Mark Thoma Does Some Intellectual Garbage Pickup
He reads Donald Luskin at National Review:
Economist's View: Bush's Fiscal Irresponsibility: Don Luskin has an article in the NRO discussing Paul Krugman's column "Democrats and the Deficit." The article is critical of Krugman's position that Democrats should be careful not to hand budget surpluses to Republicans because they are likely to give them away as tax cuts rather than use them responsibly as down payments on future government liabilities. As part of his argument, Luskin tries to rebut "Bush’s irresponsibility" by arguing Bush has done as well as Clinton on federal budget issues. For example, he says:
The debt [under Clinton] was 49.3 percent of GDP, higher than in any year of the George W. Bush administration
Well, okay, but let's look a little closer.... While it's true that the debt to GDP ratio is lower today than the 1994 value of 49.3%, it's risen steadily under Bush. At the end of fiscal year 2000 the debt to GDP ratio had fallen to 35.1%, and it fell to 33.0% at the end of fiscal year 2001. But since 2001 it has risen steadily. So the important part of the story is not that the debt to GDP ratio is lower now than it was in 1994, instead, it's that the ratio has risen steadily under the Bush administration....
Oh, and by the way, the rest of Luskin's piece, "Speaking Truth to Power," is no better at speaking the truth...
