The Weekly Posner-Becker Debate

Not every thought out of Chicago is corrupt or even just bad.  Here are two great minds (The Becker-Posner Blog) having at it on the issue of "Will We Go the Way of Japan?"

The background is that about 20 years ago Japan had a housing bubble burst and their economy was in trouble.  They are still climbing out of that hole two decades later.

Professor Gary S Becker (The University of Chicago) got the short straw and went second.  Judge Richard A Posner, US Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals (and University of Chicago Law School lecturer) got the long straw and went first.  I have provided only their concluding paragraphs.  Their full blog posts are not that long and informative, if you read them.

Judge Posner

Should the U.S. economy grow more rapidly than the public debt, we'll be okay.  But the government's focus appears to be not on economic growth, but on redistribution (the major goal of health reform) and on creating at least an aura of prosperity, at whatever cost in deficit spending and future inflation, in time for the November 2010 congressional elections.

Professor Becker

Sizable advances in productivity and the resulting sharp economic growth can ease the burden of growing government spending, and prevent anything like the expanding debt to GDP ratio and stagnation of the Japanese economy.  Can the US do it?  Certainly!  Will the US do it?  Not with the present composition of Congress, and with the tendency of the President to allow some of the more destructive members of his political party to get their way.

Something to think about.  Maybe even something to write our US Rep and our two US Senators about.

Be quick writing our Junior Senator. The TSW isn't going to be there long.♠

Regards  —  Cliff

♠  Dick Howe has an opinion on that.