Paul Ryan says the US could become Greece!
Paul Ryan, (R, Minn) gave the Republican response to Obama last night. The Congressman is said to be the best and brightest of the new right. Perhaps so, but his speech was irrational. Rather than focusing on any strategy for economic recovery, or even saying the debt, Ryan threatened us with he specter of Greece. The implication is that the elite liberal President is trying to remake the US into Europe.
As with a lot of the blizzard of confusion spun by the right, this comparison makes no sense. Compared with our system, the social democracies of Europe are doing rather well.
Why is this? The answer may be industrial policy ..a feature much touted by Robert Reich as the reason China’s totalitarian economy is outpacing our own.
Whatever, the case, Ryan’s use of the Greeks is a bad example of Europe. Europe is divers and, even more than our own states, the European countries have the independence to give us a look at different experiments. Sweden’s recent figures ought to encourage the Democrats to be more European, not less.
- Swedish GDP growth nears record high: report (21 Dec 10)
- Swedish households wealthier than ever (20 Dec 10)
- Swedish budget surplus by 2011: report (16 Nov 10)
One telling number is unemployment. Republicans charge that a robust safety net causes unemployment. In Sweden, unemployment is inching down from a high of nearly 10 percent at the height of the crisis to just over seven percent in November.
Germany and France are also doing rather well. see more