In the summer of 1966 I read books by both Milton Friedman and John Kenneth Galbraith. Friedman impressed and convinced me. Galbraith didn't come close. And I drifted away from my undergrad training by elitist interventionists toward becoming a Chicago, free(r) market, economist. Yesterday I read these remarks by Scott Sumner at Econlog and was delighted.
As Krugman has steadily moved to the left, he hasn't just changed his mind in the sense of changing his opinions; he's changed his mind in the sense of changing the way he thinks. [EE: he no longer practices "the Economic Way of Thinking" -- read the entire post to see the examples.]
Tyler Cowen has argued that Paul Krugman is the Milton Friedman of the early 21st century, and in many ways that's true. Among all economists, he is clearly the most influential public intellectual. But an even better comparison might be John Kenneth Galbraith, who was the favorite economist of intellectuals who hated economics.
I've noticed that if you explain to intellectuals that a minimum wage will hurt the poor by increasing unemployment, or that rent controls hurt renters by creating shortages, or that unemployment insurance increases unemployment, or that taxes on investment income should be abolished, they'll give you this look like "I don't know whether this guy is evil or crazy." Non-economists strongly resent the implications of much of economic theory, as it punctures holes in all their pet theories. So when a Nobel Prize winner comes along that confirms all their political views, he's going to be extremely popular among intellectuals. Especially when he's as brilliant and witty as Paul Krugman.
I don't want this too sound too negative. Just to be clear, Krugman is 10 times the economist that Galbraith was. I often disagree with him on macroeconomics, but his views are defensible and brilliantly explained. He's a great writer, and a superb theoretician. Galbraith was a great writer and . . . and that's about it.
But today Krugman's appeal to intellectuals is quite similar to the appeal of Galbraith in the 1950s and 1960s---the economist for people who hate economics. [emphasis added]
I'm sure that's true. And I'm sure that when I read Galbraith was when I realized I love, not hate, economics.