Paul Krugman is an America-hating ninny Tom Smith
Can you even believe this? From Herr Professor Krugman’s NYT column . . .
U.S.children, write Mr. Komlos and Mr. Lauderdale, consume more mealsprepared outside the home, more fast food rich in fat, high in energydensity and low in essential micronutrients, than do Europeanchildren. Our reliance on fast food, in turn, may reflect lack offamily time because we work too much: U.S. G.D.P. per capita is highpartly because employed Americans work many more hours than theirEuropean counterparts.
A broader explanation would be thatcontemporary America is a society that, in a variety of ways, doesn ttake very good care of its children. Recently, Unicef issued a reportcomparing a number of measures of child well-being in 21 richcountries, including health and safety, family and peer relationshipsand such things as whether children eat fruit and are physicallyactive. The report put the Netherlands at the top; sure enough, theDutch are now the world s tallest people, almost 3 inches taller, onaverage, than non-Hispanic American whites. The U.S. ended up in 20thplace, below Poland, Portugal and Hungary, but ahead of Britain.
Whateverthe full explanation for America s stature deficit, our relativeshortness, like our low life expectancy, suggests that something isamiss with our way of life. A critical European might say that Americais a land of harried parents and neglected children, of expensivehealth care that misses those who need it most, a society that for allits wealth somehow manages to be nasty, brutish and short.
Now we have to run out and become Euro-socialists or else, here it comes, we will throw short puppies. The econo-justice dynamic will punish us with little stumpy-boys, even unto the Nth generation. And how’s this for social science: Unicef does a report showing the Dutch take the best care of their childern and, shore nuff, the Dutch kiddies are the tallest! Gall dang! If I had known it was so easy to make them sort of dee-ductions, I woulda become an economist, just like Dr. Krugman! Honestly, does being a formerly leading economist give you some kind of special dispensation to insult everyone’s intelligence? Is he somehow allowed to say things that are so stupid because he is reputed to be so smart? I know, let’s do some Krugman style social science. When people have PhD’s and wrote lots of good papers long ago, then start writing for the New York Times, they gradually become complete hacks who confuse their prejudices for insights, and shore nuff, look at Krugman. Q.E.D. I had thought the Dutch were famous for being tall. Reagan was tall and his nickname was Dutch. The big galoot in the Western is frequently Dutch. They’re big people, Paul. Big! Their kids are big! Maybe Americans are short because they don’t eat enough cheese! For heaven’s sake. Please, just stop it. You can make plenty of completely spurious arguments without being so transparent about it.
And please, will you just shut up about Europe. We are are just too tired of Europe. Europe is not hip anymore, Paul. Maybe it’s Korea or China now, I don’t know, but it’s not Europe. Europe only seems hip to old people like you. There are a few places where things are happening, like Ireland, and maybe recently liberated parts of Central Europe, but by in large, they are horribly overtaxed, over-regulated, and the smart kids what to get the heck out of there and come to the US. Have you any idea what it is like to try to start a high-tech start up in France, or Italy, or Germany? What kind of taxes a business has to pay? Wonderful people, great food, beautiful buildings, yes, yes, but their economic system? Don’t make me laugh. The Euro strong against the dollar because Congress has been spending money like there is no tomorrow, and if we did a tenth of the things Krugman thinks are necessary to make our babies bigger, the dollar would be a lot weaker, and I doubt it would any difference to our babies. And speaking of babies, the Europeans aren’t even making them! You better hurry up and measure those little suckers, Dr. Krugman, while there are some left. Italy, France, Germany, the UK, do any of them have replacement rates of reproduction among their native populations? I don’t think so. So don’t talk to me about sick societies. At least we’re making babies.