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The Great Unraveling
Book

The Great Unraveling

Losing Our Way in the New Century

Paul Krugman
W.W. Norton, 2003

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Editorial Rating

9

Qualities

  • Innovative

Recommendation

This powerful indictment of President George W. Bush’s administration comes from a prize-winning economist and journalist. Even if author Paul Krugman’s stiffest critics would not argue with the facts in his New York Times columns, they would argue mightily about his interpretations. Since the administration’s story is still unfolding, the net effect of Bush’s economic, political and managerial decisions have not been felt fully. When they are, Krugman contends in columns published from January 2000 to January 2003, the U.S. will face dramatically higher inflation and a host of economic woes. He blames Bush for creating the moral climate that enabled the recent corporate scandals. Krugman asks passionately why Bush has lied consistently to the public about the budget, the war and even the real goal of his administration, and gotten away with it. He itemizes a list of administration lies and misuse of information. He contends that Bush’s real aim is to unravel the welfare state, reduce taxes and help the wealthy. While some columns are dated, most seem remarkably fresh, so fresh that it is too soon for a final conclusion about many of these predictions. getAbstract.com thinks this is required reading for anyone interested in politics or the U.S. economy, whether Krugman’s take on Bush will please you or infuriate you.

Summary

Moderates and Revolutionaries

Today, any discussion of economics has to involve politics. Since the 2000 election, the administration of President George W. Bush has systematically moved to implement conservative fiscal policies based on cutting taxes and eliminating social programs, such as Social Security, unemployment insurance and Medicare. These steps were often taken while Bush was trying to wage the war in Iraq. The Bush Administration used deceptive means to sell both the tax cut and the need to go to war in Iraq to the American public.

Bush debuted the tax cut proposal during his primary campaign in 2001 as a way of making himself more conservative than his Republican challenger, Steve Forbes. A wealthy man himself, Forbes came from a faction of the Republican Party that consistently pushed for tax cuts for the rich regardless of the nation’s economic conditions. Bush adopted this proposal and pushed to end all capital gains taxes, a move that would have instituted a tax structure based on taxing wages only, as opposed to wages and capital. Since most Americans do not have significant capital resources, which are used to generate unearned income (capital gains...

About the Author

Paul Krugman writes a column twice a week for the op-ed page of The New York Times and teaches at Princeton University. He won the John Bates Clark medal as the best American economist under the age of 40.

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