Paul Krugman - Political Views

Political Views

Krugman describes himself as liberal, and has explained that he views the term "liberal" in the American context to mean "more or less what social democratic means in Europe." In a 2009 Newsweek article, Evan Thomas described Krugman as having "all the credentials of a ranking member of the East coast liberal establishment" but also as someone who is anti-establishment, a "scourge of the Bush administration," and a critic of the Obama administration. In 1996, Newsweek's Michael Hirsh remarked "Say this for Krugman: though an unabashed liberal ... he's ideologically colorblind. He savages the supply-siders of the Reagan-Bush era with the same glee as he does the 'strategic traders' of the Clinton administration."

Krugman has advocated free markets in contexts where they are often viewed as controversial. He has written against rent control in favor of supply and demand, likened the opposition against free trade and globalization to the opposition against evolution via natural selection, opposed farm subsidies, argued that sweatshops are preferable to unemployment, dismissed the case for living wages, argued against mandates, subsidies, and tax breaks for ethanol, and questioned NASA's manned space flights. Krugman has also criticized U.S. zoning laws and European labor market regulation. He calls current Israeli policy "narrow-minded" and "basically a gradual, long-run form of national suicide", saying that it's "bad for Jews everywhere, not to mention the world".