And yet, a century and a half after Bastiat demolished the Broken Window Fallacy, our politicians, the public, and the official economists still think that massive government spending (aka destruction of savings) will improve the economy.
I honestly don't get it. For some reason, the same mistake is repeated over and over again, with the same failed result, yet, you still hear it stated as fact on a daily basis -- "We have to increase spending [or not cut it] so as to stimulate economic growth."
You'd think people -- economists, at least -- would think, "Well, damn, they tried that in Japan and it didn't work" or "There was that trillion in 2009, and look where we are now!"
Unfortunately, even trained economists can get so dug in to a position that they're blind to outcomes that don't agree with the pre-fabricated agenda.
It is really time we stopped hoping for a rumored space alien invasion as a solution to our economic woes. Keynes never intended these kinds of asinine interpretations of his philosophy and certainly wouldn't have approved of the attachment of his name to what we're doing these days. |
