wage this morning. It would benefit from one additional point.
While Jared acknowledges that the minimum wage may lead to some job loss it is important to note that jobs in the low wage labor market tend to be high turnover jobs, although turnover is likely to be slower in response to a higher wage. The reason why this matters is that when we talk about job loss in response to a minimum wage hike, we rarely are talking about people literally losing their jobs. Essentially this means somewhat less employment.
That would play out in the form of workers taking longer to find jobs. This could mean, for example, that workers may expect to work an average of 1 percent fewer hours in response to a hike of 10 percent in the minimum wage because it takes them longer to find a job. However, they could expect to get 10 percent more money for each hour they work. That is the sort of trade-off we would be talking about based on the extensive research on the topic.
My friend and co-author Jared Bernstein has a good post on the minimum wage this morning. It would benefit from one additional point.
While Jared acknowledges that the minimum wage may lead to some job loss it is important to note that jobs in the low wage labor market tend to be high turnover jobs, although turnover is likely to be slower in response to a higher wage. The reason why this matters is that when we talk about job loss in response to a minimum wage hike, we rarely are talking about people literally losing their jobs. Essentially this means somewhat less employment.
That would play out in the form of workers taking longer to find jobs. This could mean, for example, that workers may expect to work an average of 1 percent fewer hours in response to a hike of 10 percent in the minimum wage because it takes them longer to find a job. However, they could expect to get 10 percent more money for each hour they work. That is the sort of trade-off we would be talking about based on the extensive research on the topic.
Read More Leer más Join the discussion Participa en la discusión
Since the NYT decided to devote a Room for Debate on the question of whether the stock market is currently in a bubble, I thought I should join the party as one of the stock bubble warners from the 1990s. To my mind the story for the overall stock market is a fairly simple one. Look at the ratio of stock prices to trend earnings.
This one doesn’t look too terrifying. Obviously the market is hitting record highs measured in nominal dollars, but if we expect the price to earnings ratio to remain more or less constant over time, then we should expect the nominal value to regularly hit new highs as the economy grows. In this context, an S&P at 1800 doesn’t seem especially scary. The S&P had previously peaked at 1525 back in 2007, six years ago.
Since 2007 the price level is up by roughly 9 percent. If we assume potential growth of 2.3 percent, then the economy’s potential GDP would be 14.6 percent higher today. Taking the two together, the S&P would be 25.3 percent higher today, or at 1910, to be as high relative to trend earnings as it was in the fall of 2007. In other words, if we didn’t have a bubble in 2007, then we don’t have one today.
If we go further back to the bubble days of 2000, we had a peak S&P of roughly 1500. Since then prices have risen by roughly 30 percent. Actual growth from 2000 to 2007 was 18.4 percent. If we multiply that by my calculation of potential growth since 2007, we get a growth in potential GDP of 35.7 percent since 2000. (I am using actual growth from 2000 to 2007 since I am assuming that the economy’s growth over this period was pretty much in line with its potential.) Multiplying this 35.7 potential growth figure by the rise in prices gives us an increase of 75.6 percent since 2000, which implies that the S&P would be a bit over 2430 if it were as high relative to potential GDP today as it was at the peak of the 1990s stock bubble.
Another way to put this is that, relative to the potential of the economy, the stock market is about 68 percent of its bubble peak. Would this mean we have a bubble now? By my assessment the answer is no. The PEs at the peak in 2000 were above 30 to 1 (using trend earnings, defined as the average share of profits in GDP). That was more than double the historical average. The current ratio would put the PEs around 20. This is still well above the historical average, but not obviously in bubble territory.
There are two reasons that a higher than normal PE might be justified. The first is simply that we have unusually low interest rates. The real short-term interest rate is -1.5 percent and the real interest rate on 10-year Treasury bonds is hovering around 1.0 percent. These low rates would justify higher than normal stock prices.
The other reason that stock prices might reasonably be higher than normal is that people may feel more comfortable holding stocks today, with the easy availability of low-cost index funds, than they did in prior decades. This implies a reduced risk premium. That would mean both higher PE ratios (plausibly around 20 in my view) and lower future returns on stock. (Real returns going forward would average @ 5 percent, instead of the 7 percent return in the past.)
I could be wrong, but that’s my take — No Bubble!
