<p>What seminar does Krugman teach? I was just watching a clip of him giving a speech at the Miami Book fair and he was so extremely biased to the liberal point of view. It seemed as if he was just bashing the Bush administration. He seemed pretty bitter about the election. Does his political beliefs dominate his classes? I want to major in Fin. Engineering or Econ. I'm no hardcore conservative, but I see myself as a Moderate to a Republican. I'm not sure I'd be able to put up with his class if he's just hostile towards republicans.</p>
<p>He lambasts anyone whose economic policies don't make sense to him, not just Republicans. It's just because Republicans are in power that they're taking a lot of heat. And it's because Bush is in power that a lot of the policies he's against, such as privatizing social security, might actually get through. Try to understand Republican finances before you stand behind them, because he makes a lot of good points in his opeds in the NYTimes. Supporting the party on every issue, especially with the economy, is simply rather stupid.</p>
<p>If there is a supposed "liberal" bias, then just about every faculty member at Princeton can be considered liberal, with the noticeable exception of a few.</p>
<p>How is privatising social security bad?</p>
<p>He makes a pretty good case. Privatizing simply offers too few benefits at the cost of handing over millions to investment companies. When overhead soars from 1% to 20%, you can see why Wall Street is so anxious for Bush to privatize social security, even though they claim the financial windfall won't be that large.</p>
<p>Apparently all students of ECO 101 are taught to analyze real world cases using simple macroeconomics -- Wall Street Journal's articles apparently have been found to have numerous errors (more like biases).</p>
<p>Full Text for those who don't want to register</p>
<hr>
<p>Buying Into Failure
By PAUL KRUGMAN </p>
<p>As the Bush administration tries to persuade America to convert Social Security into a giant 401(k), we can learn a lot from other countries that have already gone down that road.</p>
<p>Information about other countries' experience with privatization isn't hard to find. For example, the Century Foundation, at <a href="http://www.tcf.org%5B/url%5D">www.tcf.org</a>, provides a wide range of links.</p>
<p>Yet, aside from giving the Cato Institute and other organizations promoting Social Security privatization the space to present upbeat tales from Chile, the U.S. news media have provided their readers and viewers with little information about international experience. In particular, the public hasn't been let in on two open secrets:</p>
<p>Privatization dissipates a large fraction of workers' contributions on fees to investment companies.</p>
<p>It leaves many retirees in poverty.</p>
<p>Decades of conservative marketing have convinced Americans that government programs always create bloated bureaucracies, while the private sector is always lean and efficient. But when it comes to retirement security, the opposite is true. More than 99 percent of Social Security's revenues go toward benefits, and less than 1 percent for overhead. In Chile's system, management fees are around 20 times as high. And that's a typical number for privatized systems. </p>
<p>These fees cut sharply into the returns individuals can expect on their accounts. In Britain, which has had a privatized system since the days of Margaret Thatcher, alarm over the large fees charged by some investment companies eventually led government regulators to impose a "charge cap." Even so, fees continue to take a large bite out of British retirement savings.</p>
<p>A reasonable prediction for the real rate of return on personal accounts in the U.S. is 4 percent or less. If we introduce a system with British-level management fees, net returns to workers will be reduced by more than a quarter. Add in deep cuts in guaranteed benefits and a big increase in risk, and we're looking at a "reform" that hurts everyone except the investment industry.</p>
<p>Advocates insist that a privatized U.S. system can keep expenses much lower. It's true that costs will be low if investments are restricted to low-overhead index funds - that is, if government officials, not individuals, make the investment decisions. But if that's how the system works, the suggestions that workers will have control over their own money - two years ago, Cato renamed its Project on Social Security Privatization by replacing "privatization" with "choice" - are false advertising. </p>
<p>And if there are rules restricting workers to low-expense investments, investment industry lobbyists will try to get those rules overturned. </p>
<p>For the record, I don't think giving financial corporations a huge windfall is the main motive for privatization; it's mostly an ideological thing. But that windfall is a major reason Wall Street wants privatization, and everyone else should be very suspicious.</p>
<p>Then there's the issue of poverty among the elderly.</p>
<p>Privatizers who laud the Chilean system never mention that it has yet to deliver on its promise to reduce government spending. More than 20 years after the system was created, the government is still pouring in money. Why? Because, as a Federal Reserve study puts it, the Chilean government must "provide subsidies for workers failing to accumulate enough capital to provide a minimum pension." In other words, privatization would have condemned many retirees to dire poverty, and the government stepped back in to save them.</p>
<p>The same thing is happening in Britain. Its Pensions Commission warns that those who think Mrs. Thatcher's privatization solved the pension problem are living in a "fool's paradise." A lot of additional government spending will be required to avoid the return of widespread poverty among the elderly - a problem that Britain, like the U.S., thought it had solved.</p>
<p>Britain's experience is directly relevant to the Bush administration's plans. If current hints are an indication, the final plan will probably claim to save money in the future by reducing guaranteed Social Security benefits. These savings will be an illusion: 20 years from now, an American version of Britain's commission will warn that big additional government spending is needed to avert a looming surge in poverty among retirees. </p>
<p>So the Bush administration wants to scrap a retirement system that works, and can be made financially sound for generations to come with modest reforms. Instead, it wants to buy into failure, emulating systems that, when tried elsewhere, have neither saved money nor protected the elderly from poverty. </p>
<p>E-mail: <a href="mailto:krugman@nytimes.com">krugman@nytimes.com</a></p>
<p>How does he respond when students question his policies and share their own beliefs with him? or are students too intimidated to disagree if their grade is on the line?</p>
<p>As far as I know, professors are very nice and will be glad to debate and discuss issues. Unfortunately, it seems like he thinks, with good reason, that Bush's economical policies are just not good.</p>
