COMM 337: Paul Krugman / Nobel / READ IN CLASS

Today we're definitely going off on a tangent. Paul Krugman, an op-ed columnist for The New York Times, has won the Nobel Prize for economics. The award cites his work on international trade and economic geography, but his columns are pretty good, too. Today we're going to read some of them, look at some of the coverage in The Times and see why he won the prize.

(If this inspires you to go on and win the Nobel Prize, too, be sure to remember to give Benedictine a big alumni contribution when you do. If you decide to name a building after me, remember my name is spelled "-s-e-n.")

If you're interested in the background, Harvard economist Edward L. Glaeser explains economic research that won the prize for Krugman.

Like many newspaper columnists, Krugman keeps a weblog. Today's headline has to be one of the most understated I've ever seen. It just says "An interesting morning." Well, yeah, I guess if I ever won the Nobel Prize, I'd find it an interesting morning, too.

His column ordinarily appears on Mondays and Fridays. Today's, which was written before the Nobel Prize was announced, was on British Prime Minister Gordon Brown's leadership in the world economic crisis. He says it shows a "combination of clarity and decisiveness hasn’t been matched by any other Western government, least of all our own." Friday's was a stark warning to international monetary policy makers they'd "better announce a coordinated rescue plan this weekend — or the world economy may well experience its worst slump since the Great Depression." Krugman has been a harsh critic of the Bush administration for years.

Here's a link to Krugman's index page in the Times' opinion section. It is filling up with links to articles about the Nobel Prize, and it contains links to the selection of Krugman's columns. We'll use it as our starting point for reading some of his columns.