Since the NYT decided to devote a Room for Debate on the question of whether the stock market is currently in a bubble, I thought I should join the party as one of the stock bubble warners from the 1990s. To my mind the story for the overall stock market is a fairly simple one. Look at the ratio of stock prices to trend earnings.
This one doesn’t look too terrifying. Obviously the market is hitting record highs measured in nominal dollars, but if we expect the price to earnings ratio to remain more or less constant over time, then we should expect the nominal value to regularly hit new highs as the economy grows. In this context, an S&P at 1800 doesn’t seem especially scary. The S&P had previously peaked at 1525 back in 2007, six years ago.
Since 2007 the price level is up by roughly 9 percent. If we assume potential growth of 2.3 percent, then the economy’s potential GDP would be 14.6 percent higher today. Taking the two together, the S&P would be 25.3 percent higher today, or at 1910, to be as high relative to trend earnings as it was in the fall of 2007. In other words, if we didn’t have a bubble in 2007, then we don’t have one today.
If we go further back to the bubble days of 2000, we had a peak S&P of roughly 1500. Since then prices have risen by roughly 30 percent. Actual growth from 2000 to 2007 was 18.4 percent. If we multiply that by my calculation of potential growth since 2007, we get a growth in potential GDP of 35.7 percent since 2000. (I am using actual growth from 2000 to 2007 since I am assuming that the economy’s growth over this period was pretty much in line with its potential.) Multiplying this 35.7 potential growth figure by the rise in prices gives us an increase of 75.6 percent since 2000, which implies that the S&P would be a bit over 2430 if it were as high relative to potential GDP today as it was at the peak of the 1990s stock bubble.
Another way to put this is that, relative to the potential of the economy, the stock market is about 68 percent of its bubble peak. Would this mean we have a bubble now? By my assessment the answer is no. The PEs at the peak in 2000 were above 30 to 1 (using trend earnings, defined as the average share of profits in GDP). That was more than double the historical average. The current ratio would put the PEs around 20. This is still well above the historical average, but not obviously in bubble territory.
There are two reasons that a higher than normal PE might be justified. The first is simply that we have unusually low interest rates. The real short-term interest rate is -1.5 percent and the real interest rate on 10-year Treasury bonds is hovering around 1.0 percent. These low rates would justify higher than normal stock prices.
The other reason that stock prices might reasonably be higher than normal is that people may feel more comfortable holding stocks today, with the easy availability of low-cost index funds, than they did in prior decades. This implies a reduced risk premium. That would mean both higher PE ratios (plausibly around 20 in my view) and lower future returns on stock. (Real returns going forward would average @ 5 percent, instead of the 7 percent return in the past.)
I could be wrong, but that’s my take — No Bubble!
Read More Leer más Join the discussion Participa en la discusión
That’s more than half of the money appropriated for the program. Yes, some folks will know that the $40 billion refers to a cut over 10 years. But is there some reason that the NYT can’t provide such information in the article and not risk misleading a large share of its readers.
That comes to roughly 5 percent of the cost of the program. To give readers a bit more context, the NYT could have used CEPR’s nifty Responsible Budget Calculator to inform readers that the cut amounts to 0.09 percent of projected federal spending over this period. In short, this cut may be a big deal to the people affected, it means little in terms of the deficit or anyone’s tax bill.
The NYT is supposed to be committed to putting numbers like this in a context that makes them understandable to readers. Would anyone at the NYT really want to claim this piece expressed the proposed cuts in a way that made them understandable to most of their readers?
That’s more than half of the money appropriated for the program. Yes, some folks will know that the $40 billion refers to a cut over 10 years. But is there some reason that the NYT can’t provide such information in the article and not risk misleading a large share of its readers.
That comes to roughly 5 percent of the cost of the program. To give readers a bit more context, the NYT could have used CEPR’s nifty Responsible Budget Calculator to inform readers that the cut amounts to 0.09 percent of projected federal spending over this period. In short, this cut may be a big deal to the people affected, it means little in terms of the deficit or anyone’s tax bill.
The NYT is supposed to be committed to putting numbers like this in a context that makes them understandable to readers. Would anyone at the NYT really want to claim this piece expressed the proposed cuts in a way that made them understandable to most of their readers?
Read More Leer más Join the discussion Participa en la discusión
