The New York Times’ Nobel Laureate economist whose “first pass” take after Trump was elected president was that the markets would never recover has weighed in on inflation, and he doesn’t think it’ll be a big problem, if at all:
One of the minor annoyances of frequent punditry is how often you're falsely accused of moving the goalposts. Right now, some of us are cautioning not to read much if anything into inflation numbers 1/ https://t.co/IoSOnU1cyy
— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) May 29, 2021
And maybe “inflation” isn’t even the proper term in this case. Perhaps “transitory price blips” is a better way to go:
And immediately you get accused of making ex-post excuses, even though we were warning months ago about the likelihood of transitory price blips 2/
— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) May 29, 2021
Here's one from March 3/ https://t.co/yCx1PrXYwX
— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) May 29, 2021
And a specific warning that traditional core inflation would be misleading 4/ https://t.co/138CyWqKuQ
— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) May 29, 2021
Not a big deal. But really, everything we've seen so far is pretty much in line with a benign scenario — not saying that things can't go wrong, but they haven't so far 5/
— Paul Krugman (@paulkrugman) May 29, 2021
Based on past experience with Krugman’s predictions, “don’t worry too much about the inflation numbers” can be easily translated to “maybe start to really worry about the inflation numbers.”
"transitory price blips" 🤡
— The Moops (@_The_Moops) May 29, 2021
"Economist"👇🏻🤔 https://t.co/KHDinfY00o
— Sister Toldjah 😁 (@sistertoldjah) May 29, 2021
Imagine Krugman’s take if this was happening and Trump was still president.
"One of the annoyances of being a vocal public figure who constantly moves the goalposts is people pointing out that I constantly move the goalposts." https://t.co/FJLNkhnMyB
— Ornery (@OrneryThe8th) May 29, 2021
“There is no inflation!” – Krug Man pic.twitter.com/O2c69uYJ95
— FudgeTosser (@FudgeTosser) May 29, 2021
Paul… you’re a good man. But for you to ignore the hyper inflation EVERYONE is seeing in the stuff they buy using some economics mumbojumbo is rather elitist, and downright nasty. Call a spade a spade. Hyperinflation is here. Don’t believe me? Here… see these charts. https://t.co/IXgPlPxNt4 pic.twitter.com/CjLQJ9D0tp
— Gordon Johnson (@GordonJohnson19) May 29, 2021
And you can say “transitory” all you want… but poor people don’t care for all the economic mumbojumbo. The purchasing power of their dollar is imploding, while their pay is stagnant, so we can buy more solar panels/rare earths made in China, and pay billionaires A LOT more. pic.twitter.com/YmPTnAxokd
— Gordon Johnson (@GordonJohnson19) May 29, 2021
Hey, it’s not as if Krugman has ever been wrong before. *Cue eye roll*
Did you fax this? https://t.co/gY3Fqu2Ahc
— Joel Engel (@joelengel) May 29, 2021
LOL.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member