Arguing with Zombies: Economics, Politics, and the Fight for a Better Future by Paul Krugman

New York Times Bestseller An accessible, compelling introduction to today's major policy issues from the New York Times columnist, best-selling author, and Nobel prize-winning economist Paul Krugman, now with a new preface. There is no better guide than Paul Krugman to basic economics, the ideas that animate much of our public policy. Likewise, there is no stronger foe of zombie economics, the misunderstandings that just won't die. In Arguing with Zombies, Krugman tackles many of these misunderstandings, taking stock of where the United States has come from and where it's headed in a series of concise, digestible chapters. Drawn mainly from his popular New York Times column, they cover a wide range of issues, organized thematically and framed in the context of a wider debate. Explaining the complexities of health care, housing bubbles, tax reform, Social Security, and so much more with unrivaled clarity and precision, Arguing with Zombies is Krugman at the height of his powers. It is an indispensable guide to two decades' worth of political and economic discourse in the United States and around the globe, and now includes a preface on Zombies in the Age of COVID-19. With quick, vivid sketches, Krugman turns his readers into intelligent consumers of the daily news and hands them the keys to unlock the concepts behind the greatest economic policy issues of our time. In doing so, he delivers an instant classic that can serve as a reference point for this and future generations. Editorial Reviews Years after appearing in the daily newspaper, Paul Krugman's columns resonate because he avoids the herd mentality of most journalism. Applying history, math, and humanity, he transforms our understanding of great issues, and when writing on economics translates the dismal science into plain English. - David Cay Johnston A revelation. It showcases the range of Krugman's intellect... and his gift for clear, accessible writing. - Stephanie Mehta 10/14/2019 Nobel Prize-winning economist and liberal pundit Krugman (End This Depression Now!) attacks conservatives' policies--and morals--in these smart, tough essays. Selecting from his New York Times column and other writings, Krugman covers 15 years of zombie ideas that keep shambling along, eating people's brains because they serve the interests of the rich. These include George W. Bush's snake-oil scheme to privatize Social Security, Republican claims that Obamacare isn't working, and conservative dogma that cutting taxes on the wealthy helps the economy. Krugman occasionally resorts to charts and wonkery to refute such pretenses, but mainly exercises his great talent for translating economics into plain English: My spending is your income and your spending is my income, he writes in a critique of recessionary budget cuts. If we both slash spending, both of our incomes fall. Krugman's biting prose impugns character as well as doctrine--the persistence of climate change denial, he asserts, means Republicans don't just have bad ideas; at this point, they are, necessarily, bad people--and sometimes lapses into derangement syndrome, as when he characterizes the GOP as an authoritarian regime in waiting. Progressive partisans will cheer Krugman's plainspoken, bare-knuckled, and persuasive ripostes to conservative orthodoxy. (Jan.) - Publishers Weekly In an era when facts are too often disdained and discarded, Paul Krugman wields them like a rapier. A brilliant scholar and polemicist, Krugman's incisive columns are a beacon for anyone who cares about public policy and progressive change. - David Axelrod 11/01/2019 In this collection, Nobel Prize-winning economist Krugman presents short essays, mostly written since 2003 as columns for The New York Times, as well as several longer pieces. He groups the writings in topical sections covering Social Security, tax reform, health care, trade, inequality, politics, the 2008 financial crisis, and other pertinent subjects. Krugman does not shy away from controversy, and considers zombies to be people who cannot accept that their ideas are factually wrong. In one essay on Social Security, he calls out the Bush Administration for lying about the benefits of privatization. He describes Representative Paul Ryan as the flimflam man, the Trump tax cut as a scam, and Fox News as a Republican propaganda outlet. Though the older essays come across as somewhat dated, they recount the debates of the time, and Krugman updates them with more recent ones along with unifying introductions to each section. His essays before 2004 are included in the 2003 collection The Great Unraveling. VERDICT While Krugman's rousing, jargon-free writings will please progressive readers, they will be disconcerting to many conservative ones. An informative and controversial study combining business and political science.--Lawrence Maxted, Gannon Univ. Lib., Erie, PA - Library Journal Narrator Rob Shapiro delivers long, fluid strokes, perfectly paced to draw the listener into Paul Krugman's latest compilation of columns, blog posts, and essays on macroeconomics. Shapiro captures Krugman's passion for explaining the economic implications of political actions. His warm tones breathe life into zombie economics, the ins and outs of the housing bubble, recessions, depressions, and periods of prosperity. Arranged by topic, the columns span 2004 through late 2019, reaching back as far as the Great Depression to provide historical, political, and economic context, during the Reagan, Clinton, Bush, Obama, and Trump administrations. Listeners are treated to the author's passionate reading of the foreword, a tone that is capably echoed by Shapiro throughout the rest of the audiobook. M.B.K. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine - FEBRUARY 2020 - AudioFile Narrator Rob Shapiro delivers long, fluid strokes, perfectly paced to draw the listener into Paul Krugman's latest compilation of columns, blog posts, and essays on macroeconomics. Shapiro captures Krugman's passion for explaining the economic implications of political actions. His warm tones breathe life into zombie economics, the ins and outs of the housing bubble, recessions, depressions, and periods of prosperity. Arranged by topic, the columns span 2004 through late 2019, reaching back as far as the Great Depression to provide historical, political, and economic context, during the Reagan, Clinton, Bush, Obama, and Trump administrations. Listeners are treated to the author's passionate reading of the foreword, a tone that is capably echoed by Shapiro throughout the rest of the audiobook. M.B.K. Winner of AudioFile Earphones Award AudioFile 2020, Portland, Maine - FEBRUARY 2020 - AudioFile 2019-09-25 Penetrating analyses of urgent, controversial problems. Krugman (Economics/City Univ. of New York; End This Depression Now!, 2012, etc.), winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, gathers more than 90 articles, most from his New York Times columns, lucidly explaining often confounding economic issues. Prefacing each of 18 sections with a cogent overview, the author takes on topics that include social security, health care, the 2008 financial crisis and its aftermath (essays that comprise more than a third of the book), the myths of austerity, Europe's economic problems, tax cuts, trade wars, inequality, climate change, and, not least, the damage being inflicted by Donald Trump and his enablers. Many of the pieces are hard-hitting arguments against zombie ideas, an idea that should have been killed by evidence, but refuses to die. Zombie ideas, Krugman asserts, are put forth by influential people who move in circles in which repeating such ideas is a badge of seriousness, an assertion of tribal identity. Alternatively, ideas such as climate change denial, which persist despite prolific evidence, are better described as cockroach ideas--false claims you may think you've gotten rid of, but keep coming back. There are plenty of villains in Krugman's crosshairs: the anti-labor extremist Brett Kavanaugh, flimflam man Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, Bernie Madoff, George W. Bush and his fraudulent march to war, and Ronald Reagan, to name a few. Many essays focus on the current president. It's not just that Trump has assembled an administration of the worst and dimmest, writes the author. The truth is that the modern GOP doesn't want to hear from serious economists, whatever their politics. It prefers charlatans and cranks, who are its kind of people. Krugman is a serious economist who detailed his intellectual focus and style in a 1993 essay, How I Work. He cites four rules that guide his research: listen to intelligent views; question the question; dare to be silly; and simplify, simplify. All serve him--and his readers--admirably. Shrewd, witty, informed essays that are much needed in our anti-intellectual age. - Kirkus Reviews