“Let’s sh*t on East Europeans: their English is bad, won’t respond & actually do what they’ve agreed to & reelect govts that are responsible.”
—
Estonian President Toomas Hendrik Ilves, going after Keynesian economist Paul Krugman on Twitter after the latter criticized Estonia’s use of austerity measures to produce a steady, though still incomplete, recovery from the recession.
Ilves sent out a series of very angry tweets in response to Krugman’s short article, and later shared a lengthy article he wrote in March explaining his support for thrifty policies in Estonia — and how well they have worked compared to the policies of many of Estonia’s European neighbors to the West and South.
The Estonian Finance Minister also followed up in a press conference, saying:
In reality, Krugman has to a great extent supported the system that created our poverty and which is now over — and which regulated and printed money according to their own interpretation of economic rules. In the US that is possible, but we cannot solve our poverty according to those recipes — by borrowing money and buying ourselves expensive things.
He’s right — except that it’s not really possible for us either.
