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The comeback kid: Europe!
That's the conclusion reached by columnist Paul Krugman in today's New York Times. He argues that Europe is actually doing much better than what lots of pundits and politicians in the states are making it out to be. Case in point: employment has increased more in Europe than stateside since 2000.We've of course seen more concrete evidence of this recently, in all of our postings about European travelers coming to New York for bargain shopping. It's a fact now that the Euro is rivaling the dollar in world dominance, and that the European economy is just about as big as the US economy.
Krugman's column ultimately argues that it's possible to have your cake--and eat it too. The Europeans have universal health-care and a guaranteed safety net for the poor, but they've managed to do this without having their economy go down the drain. As for Americans, we'll always have our cute version of Europe: Canada!
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Jim Jan 11th 2008 6:23PM
Reason there are more jobs in Europe is that the US is relocating it jobs to europe to save cash. Reason for decrease in the US.
ilona May 6th 2008 9:28PM
european wages are higher than wages in the usa ..also 6 weeks vacation and 2 years maternity leave is not something an american company takes on willingy...basf siemens daimler ksb should i go on are european companies that bring their operations over here because of cheap american labor ..and not to mention basically no labor laws to protect the worker........european companies have to regard it workforce i think americans scream about socialism ..when they hear regard for its workers ......maby treating people decent just results in a better outcome....
Eva Jan 11th 2008 7:16PM
Interesting. I'd never thought of Europe as being in need of a comeback, but in the past year (since I've started reading American news more often) I've noticed the attitude the author refers to - the idea that Europe is some sort of tired, done-for place, economically speaking at least, and an example of everything NOT to do. That always puzzled me - it's so wildly inaccurate that I couldn't understand how anyone could actually believe it...
Since he was on the topic of comparative spending of tax dollars anyway, I would have loved to see him compare the military expenditures of the US versus all the EU countries.
John Jan 11th 2008 8:00PM
Krugman?
Whatever he says', it is more than likely that the opposite is true.
There are websites dedicated just to track the mistakes of the "world's most dangerous pundit" as he has been calle for the reach that his column in the NY Times gives him. He has had so many instances of crying wolf over the economy or praising a foreign coutriie's just to see it go down the drain that it boggles the mind.
During the nineties he was all in praise of cetain of President's Clinton's economic positions but as soon as Bush was elected he started criticizing those same positions not even caring that the archives of the times had dozens of his own articles saying the exact opposite.