Sweden: No Longer the Free Market Conversation Stopper

A great piece in Bloomberg that takes apart the “What about Sweden?” non-argument that invariably comes up in debates over the free market. (Thanks to Chris B.)

Incidentally, Bob Murphy notes that Paul Krugman, in his typical style, misleads about what’s been happening in Sweden. Bob writes: “Did you have any idea that Sweden ran a budget surplus of 2% of GDP in 2011? Me neither. Reading Krugman certainly did[n't] give me any reason to suspect that. Krugman had produced a chart and implied that the United States was engaged in more austerity than Sweden. Go look at his post. He calls it ‘spending side austerity’ presumably to cover his bases. But it’s not like he says, ‘Oh, admittedly, Sweden is running a budget surplus, but I’m saying that’s because of their loose monetary policy which has boosted revenues and allowed them to reduce transfer payments…’ No, none of that. He just implies that conservatives are insane, puts up an irrelevant chart, and then gives a very misleading analysis of it.”

Originally posted on TomWoods.com