That’s the conclusion reached by columnist Paul Krugman in today’s New York Times. He argues that Europe is actually doing much better than what lots of pundits and politicians in the states are making it out to be. Case in point: employment has increased more in Europe than stateside since 2000.
We’ve of course seen more concrete evidence of this recently, in all of our postings about European travelers coming to New York for bargain shopping. It’s a fact now that the Euro is rivaling the dollar in world dominance, and that the European economy is just about as big as the US economy.
Krugman’s column ultimately argues that it’s possible to have your cake–and eat it too. The Europeans have universal health-care and a guaranteed safety net for the poor, but they’ve managed to do this without having their economy go down the drain. As for Americans, we’ll always have our cute version of Europe: Canada!