Paul Krugman, "Inequality and the City": Establish a New Federal Agency?

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In a New York Times op-ed entitled "Inequality and the City," Paul Krugman praises the amenities of New York City, while deploring the rising price of housing, which is becoming unaffordable for the less affluent. Krugman writes:

"New York, New York, a helluva town. The rents are up, but the crime rate is down. The food is better than ever, and the cultural scene is vibrant. Truly, it’s a golden age for the town I recently moved to — if you can afford the housing. But more and more people can’t.

And it’s not just New York. The days when dystopian images of urban decline were pervasive in popular culture — remember the movie 'Escape from New York'? — are long past. The story for many of our iconic cities is, instead, one of gentrification, a process that’s obvious to the naked eye, and increasingly visible in the data."

Krugman's concludes:

"New York City can’t do much if anything about soaring inequality of incomes, but it could do a lot to increase the supply of housing, and thereby ensure that the inward migration of the elite doesn’t drive out everyone else."

Okay, New York City has grown expensive, but what about Detroit? In a July 30, 2015 CNBC article entitled "Detroit: A tale of two housing markets," Diana Olick writes:

"Bidding wars, more competition, better listings—Detroit housing is having a banner summer, Detroit suburban housing that is. Unlike so many other major metropolitan markets, Detroit's downtown is seeing no renaissance at all, at least not yet.

. . . .

The comparison is stark: The median home price in downtown is just $21,102 versus a median price of $162,900 in the suburbs, according to Realcomp, the area's multiple listing service."

Or stated otherwise, Detroit bears no resemblance to New York City.

And Baltimore? Whereas the crime rate is down in NYC, Baltimore was more akin to a warzone in April of this year, following the death of Freddie Gray.

But more to the point, if we take Krugman's argument one baby step further: Should a new government agency monitor the ebb and flow of real estate prices and mandate the construction of low income housing where the more prosperous reside, e.g., in the suburbs of Detroit, thereby bringing the less affluent closer to those same employment opportunities being offered by General Dynamics, Delphi and BorgWarner?

Just asking.

[On the subject of Krugman and income inequality, you might be interested in having a look at a July 1, 2015 Daily Caller article entitled "Paul Krugman Sticks It To Poor People With $225,000 Salary To Study Income Inequality" by Eric Owens.]

Gail Collins, "New York Has a Message": The Rotten Apple

"They published my letter! Here it is, 'A lesbian no more'!

- Freddie Bauer played by John Candy, "Splash," 1984

Gail Collins, eager to ignore Obama's Syria imbroglio (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.co.il/2013/09/vladimir-putin-plea-for-caution-from.html), would instead draw our attention to the New York City mayoral race. In her latest New York Times op-ed entitled "New York Has a Message" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/12/opinion/collins-new-york-has-a-message.html?_r=0), Collins writes:

"New York is capable of providing large thoughts that do not concern sex. One of them involves Bill de Blasio, who zoomed from nowhere into first place in the race for the Democratic mayoral nomination."

Well, not quite. You will recall that Bill de Blasio married a woman, who for years openly identified as a lesbian (see: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/election/de-blasio-wife-chirlane-mccray-talks-lesbian-article-1.1339398).

Yes, when I left the party at the Kremlin very early this morning - vodka was spilling over the floor after the Times published Putin's opinion piece - they were also roaring with laughter at the Weiner/Quinn/de Blasio primary, which one former KGB functionary quipped was more entertaining than anything currently being offered on Broadway. No, Putin and friends don't care for anything having to do with homosexuality.

And the New York mayoral primary was almost as amusing for them as revelations that a "D.C. businessman at the center of an ongoing city corruption investigation secretly spent more than a half-million dollars on get-out-the-vote efforts for Hillary Rodham Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign" (http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/new-charge-in-campaign-finance-investigation-into-dc-businessman-jeffrey-thompson/2013/09/11/c89cb2e2-1af6-11e3-82ef-a059e54c49d0_story.html?hpid=z1).

Why am I not laughing?

