The Deficit Problem Is Not “We, the People,” It is “You, the Incompetent Elite”

[Hannah Bell]

New York Times columnist David Leonhardt told readers today that the problem of the debt is “we, the people.” Is that so?

Was it we the people who were too dumb to see an $8 trillion housing bubble and recognize that its collapse would wreck the economy? No, that was the job of the great Maestro Alan Greenspan and his sidekick Ben Bernanke, the brilliant scholar of the Great Depression. It was also the job of all the economists who do research and opine to the public on the macroeconomy. Virtually all of these highly educated highly intelligent economists either did not see the bubble or insisted it was not worth their time.

Our deficit today is due to the collapse of this bubble. There is no dispute about this. If there had been no bubble and the economy was still chugging along with 4.5 percent unemployment, the budget would either be balanced or close enough that no serious person would be expressing alarm (check out the pre-crisis CBO projections).

Is our huge deficit a problem today? Not if you think people should have jobs. Private sector demand has plunged because of the collapse of the bubble. If the public sector does not fill the demand gap with deficit spending, then we have less demand and fewer jobs. That’s worth saying a few hundred thousand times since the deficit hawks have filled the airwaves and cyberspace with so much nonsense.

People who want smaller deficits want fewer jobs – that is the way the economy works right now. There is no plausible story through which cutting demand from the public sector will generate more jobs in the private sector...Instead, they will blame ordinary workers for thinking that they should be able to get a decent retirement and have the same sort of health care coverage as people in every other wealthy country.

http://www.cepr.net/index.php/blogs/beat-the-press/the-deficit-problem-is-not-we-the-people-it-is-you-the-incompetent-elite/

[kestrel91316]

1. Carping about "the elite" is historically a RW talking point.

RW talking points are forbidden on DU, as you well know.

[Hannah Bell]

3. it's also a left-wing talking point. you want to pretend there are no elites in the US,

be my guest.

Dean Baker is no right-winger; he's a well-known & respected left-leaning economist.

[Jackpine Radical]

2. Incompetent, shit.

Felonious, yes. Psychopathic, of course. Incompetent, no.

[Orsino]

4. Yes. If anyone's incompetent...

...it's the We-the-People who keep voting for corrupt, lying assholes.

[Psephos]

5. A pithy way of nailing it. n/t