"Social Security is structured from the point of view of the recipients as if it were an ordinary retirement plan: what you get out depends on what you put in. So it does not look like a redistributionist scheme. In practice it has turned out to be strongly redistributionist, but only because of its Ponzi game aspect, in which each generation takes more out than it put in. Well, the Ponzi game will soon be over, thanks to changing demographics, so that the typical recipient henceforth will get only about as much as he or she put in (and today’s young may well get less than they put in)."
Like many of his protectionist trade opinions, he used to be right where now he’s wrong. This is from 1997.
(via laliberty)
Krugman has advocated free markets in contexts where they are often viewed as controversial. He has written against rent control in favor of supply and demand,[128] argued that “sweatshops” are preferable to unemployment,[29] challenged minimum wage and living wage laws,[129] likened the opposition against free trade and globalization to the opposition against evolution via natural selection,[130] opposed farm subsidies[131] and mandates, subsidies, and tax breaks for ethanol,[132] questioned NASA’s manned space flights,[133] and written against some aspects of European labor market regulation.[134][135] He once famously quipped that, “If there were an Economist’s Creed, it would surely contain the affirmations ‘I understand the Principle of Comparative Advantage’ and ‘I advocate Free Trade’.”[136][137]