Gail Collins, "Off to the Mayoral Races": Animal Protection? What About Human Protection?

No matter what else is happening in the world, Gail Collins loves a good animal story. You will recall how she made the matter of "dog on the car roof" central to her commentary during the 2012 US presidential campaign. Well, today Gail is back with another highly relevant animal story, which should put her in line for a Pulitzer.

In her latest New York Times op-ed entitled "Off to the Mayoral Races" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/05/opinion/collins-off-to-the-mayoral-races.html?_r=0), Gail writes of the New York mayoral election:

"And don’t discount the Central Park carriage horses. Animal rights advocates have long yearned to abolish the industry, and Quinn is the only major Democrat who disagrees. The horses are very well-protected by regulation — they have to have five weeks of out-of-town vacation a year. French workers do not have as good a holiday package as the Central Park carriage horses. However, they do have to walk through traffic, which makes many people uncomfortable.

The horses became a huge issue early in the campaign, when there was an entire mayoral forum devoted to the subject of animal protection."

I care deeply about animal rights and contribute every year to animal protection organizations.

But apparently unbeknownst to Gail, there is also this other current issue involving human rights, i.e. the murder on August 21 of nearly 1,500 civilians by the Assad regime using sarin gas. An opinion from Gail on the matter or on Obama's flaccid "red line"? Too controversial. She would rather tell us about Dante de Blasio's "spectacular Afro."

What, Gail doesn't deserve a Pulitzer for this masterpiece? Heck, if Obama merited the Nobel Peace Prize, Gail should be at the front of the Pulitzer list by several lengths.

Paul Krugman, "Detroit, the New Greece": Shit Happens

Bumper Sticker Guy: [running after Forrest] Hey man! Hey listen, I was wondering if you might help me. 'Cause I'm in the bumper sticker business and I've been trying to think of a good slogan, and since you've been such a big inspiration to the people around here I thought you might be able to help me jump into - WOAH! Man, you just ran through a big pile of dog shit!

Forrest Gump: It happens.

Bumper Sticker guy: What, shit?

Forrest Gump: Sometimes.

- "Forrest Gump," 1994

Earlier this month, Paul Krugman, in a New York Times op-ed entitled "War On the Unemployed" (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.co.il/2013/07/paul-krugman-war-on-unemployed-what.html), blamed hard-hearted Republicans for slashing North Carolina's unemployment benefits in order to avoid a fiscal disaster. Krugman didn't bother to observe that North Carolina's federal debt is the third largest in the country.  Krugman also didn't consider North Carolina's unfunded retiree health care benefits totaling some $34 billion.

How would Krugman have North Carolina repay this debt? Perhaps we'll never know. What we do know is that states can't print their own money like the federal government. States also can't file for bankruptcy.

Cities, however, can file for bankruptcy.

Today in a Times op-ed entitled "Detroit, the New Greece" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/22/opinion/krugman-detroit-the-new-greece.html?_r=0), Krugman begins by reminding us of Greece's recent financial crisis:

"As you may recall, a few years ago Greece plunged into fiscal crisis. This was a bad thing but should have had limited effects on the rest of the world; the Greek economy is, after all, quite small (actually, about one and a half times as big as the economy of metropolitan Detroit). Unfortunately, many politicians and policy makers used the Greek crisis to hijack the debate, changing the subject from job creation to fiscal rectitude."

Or in other words, Krugman would have us believe that Greece was a small isolated situation, having little impact on the larger European whole. Of course, in order to make this argument, Krugman needs to avoid any reference to the worrisome economies of Spain, Italy, Ireland and Portugal, or even, for that matter, of the UK.

Krugman would then also have us believe that Detroit's bankruptcy is an isolated incident involving economic (car industry) misfortune. Paul concludes:

"The important thing is not to let the discussion get hijacked, Greek-style. There are influential people out there who would like you to believe that Detroit’s demise is fundamentally a tale of fiscal irresponsibility and/or greedy public employees. It isn’t. For the most part, it’s just one of those things that happens now and then in an ever-changing economy."

