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Paul Krugman's Marxist Economic Fix: More Unions and Free Healthcare

By Noel Sheppard | March 07, 2011 | 10:10

A  A
Noel Sheppard's picture

New York Times columnist Paul Krugman doesn't believe education is the key to solving America's economic woes.

Quite the contrary, in his recent article "Degrees and Dollars," the Nobel Laureate argued that the path to a more prosperous nation is for unions to have increased bargaining power and for everyone to have "free" healthcare:

It is a truth universally acknowledged that education is the key to economic success. Everyone knows that the jobs of the future will require ever higher levels of skill. That’s why, in an appearance Friday with former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, President Obama declared that “If we want more good news on the jobs front then we’ve got to make more investments in education.”

But what everyone knows is wrong.

Krugman then laid out the major flaw in this premise: technological advancements are diminishing the value of education. With each new piece of software being created, some workers are becoming obsolete:

[A]ny routine task — a category that includes many white-collar, nonmanual jobs — is in the firing line. Conversely, jobs that can’t be carried out by following explicit rules — a category that includes many kinds of manual labor, from truck drivers to janitors — will tend to grow even in the face of technological progress.

And here’s the thing: Most of the manual labor still being done in our economy seems to be of the kind that’s hard to automate. Notably, with production workers in manufacturing down to about 6 percent of U.S. employment, there aren’t many assembly-line jobs left to lose. Meanwhile, quite a lot of white-collar work currently carried out by well-educated, relatively well-paid workers may soon be computerized.

So, technology, in Krugman's view, is destroying the marketplace for well-educated, well-paid, white-collar jobs. The problem is what's left won't be able to make enough money to really prosper.

But Krugman has a solution:

We need to restore the bargaining power that labor has lost over the last 30 years, so that ordinary workers as well as superstars have the power to bargain for good wages. We need to guarantee the essentials, above all health care, to every citizen.

The end of that first sentence deserves repeating: "so that ordinary workers as well as superstars have the power to bargain for good wages."

And therein lies the real truth.

Folks like Krugman aren't interested in prosperity. Frankly, they loathe it.

Instead, they want to make sure that the less-skilled in our society make as much as the "superstars." This is why they advocate unions and shun things such as merit increases and employee evaluations.

People making more money because they work harder offend folks like Krugman as does the idea that "ordinary workers" might be terminated for below average performance.

"From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs."

That's what Karl Marx wrote in his infamous "Critique of the Gotha Program," and Krugman couldn't agree more.

Scarier still is that this is how most of the media think as well as today's Democrat Party and White House resident.

This should tell you why the Left have made Wisconsin a battleground, for the preservation and expansion of unions is the next step in "solving" our economic problems after forcing ObamaCare down the throats of the citizenry.

And they wonder why a movement has formed to take back America.

About the Author

Noel Sheppard is the Associate Editor of NewsBusters. Click here to follow Noel Sheppard on Twitter.
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Comments

If everyone has "free healthcare" . . .

Submitted by Galvanic on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 10:19am.

. . . there's really no need for unions.

Workers are protected by Federal and state laws.

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Okay-all these great unions-

Submitted by JIMMY1660 on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 11:57am.

Government Local State Federal Unions-who pays for this?

we need jobs-the USA is an Automotive based economy. we need more oil coal natural gas-to keep the gas prices down, then folks buy cars and light trucks.

Enviro crazies-shut off your energy-walk to work i will not.

Fast & Furious along with Solyndra are example of who BHO is BHO Policies have caused Failed Economy- Liberals = Wealth Re-distribution

 

 

 

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Here you go Jimmy

Submitted by Blonde on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 12:06pm.

Who pays for all these unions ~ we do!

Handy Reference Guide to Obama's Gaffes and Goofs ~ Currently Numbering 200 (and Counting)

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This is SOP

Submitted by Thunder Lizard on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 10:42am.

Standard Operating Procedure for liberals and leftists - when something clearly does not work, it just means that you are not doing enough or spending enough on the program. 

Krugman style economics:  Failure?  Bankruptcy?  Full steam ahead!.  

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Loosely translated:

Submitted by johnsonl on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 11:10am.

"We are not creating enough socialists through the educational system. We must accomplish our goals through the labor unions and other entitlements. Why must these uneducated fools resist us? Don't they realize we are the bestest, mostest goodest, smartest and we know what's best for them?"

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This guy was given a Nobel Prize? Not possible!

Submitted by JLin on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 11:26am.

