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Given Krugman's history of predicting the future (i.e. saying the internet was incremental like the fax), I view his endorsement as an indictment of the book

• panarky 10y ago
  Krugman was also a very lonely voice going against conventional wisdom and time has proven him right on some big bets. Contrarian Call #1 - He called bullshit on the rationale for the Iraq war very early. Contrarian Call #2 - His models showed that the stimulus and bailouts after the financial collapse would not cause runaway inflation. If you read his review of the book (not an endorsement) you'll see that it's Contrarian Call #3 -- that maybe the bulk of productivity improvements from the internet have already been achieved. Let's discuss the ideas, evidence and models, not take ad hominem shortcuts.
  • nickff 10y ago
    To clarify your criticism, the definition of ad hominiem (from Wikipedia) is: "argumentum ad hominem, is a logical fallacy in which an argument is rebutted by attacking the character, motive, or other attribute of the person making the argument...". I criticized him as having a bad history of predicting things (not his personality, position, or viewpoint), and history is the best predictor of future performance. Krugman said that the internet was similar to the fax (back in the 1990s), and was wrong; however, I will grant that Krugman may not be as bad as other NYT columnists. Krugman, circa 1995: "By 2005 or so, it will become clear that the Internet's impact on the economy has been no greater than the fax machine's."