Or in other words, "Shit happens." No need to examine the fiscal travails of other municipalities such as Washington, D.C, Chicago, Cincinatti and . . . New York.

Well, just by chance, Bill Keller has conveniently published today a Times op-ed entitled "New York Is Not Detroit. But ..." (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/22/opinion/keller-new-york-is-not-detroit-but.html?pagewanted=all), in which he says of the Big Apple:

"Our great city is not on the verge of collapse — we are not Detroit — but it is in danger of slipping into decline. The issue is the same one that helped send Detroit toward bankruptcy last week and has put other American cities on the disabled list: the immense pile of promises made over the decades to the city’s employees — the teachers and cops and firefighters and bus drivers and sanitation workers and maintenance crews who labor to keep the city, physically and socially, in working order."

Keller refers to "a trifecta of problems" plaguing New York: public workers' salaries, health benefits and pensions. Keller continues:

"Or, to pick another measure of our predicament, the total liabilities of the city now exceed its total assets by $125 billion, a condition referred to as balance-sheet insolvency.

. . . .

In New York and many other places, the preferred option has been to kick the problem down the road. You do not have to be an actuary to marvel at the amount of flimflam politicians at all levels on all sides have employed to avoid facing the problem. My personal favorite: Are we having a hard time coming up with money for our annual payment into the New York State teachers’ pension fund? No problem. Thanks to a gimmick invented in Albany, we just borrow the money — from the pension fund!

. . . .

But while New York is in better shape than many other troubled states and localities, the situation is still insidious."

Query: If New York ultimately slashes benefits to municipal employees, will Krugman find a way to blame the Republicans? Or will he note the departure of many financial firms from the crumbling city and again tell us that shit happens.

New York Times Editorial: "More Overreach by the N.Y.P.D.": Who Is Causing Whom "Suspicion and Mistrust"?

In an editorial entitled "More Overreach by the N.Y.P.D." (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/24/opinion/more-overreach-by-the-nypd.html?_r=0), The New York Times takes the NYPD to task for installing a surveillance camera at the entrance to a mosque in New York City. The editorial concludes:

"Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly has responded to such complaints by insisting that the department’s surveillance program is perfectly legal and implying that critics are undermining public safety. This is the same response he offers when challenged on the stop-and-frisk program. This arrogant approach tries to discredit legitimate criticism while justifying further overreach by a department with a history of abusive behavior. It is up to the courts to determine whether the Muslim surveillance program and the stop-and-frisk program are constitutional. What already seems clear is that these surveillance policies create suspicion and mistrust, which does not help the Police Department or anyone else."

Needless to say, the editorial does not make mention of a recent Pew Research Center survey (http://www.pewforum.org/Muslim/the-worlds-muslims-religion-politics-society-exec.aspx), which determined:

"Few U.S. Muslims voice support for suicide bombing or other forms of violence against civilians in the name of Islam; 81% say such acts are never justified, while fewer than one-in-ten say violence against civilians either is often justified (1%) or is sometimes justified (7%) to defend Islam."

Only 1% of US Muslims "say violence against civilians is often justified," and only 7% say that such violence "is sometimes justified"? These numbers are astonishing.

Recently, we have heard repeatedly from left-leaning pundits, e.g., Thomas Friedman, who are willing to endure NSA surveillance of their phone calls, e-mails and Internet surfing to prevent another 9/11 (see: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-calderone/tom-friedman-9-11-new-york-times_b_3429219.html).

But surveillance of mosques? How horrifying! How politically incorrect!

Query: Who Is Causing Whom "Suspicion and Mistrust"? Hint: It's not a corpulent, intellectually challenged (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.co.il/2013/06/thomas-friedman-postcard-from-turkey.html) Thomas Friedman.

Yes, I'm mad. How mad? I'm not "mad enough" to go see "World War Z" (see: http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.co.il/2013/06/maureen-dowd-zombie-scare-with-zombie.html), but consider the enduring relevance of "Network" from 1976: "I'm mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!"