Who could possibly listen to this gibberish with a straight face? This is truly emabarrassing. He has to be mentally ill. The illogic is staggering unless maybe he got into a mess of ergot of rye, in which case it would seeem perfectly logical to a drugged brain .

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 Those who can, do.  Those

Submitted by motherbelt on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 11:31am.

 Those who can, do.  Those who can't...get Nobel prizes for bloviating about it.

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Yeah, Paulie...

Submitted by adamsmith on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 11:36am.

that Keynesian "Trickle Up" economy is doing just gangbusters since you have your Commie in Chief pushing it onto America killing it one day at a time...I'm sure he'll get re-elected and all the Commies can say it was Bush's fault when America ceases to be. This country elected a nightmare....

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I'm glad I duct-taped my head

Submitted by motherbelt on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 11:37am.

I'm glad I duct-taped my head before I hit the "read more" button....

Basically, Krugman is advocating equal pay for all, regardless of the job, regardless of the skill or education required to do it.......

Why should a doctor make more than a  truck driver?

It's not fair, dammit!

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This is like gradeschool.

Submitted by JLin on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 11:51am.

Remember the first time you thought that the cure for all the world's ills was to just divvy up the pie so everyone has a full plate then we would all be fair and happy? Then when you grew up you soon realized that productive people saved and created wealth but large numbers of people just simply spent theirs and were broke in short order.

You can't fix stupid, and it seems Krugman knows that but is committed to the gradeschool notion of "fairness" because it maintains the control of the Statist bureaucrat and politician. It's all about the supremacy of the State and its syncophants - like Krugman. After all they do know what's best. That's why we must serve the State and not the other way around. Amen.

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Hold the Duct Tape a Sec, mb

Submitted by Blonde on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 11:55am.

I ran across this most excellent video at Big Government yesterday, and this is the perfect place to post it.

Basically, the argument is that we are now in the beginnings of a new "Age" as humankind.  The first great transition was from a hunter-gatherer society to an agricultural society, which enabled the re-ordering of society from nomadic tribal groups to vast city states and eventually nations (the certainty of the food supply enabling the consolidation of power).  The second was the industrial revolution, which again re-ordered society, where wealth was super concentrated, resulting in a top-down government.

We are now at the doorstep of the third great societal transformation...the Information Age.  The author argues, and rightly so IMO, that the government will once again have to become more localized and horizontal to accomodate a society of individuals who have vast information and capabilities at their fingertips (unlike a century ago, our options as consumers are unlimited on the internet).

Krugman and the statists don't understand the changes that are about to happen.  They are clinging (bitter clingers) to an outmoded societal model, hoping to revive their "old" manufacturing jobs and workplace structures.  Just like the weekly magazines (Time & Newsweek) are dinosaurs, so is the "old" model of employment.  But being the leftists that Krugman et. al. are, they revert back to the ancient progressive ideal of equal outcomes for all.  B.S.!

Check it out, I really enjoyed it.

Handy Reference Guide to Obama's Gaffes and Goofs ~ Currently Numbering 200 (and Counting)

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J,

Submitted by Dave. on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 4:18pm.

And to think, they accuse us of being knuckle-dragging throwbacks.

-Dave

Vote for the American in November

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What I don't understand is

Submitted by inquiringmind on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 11:51am.

What I don't understand is that this is an educated man. Where in the history of this world has the system he is proposing worked?

In every case the Socialist ecomomy collapses under it's own weight because eventually there are too many taking and too few producing.

The outright insentive to achieve and create is removed for the majority of the population. They don't have to work because the system will take care of them.

The only thing I can come up with is that whether Socialism or Communisim, they still need rulers. So while the masses leave their same size houses to drive their same size cars, to a job that is pretty much like every one elses and then retire in their same government sponsored old age program, the elete live off the fat of the workers.

And that is where Krugman sees his position in life.

Either that or he is just a Friggin idiot.

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Comrade Krugman

Submitted by Comrade Jim on Mon, 03/07/2011 - 12:57pm.

You are too modest in your proposal. Everybody needs a union: The Toddlers Union, The Children's Union, The Teenagers Union, ... Then every occupation needs a union: The Shoeshine Boys Union, The Internet Users Union,...

Also everything should be free, not just Healthcare: free housing, free clothing, free cars, free gas, free food,... free brothels,... free politicians (no salary), free economists (again, no salary). Also why not free criminals (they will not steal money but instead they will leave money behind).

Professor Krugman, you are really onto something here; the possibilities are endless.
 

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