My CBPP colleague Chuck Marr flags something important from a recent press release by Rep. Dave Camp, the Republican Chair of the tax writing committee in the House.
Lew Daly has an interesting, but unfortunately misdirected, critique of the measurement of the public sector’s contribution to GDP. He notes several areas, such as infrastructure and education spending, where the government contributes to our well-being, but which are not directly picked up in GDP as contributions from the government. While the point is true, the piece fundamentally mistakes what GDP is and also grossly understates the government’s role in the economy. Continue reading Dean Baker: GDP and the Public Sector | CEPR→
For much of the past five years readers of the political and economic news were left in little doubt that budget deficits and rising debt were the most important issue facing America. Serious people constantly issued dire warnings that the United States risked turning into another Greece any day now. President Obama appointed a special, bipartisan commission to propose solutions to the alleged fiscal crisis, and spent much of his first term trying to negotiate a Grand Bargain on the budget with Republicans.
That bargain never happened, because Republicans refused to consider any deal that raised taxes. Nonetheless, debt and deficits have faded from the news. And there’s a good reason for that disappearing act: The whole thing turns out to have been a false alarm.
