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IPFS News Link • Economy - Economics USA

Paul Krugman is Wrong Again

• https://news.bitcoin.com

Paul Krugman, the famed economist who's made a career out of being wrong about things, is wrong again. That in itself is no more surprising than the fact that his latest op-ed takes aim at his favorite bête noire – bitcoin. The surprising part is that Krugman has resorted to the same hackneyed arguments he always uses to attack cryptocurrency. It's an odd decision from such a learned scholar when there are far more lethal lines of attack for a crypto sceptic to take.

Krugman Swings and Misses

Paul Krugman Is Excited to See Bitcoin Have Issues

In 1998 Paul Krugman famously predicted: "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." On the rise of communication networks (read social media) he said they'll fail because: "most people have nothing to say to each other". Now he is at it again, but with Bitcoin.

"Beware that, when fighting monsters, you yourself do not become a monster," Nietzsche warned, "for when you gaze long into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." Bitcoin is Paul Krugman's monster, and despite having swung at it repeatedly over the years, he's yet to strike a meaningful blow. In an op-ed published in the NYT today, Krugman outlines, for the umpteenth time, why he's a crypto cynic.

Cynics, for all their doom and gloom, are a welcome antidote to the mindless euphoria, shilling, and moon predictions that pervade the crypto space. Paul Krugman, therefore, is perfectly entitled to take issue with bitcoin. But why has he chosen to attack the very things that make bitcoin so appealing? It's astonishing how many times someone can be wrong in the course of a single article – and one penned by a Distinguished Professor of Economics, no less. Either Paul Krugman is the world's subtlest troll or he's the world's most benighted professor of economics.

Paul Krugman vs Reality

Here's a sample of what Paul Krugman has to say during the course of his NYT op-ed:

PK: "Instead of near-frictionless transactions [with fiat], we have high costs of doing business, because transferring a Bitcoin or other cryptocurrency unit requires providing a complete history of past transactions."


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