This is a great example. I'm glad he spelled out the Hayek point.
His blog is kind of like a mini-NY times column. There's not the interaction with readers that other blogs have, so it's a way of posting quick thoughts. That's not the dynamic on my blog, for example.
That means he'll write quick dismissals of Hayek and The Road to Serfdom sometimes - he's sharing his view after all.
The usual suspects cry bloody murder and just assume Krugman is in the dark. He's not that naïve, and this is a good example. He knows there are counter arguments. He's read them. He evaluates them to be weak, and the point of "well what was his point?" that Krugman makes is a good one. "Welfare states will go Stalinist unless people keep them from going Stalinist" is a pretty vacuous statement as an analytical statement (if it's a call to action or something like that it's less vacuous, but RTS is usually treated like an insightful analytic statement about the modern welfare state).
I for one try to avoid talking about RTS because I honestly don't feel like I can get a straight answer from anyone. When they are arguing against critics they it doesn't argue welfare states go Stalinist, but when talking amongst themselves that always seems to be what they think it does say. And it's impossible to discuss the book without getting accused of arguing in bad faith by someone, so I avoid that and talk about other things Hayek has written that don't raise quite the same hackles.
Add this to his discussion the other day about price distortions, and I think people need to start accepting he's not as naïve as some people suggest.
He just thinks you're wrong.
Tuesday, April 2, 2013
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It's enormous that you are getting thoughts from this paragraph as well as from our argument made at this place.
ReplyDeleteAlso visit my webpage ... traffic lawyer in NJ
So DK when Krugman writes "Three generations into the modern welfare state, and western democracies look less Stalinist than ever" how am I supposed to take that since he is not as naive as I used to think he was? Since you can read his mind, how does he measure "Stalinist" on a scale? What makes him think that today we are the least Stalinist we have ever been?
ReplyDeleteP.S. If he were a holder of GM bonds circa 2009, he would think we have gotten pretty Stalinist (read, government takes on the behalf of favored elites - unions in this case).
You're under a bizarre misconception. In fact I can't read his mind.
DeleteThink about things from his perspective, give it some though, see what you come up with, and feel free to come back and comment any time.
Pemakin: "Stalinist (read, government takes on the behalf of favored elites - unions in this case)"
DeleteSounds like you are too young to remember Stalin, Man of Steel. Sounds like you don't know what elites are, either.
DK, I was being provocative with the "read his mind" comment. If you read his paragraph carefully, he is not just saying Hayek was wrong when he linked the welfare state with the slippery slope to Stalinism (I agree with that pretty much) but in fact is saying he got it backward. He is saying that as the welfare state has progressed over 75 years we are today less Stalinist than ever. I know of no evidence that supports that observation, do you? Were we a " little Stalinist" under Roosevelt, and not today? How about Reagan? My point is that statement, to use your words, is pretty vacuous.
DeleteMin, yes, like much of the population, I was not alive when Stalin was. However, I was assuming neither Hayek (if he ever claimed this) or Krugman were referring to those elements of Stalinism. And, I fully understand the leadership of the UAW to be elites, if you don't you are the naive one.
We are definitely less "Stalinist" (obviously we all know that's a blunt term, but we have to take what he gives us). Seventy five years ago power as much more centralized in the "right" people. Women, minorities, and various lifestyle minorities are much fuller participants in society and democracy today. Broad participation in social processes is not the only definition of non-totalitarianism but it's a good one.
DeleteThe welfare state has allowed all sorts of people to access leveling technologies (the IT revolution) and institutions (principally education). And has the welfare state narrowed the franchise? No, the biggest threats to recentralizing political power have come from people who oppose the welfare state.
No, I don't think the clam of his is vacuous at all.
I like the image of a vacuous clam. ;)
DeleteDK, it never occured to me that Krugman would use the term "less Stalinist" to mean just more broadly participatory society. But fair enough. However, isn't the only relevant question what Hayek would have meant when (if) he used the term? It seems to me that definition would not have been his first.
DeleteHmm, I never got the impression from RTS that Hayek was arguing that social welfare policies automatically lead to totalitarianism, so that is at best a gross mischaracterization. Also, does the word Stalinism ever come up in RTS? For the most part Hayek talks about Nazism in fact because he is trying to be politic about such things at a time when Britain and the USSR are still allies. So the fact that Krugman uses the word Stalinism tells me that he's prolly never read RTS.
ReplyDeletePlease read the Krugman post again. I think you are inserting the gross mischaracterization here. He did not say that Hayek argued it "automatically" lead to socialism.
DeleteI think you're making too much of the use of the term "Stalinism" in the post.
Anyway, this is one of Krugman's dumbest columns, not that Krugman is alone in arguing dumb things about the RTS or Hayek generally. That's something which stretches across the political spectrum I'm afraid.
ReplyDeleteOr to quote Hayek from RTS:
ReplyDelete"There is no reason why, in a society which has reached the general level of wealth ours has, the first kind of security should not be guaranteed to all without endangering general freedom; that is: some minimum of food, shelter and clothing, sufficient to preserve health. Nor is there any reason why the state should not help to organize a comprehensive system of social insurance in providing for those common hazards of life against which few can make adequate provision." _The Road To Serfdom_, pg. 124
Now throughout the RTS (if you anyone ever cares to read it), Hayek does have a few themes that he pounds away at, centralized planning, competition and prices being three of the most important. From what I can tell from Krugman's comments his understanding of RTS rivals that of Glenn Beck.
LSB
DeleteWhy do you troll here instead of Glen Becks's sound stage or whatever.
If Beck is so wrong in his portrayal of Hayek, why hasn't Hayek come back from the dead to smite him. Or, better yet, why don't you go get a sign and march in front of Beck's offices and production facilities, chanting, Beck Lies!!!!
LSB
DeleteWhy do you troll here instead of Glen Becks's sound stage or whatever.
If Beck is so wrong in his portrayal of Hayek, why hasn't Hayek come back from the dead to smite him. Or, better yet, why don't you go get a sign and march in front of Beck's offices and production facilities, chanting, Beck Lies!!!!
If you presented the quote from Hayek to most Republicans or Libertarians without disclosing it came from Hayek they would denounce it as a dangerous socialist doctrine.
Delete...unless he was talking about Pinochet :)
Delete