Is America on its way to becoming a boiled frog?

[Greyhound]

By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: July 12, 2009

I started thinking about boiled frogs recently as I watched the depressing state of debate over both economic and environmental policy. These are both areas in which there is a substantial lag before policy actions have their full effect — a year or more in the case of the economy, decades in the case of the planet — yet in which it’s very hard to get people to do what it takes to head off a catastrophe foretold.
And right now, both the economic and the environmental frogs are sitting still while the water gets hotter...

At this point, however, the acute crisis has given way to a much more insidious threat. Most economic forecasters now expect gross domestic product to start growing soon, if it hasn’t already. But all the signs point to a “jobless recovery”: on average, forecasters surveyed by The Wall Street Journal believe that the unemployment rate will keep rising into next year, and that it will be as high at the end of 2010 as it is now...

Now, it’s bad enough to be jobless for a few weeks; it’s much worse being unemployed for months or years. Yet that’s exactly what will happen to millions of Americans if the average forecast is right — which means that many of the unemployed will lose their savings, their homes and more...

To head off this outcome — and remember, this isn’t what economic Cassandras are saying; it’s the forecasting consensus — we’d need to get another round of fiscal stimulus under way very soon. But neither Congress nor, alas, the Obama administration is showing any inclination to act. Now that the free fall is over, all sense of urgency seems to have vanished...

And let’s be clear: both the president and the party’s Congressional leadership understand the economic and environmental issues perfectly well. So if we can’t get action to head off disaster now, what would it take? I don’t know the answer. And that’s why I keep thinking about boiling frogs.

Yet another warning from the most frequently ignored Noble Prize recipient in the nation.

[hedgehog]

1. This frog's been sitting in hot water for quite a while. Why else

do so many people have so much credit card debt? I don't think people all went to Aruba on credit. i think it was more a case of the refrigerator crapped out, or the kid needed braces or the roof started leaking or I'll put the groceries on credit just this once because things are tight this month....because I'm bound to get a raise next year, right?

[Greyhound]

3. Bingo! More than personal credit, the parasites have been draining America's assets,

or equity if you will, for a quarter century. They've been selling acres to keep the appearance that the farm is still working and now we're down to the last 5 or so. Not enough to actually farm but with a mortgage so high there's little hope of ever paying it off.

[Dawgs]

2. Huh? "frequently ignored Noble Prize recipient in the nation"

Krugman is everywhere. DUers, HuffPost, the Sunday morning news shows, liberal talk radio, and pretty much every other news organization mentions Krugman daily. President Obama has even met with him a few times.

His opinion is widely accepted by many. The man has no real power, so getting as much attention as he has gotten is unprecedented.

Nice try though.