The left-wing economist Paul Krugman has admitted that he was wrong about his predictions for inflation and the strength of the Biden economy, describing the realization as an “experience in humility.”
In an op-ed for The New York Times, the Nobel prize-winning economist admitted that his predictions regarding inflation were a “very bad call.”
“In early 2021 there was an intense debate among economists about the likely consequences of the American Rescue Plan, the $1.9 trillion package enacted by a new Democratic president and a (barely) Democratic Congress,” he wrote. “Some warned that the package would be dangerously inflationary; others were fairly relaxed. I was Team Relaxed. As it turned out, of course, that was a very bad call.”
“But what, exactly, did I get wrong?” he added. “Both the initial debate and the way things have played out were more complicated than I suspect most people realize.”
After Biden claimed victory in November 2020, Krugman wrote a column for the Times predicting an economic “boom” with a Democrat back in the White House.
“If I’m right, however, the peculiar nature of the coronavirus slump may give Democrats another big political opportunity,” he wrote at the time. “There’s a pretty good chance that they’ll be able to run in the 2022 midterms as the party that brought the nation and the economy back from the depths of Covid despond. And they should seize that opportunity, not just for their own sake, but for the sake of the nation and the world.”
It is not the first time that Krugman has made predictions that are far wide of the mark. In 1998, he allegedly warned that it will soon “become clear that the internet’s impact on the economy has been no greater than the fax machine’s.”
Ben Kew is English Editor of El American. He studied politics and modern languages at the University of Bristol where he developed a passion for the Americas and anti-communist movements. He previously worked as a national security correspondent for Breitbart News. He has also written for The Spectator, Spiked, PanAm Post, and The Independent
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Ben Kew es editor en inglés de El American. Estudió política y lenguas modernas en la Universidad de Bristol, donde desarrolló una pasión por las Américas y los movimientos anticomunistas. Anteriormente trabajó como corresponsal de seguridad nacional para Breitbart News. También ha escrito para The Spectator, Spiked, PanAm Post y The Independent.