Nobel Prize winners Paul Krugman (left) and Joseph Stiglitz are just two of the economists opposed to the TPP deal who Greg Mankiw pretends don’t exist. (cc photos: Prolineserver, Raimond Spekking)
The New York Times (4/24/15) handed its readers an exploding cigar this weekend—in the form of an “Economic View” piece by Greg Mankiw headlined “Economists Actually Agree on This: The Wisdom of Free Trade.” In this piece, Mankiw—an economic adviser to George W. Bush and Mitt Romney who writes regularly for the Times—put forward an argument in favor of fast-tracking the TPP and TIPP trade pacts whose logic was so tortured it might shock Dick Cheney.
“The issue at hand,” wrote Mankiw,
is whether Congress will give President Obama “fast track” authority to negotiate a trade deal with our trading partners in the Pacific…. Among economists, the issue is a no-brainer…. Economists are famous for disagreeing with one another…. But economists reach near unanimity on some topics, including international trade.
So all economists are for TPP because TPP is a “free trade” bill and all economists are for “free trade.” Simple, right? The only reason Congress wouldn’t pass fast track, Mankiw suggests, is if politicians listened to voters who were “worse than ignorant about the principles of good policy.”
You would never know, reading Mankiw’s piece, that many economists in fact oppose TPP and fast track. Or that economists can and do reject the characterization of TPP and the like as “free trade” bills. Or that there is no consensus in the economics field that free trade necessarily benefits most people.
These positions advanced by reputable members of his profession disappear as Mankiw dismisses any objections to his argument as “irrational beliefs.”
Some of the prominent economists who oppose TPP, a species that Mankiw pretends doesn’t exist, have in fact been published by the New York Times, like Joseph Stigliz (3/15/14) and Paul Krugman (2/27/14)—both of whom, for what it’s worth, have won the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences.
Unlike Mankiw, both Stiglitz and Krugman acknowledge there are people in the economics profession who disagree with them, and they actually grapple with the arguments of those opponents. Stiglitz, in particular, could be responding directly to Mankiw’s column—if it weren’t for the fact that it was published more than a year later:
Free trade was a central tenet of economics in the discipline’s early years. Yes, there are winners and losers, the theory went, but the winners can always compensate the losers, so that free trade (or even freer trade) is a win-win. This conclusion, unfortunately, is based on numerous assumptions, many of which are simply wrong.
The older theories, for instance, simply ignored risk, and assumed that workers could move seamlessly between jobs. It was assumed that the economy was at full employment, so that workers displaced by globalization would quickly move from low-productivity sectors…to high-productivity sectors. But when there is a high level of unemployment…there can’t be such complacency.
Pretending that there is no serious disagreement to your point of view implies that your point of view can’t stand up to disagreement. Such a pretense may be the best strategy for getting fast track passed—but it does a disservice to democracy, and the New York Times is facilitating an antidemocratic gambit when it allows its economic pundit to disappear serious economic critics of the TPP deal.
You can send a message to the New York Times at letters@nytimes.com, or to public editor Margaret Sullivan at public@nytimes.com. Please remember that respectful communication is the most effective.
See also
Mankiw Mendacity and Morality and his League of Failed Economists
by William Black
http://www.therealnews.com/t2/component/content/article/2362
Right, that was in the Upshot section, belonging to the not too smart “editor” Leonhardt. He think readers fools, who can’t Google a proper name, and that’s just the start.
The Harvard economist as the Times labels him, and he is, also worked for the G. Walker Bush administration and the Romney campaign, as FAIR notes here, but these two facts the Times fails to disclose.
Gee, can’t imagine why Bain Capital types would want more “free” trade deals. Well not, I can think of all sorts of reasons Bain-Romney would want more of these deals.
The New York Times can’t quite seem to face several of America’s critical issues these days, including the already catastrophic results of global warming, the obvious need to outlaw guns in private hands, and the obvious need to prosecute police department murders.
I suspect that somewhere up high on its masthead are a couple of billionaires.
Alex C:
There’s no particular need to outlaw private gun ownership in the US. Finland, Switzerland and Canada get along just fine with guns in private hands. France too.
My guess is that you’ve posted here to be able to generate a “look what liberals believe, they’re coming for our guns,” comment at the likes of FoxNews.
Doug,
Nice link to William Black.
I’m surprised that Black doesn’t make the connection between George Mason U (a state school) and its Mercator Institute, which is heavily backed by the Koch brothers.
Bet the economist from GMU that Mankiw has cited is from Mercator–the Times sure has published Mercator types, sans clear attribution, more than once.
Jay: Good point, but no, I didn’t plant the comment to inflate Fox News airheads. Not to belabor it, but if you do the numbers on projections of U.S. population growth and recent increases in U.S. gun deaths, you might agree that the right to hang substitute erections over the mantle will have to be denied to Americans within the century.
It must be asked of the NYT what it finds favorable in the current proposals in the TPP for the US in a specific applied way. The general application of the concept of free trade must be shown to be useful and capable of being applied with success to be supported — Mankiw has yet to show–his reasons to promise success !!!!!
I followed your suggestion, and emailed the NY Times Letter to the Editor. Here’s the letter.
TO: Letters to the Editor
It is time for The New York Times to report on the Investor State Dispute provisions of the Trans Pacific Partnership.
Unfortunately, your paper has neglected to inform readers about this aspect of the TPP, which would undermine our city, state, and country’s laws, and also make taxpayers pay “damages” when a multinational company claims that laws meant to protect us disallow their “expected profits”.
M.Toro
Brooklyn
Letter sent to NYT:
How is it that the Times can publish such a misleading column like Greg Mankiw’s “Economists Actually Agree on This: The Wisdom of Free Trade” when (a) two Noble laureate economists (Stiglitz and Krugman) have opposed it in your pages and (b) allowing only an up-or-down vote on the TPP makes Congress a rubber stamp with little say on the agreement? Mr. Mankiw’s view that TPP is a “trade bill” is completely naive; based on the scant information we have about what it stipulates (particularly about intellectual property) it encompasses far more than trade. Surely he is aware that passage of TPP could allow global corporations to trump hard-won environmental and worker protections. Does he want to see companies override federal and state statutes and even local ordinances because they stand in the way of maximizing profits?
Why would a US President who has pledged greater transparency classify the text of TPP and insist that Congress not be permitted to change it? If this agreement is so wonderful for all parties involved, why can’t we know what it is before it becomes law? By doing so, the Obama administration seems to be abetting a corporate coup that I and others believe over time will erode democratic processes, further dis-empower workers, and accelerate environmental degradation.
Such a deal. I can’t wait.