Deriving it's title from the 1960 classic ghostwritten for Barry Goldwater, this book blasts what Krugman calls "movement conservatism" for being anti democratic, elitist, self serving, untenable, false, misleading and packed with lies. He goes on for several chapters in this vein before he gets down to his own proposal for a liberal, a progressive, agenda which is centered around universal, single payer, health care.

Krugman gives some simple, easily verified, easily understood numbers which show, in his opinion, that a single payer system would provide better health care to more people for less money than the nightmare system of health care by accountants that we have today. Simple put, he proposes to extend Medicare to everyone. Of course the insurance industry and the pharmas will fight tooth and nail to prevent this happening and doctors are always complaining about the level of payment from Medicare. I always feel sorry for my doctor whenever I see him pull out of the driveway of his McMansion in his Mercedes. I know he really wants a Bentley and who can blame him.

I'll Never Forget The Day I Read A Book!

I hated the semester of economics we had to take in high school. Nothing we studied made sense to me. Probably my nascent liberalism picked up on my teacher's conservatism, and it wasn't really the subject I hated but the way he taught it.

So once I realized this book was primarily about economics, I groaned a little. But I kept reading because the book club I'm in was reading it, and it had been over a year since I'd finished one of our books. Too bad for me I waited til it was a book about economics.

Turns out, it was pretty good. It's fairly readable for nonfiction, with frequent headings to break up the text and a few charts and tables here and there.

I'd actually give the bulk of the book 2 or 3 out of 5 stars. But the chapter on health care gets 5 out of 5, no question. I'm going to get the husband to read just that chapter.

I started dogearing pages in that chapter to mark places I wanted to jot down quotes. By 5 pages in, I'd dogeared every page so I stopped and decided to make a copy of the whole chapter for myself.

Here's one thing I dogeared, just to give you a taste:

"So how does the U.S. health care system, with its unique reliance on private insurance, stack up against the systems of other advanced countries? Table 7 tells the story. It shows how much different countries spend per person on health care, and compares that spending with average life expectancy, the simplest measure of how well the health care system is functioning. The United States spends almost twice as much on health care per person as Canada, France, and Germany, almost two and a half times as much as Britain -- yet our life expectancy is at the bottom of the pack."

Format: Country, Spending per Person (2004), Life Expectancy in Years (2004)
United States, $6102, 77.5
Canada, $3165, 80.2
France, $3150, 79.6
Germany, $3043, 78.9
Britain, $2508, 78.5

Source: World Health Organization, http://who.int/research/en/ ( )

I don't read Krugman's columns much, so didn't have many preconceived expectations. Thought he made a lot of interesting points, in particular about our country's financial history, but thought the evidence for many of his claims seemed sparse. In particular, many of his comments about the Republican party, if true -- I'm not 100% convinced, really scare me. ( )

Explores the intertwining of economics and politics over the last 80 years, detailing the triumph of the New Deal and the rise of Movement conservatives. Postulates the greater impact of politics on the economy than textbook economics. Focuses on a return to progressive ascendency, with universal health care as a cornerstone. Pleasant, deep, accent-less reading voice.

Krugman takes the reader on a succinct and readable journey through of US economic history beginning from about 1900 up to the present. His focus is how the average (or more precisely median) worker has fared. Krugman recounts the great economic inequality in the pre-Great Depression era and demonstrates that nearly identical levels of inequality have returned.

Krugman’s primary argument is that US government policies and actions can be used to reduce economic inequality and that it did so in response to the Great Depression, through World War Two and beyond. He calls this era the Great Compression when the average CEO of a large company made about 30 times the income of an average worker rather than today’s multiplier of 300. He further argues that conservative political forces used Nixon’s Southern strategy to divide workers and attain power. Once there, these forces applied Friedman economics (and some made-up economics like the ‘supply-side’ craze) to government policies, declared war on unions, and deregulated across the board. Krugman presciently argued that the Republicans’ politics of racial division were nearing the end of the road as the demographics of the US changed.

Krugman expected the recent victory by a progressive Democrat in 2008. He sets forth several fairly specific policy recommendations for progressives (liberals who do things): universal health insurance, a more progressive tax structure, increase the minimum wage, and make union organizing easier. Part of his argument for giving priority to universal health insurance is that it will demonstrate that the government can indeed institute policies that make a person’s life better. After several decades of anti-government rhetoric, such a demonstration is necessary.

Krugman’s prescriptions are not a complete progressive agenda – he barely touches on the environment – but if President Obama and Congress institute Krugman’s ideas in the economic realm we will have a fairer society where the benefits of economic activity are more equitably shared. My personal feeling is they should act aggressively and swiftly on multiple fronts before the GOP has recovered its footing and to occupy the inevitable political counterattack busy with many challenges at once. ( )