<p>Seminars are for discussion, not for lecture. Alternate viewpoints are certainly discussed all the time.</p>
<p>He dislikes Bush a great extent for his steel tariffs, which is a protectionist policy that should be looked down upon by most conservatives. Unlike many popular media figures, he doesn't look at an administration and just go against it. He has certain viewpoints and beliefs about what is best for the economy and society, and is upset whenever anyone strays from his guidelines.</p>
<p>And on privatization of social security...ugh. We already have the power to invest in mutual funds with our pocket incomes. It is impossible for everyone to make a profit on their investments - there will always be some people taking losses, so who will take care of those people who invest in unstable stocks and junk bonds?</p>
<p>An idea that was suggested is that the government uses its financial analysts to invest in mutual funds etc. based on their expertise, which is basically just hypocritical. </p>
<p>It's one of those lose-lose situations that have haunted politics for centuries.</p>
<p>he's certainly liberal and I've heard his classes are too. But there are conservatives at P-town who teach conservative courses, like Robby George</p>
<p>The way I see it if you <em>#$</em> up with your own money, that's your problem.</p>
<p>yeah, he is definetely liberal, but not everything he says adheres to one philosophy. I have no idea what he believes on social issues. However, I wouldn't say he is anti-Bush, he is just anti-Bush policies. Do you think thats a fair thing to say?</p>
<p>If you mess up with your money, let it be only a certain portion of your money like it is now. Not all of your money - money that could otherwise be used for unemployment benefits, healthcare, social security, etc. And remember, if you privatize social security in the way currently being discussed, you are mandated to invest it in the financial systems. You can't just use that money to buy a new TV or anything, so it is still not exactly YOUR money.</p>
<p>Still, I guess its OK to support either of the diverging standpoints as long as it makes more sense to you.</p>
<p>Being a huge Krugman column fan, I will try to remain is impartial as I can in this post. From what I know about Krugman, the classes he teaches focus on different issues than what he writes about in his columns. Like you mentioned before, he in his articles he focuses on things like criticism of privitization of social security, criticism of supply side economics and the bush tax cuts, the twin deficits and and how they affect the value of the dollar and interest rates, as well as aggretate demand or "bang for the buck" generated from the tax cuts. As a professor, however, he is renowned for his work in the field of global economics and world trade(which I believe are the only classes he teaches). He is well known for publishing books like The New Trade Theory, The Return to Depression Economics, and numerous text books on international economics. The research he conducted on world trade earned him the John Bates Clark Medal, awarded to the best American economist under the age of forty.</p>
<p>Now I've never actually heard anything about whether Krugman is a biased professor or not, but based on some of his work's I've read, I find it highly unlikely. Peddling Prosperity and The Age of Diminished Expectations(sorry, I don't know how to underline) were written back when he was a professor at MIT and didn't publish a weekly column. In these books, he offers a normative analysis of the attack on Keynesian economics, the ideas of Milton Friedman, Martin Feldstein, and Arthur Laffer, how the supply-side policies of the 80's affected growth, inflation, unemployment, and the distribution of income, and finally Clinton and the strategic traders. These books are intended for econ students or people what want to learn more about economics. In them there is really no hint of left or right bias. Krugman's NY Times column is an op-ed, and by definition he is supposed to express his opinions on the current fiscal policies of this administration. So based on his books(excluding The Great Unraveling) that are more geared toward people wanting to learn more about economics, I'd guess that the style of his lectures are similar to these writings.</p>
<p>I am a big fan of Krugman's columns, but In this post I will try to focus on his merit as a professor. From what I know about Krugman, the classes he teaches focus on different issues from what he writes about in his columns. Like you mentioned before, in his articles he focuses on things like criticism of privitization of social security, criticism of supply side economics and the bush tax cuts, the twin deficits and and how they affect the value of the dollar and interest rates, and well as aggretate demand or "bang for the buck" generated from the tax cuts. As a professor, however, he is renowned for his work in the field of global economics and world trade(which I believe are the only classes he teaches at Princeton). He is well known for publishing books like The New Trade Theory, The Return to Depression Economics, and numerous textbooks on international economics. These books are used in college level econ classes by conservative and liberal professors alike. The research he conducted on world trade earned him the John Bates Clark Medal, awarded to the best American economist under the age of forty. So obviously, whether or not his lectures are biased, his credentials</p>
<p>I don't actually know anyone who has Krugman who can tell me about his teaching style, but based on some of his work's I've read, I find it highly unlikely that his class is slanted toward the left. Peddling Prosperity and The Age of Diminished Expectations(sorry, I don't know how to underline) were written back when he was a professor at MIT. These books are intended for econ students and people what want to learn more about economics without the slant of and op-ed column. In them there is really no hint of bias. In Peddling Prosperity, he offers a normative analysis of the attack on Keynesian economics, the ideas of Milton Friedman, Martin Feldstein, and Arthur Laffer, how the supply-side policies of the 80's affected growth, inflation, unemployment, and the distribution of income, and finally Clinton and the strategic traders. Krugman's NY Times column is an op-ed, and by definition he is supposed to express his opinions on the current fiscal policies of this administration. So based on these works , I'd guess that the style of his lectures are similar to these writings. Even if he does express his opinions in his classes, I still believe that it would be foolish for anyone to pass up an opportunity to have a Bates Clark Medal winner like Krugman. Even though I am a Keynesian and agree with Krugman's thoughts, it would still be an honor for me to have conservative economists like Feldstein, Mankiw, and Barro(all teach at Harvard) as professors because like Krugman, their studies and writings are have earned them respect and influence in the field of economics.</p>