Mayors from Minneapolis, Philadelphia, and other cities visited Washington, D.C. to talk with lawmakers about the effects of “sequestration” on cities. “Too often,” says Mayor Rybak of Minneapolis, “a line-item cut in Washington one year will lead to an expense in a city the years after.” Scott Smith, the Republican mayor of Mesa, Ariz., is […]
austerity
Economists urge “Jobs and Growth, Not Austerity”
Campaign for America’s Future is circulating a petition against austerity measures: About 350 economists and experts have signed a statement calling for “presidential leadership — and congressional action — to spur jobs and growth, not dangerous austerity.” The statement warns Washington leaders to heed the lessons of European countries that have tried to cut their […]
The Austerity Bomb
The “fiscal cliff” is definitely the worst term for a constructed policy impasse, but I’m not sure how I feel about “austerity bomb.” Brian Beutler at Talking Points Memo used the term in an article earlier this week: Automatic, across-the-board reductions to domestic and defense spending, combined with the looming expiration of the Bush tax […]
Austerity, then and now
I saved this article almost a year ago, but I came back to it while thinking of how things in Europe have unfolded over that year, and how austerity has become a more loaded term across the Atlantic, even as it . Cowell begins by lamenting (I think, his tone is hard to gauge) that […]
Analysis: Aid recipients welcome IMF’s shift on austerity | Reuters
I think this one’s worth including in its entirety: (Reuters) – Graduates of IMF emergency loan programs accepted the Fund’s admission that it miscalculated the cost of austerity with a mix of schadenfreude and frustration that the change came too late to spare them economic pain.