Burgery in Progress!

Econ Prof Steve Landsburg recently waxed wroth about internet trolls who spend time refuting arguments others never made. Since I think that the gentleman himself tends to indulge in that sort of rhetoric whenever his mind turns to Paul Krugman - pretty often - I thought it only fitting to honor him with the eponymn. It only took a couple of days before he provided us another example: a veritable (Lands)burgery in progress.

The subject of this particular burg is the following graph due to Paul Krugman.


Bear in mind that Krugman is responding to those who said government spending exploded after Obama took office, is explicitly considering only the time after the fall of Lehman (Sept 15, 2008), and is considering all government (federal, state, and local) spending. Krugman points out that there is no explosion of spending in 2009, despite the ramp up of countercyclical programs like unemployment insurance.

Next the critique:


Now, what I’m seeing here is something like a 25% increase in spending under the Bush/Obama policies of the past four years. Which makes me wonder exactly what it would take to count as a surge in Krugman-land.

Notice how the "Burg" has changed the subject from Obama to the mythical President Bush/Obama, and the time period from the last two years to the last almost five. This is textbook burgery, but he isn't done. It seems that some people noticed his change of subject. What to do? Pivot and change the subject again! This time to federal spending only, which, as Krugman has mentioned, has surged in the stimulus and other programs - a surge which has largely been matched by the collaspe in expenditures by state and local governments. Bravo: the Burgmeister is still master of his domain.

If you go to the source at the St. Louis Fed you can gin up a thirty year history of federal spending, which shows a steep but roughly linear increase in the 12 years of Reagan and Bush I, a levelling off in the Clinton years, and an exponential increase beginning with Bush II and continuing to present.

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