OECD Economic Research Finds That Government Spending Harms Growth

At the risk of understatement, I ’mnot a fan of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Perhaps reflecting the mindset of the European governments that dominate its membership,the Paris-based international bureaucracy has morphed intoa cheerleader for statist policies.All of which was just fine from the perspective of the Obama Administration, whichdoubtlessly appreciated the OECD ’s partisan work topromote class warfare andpimp for wasteful Keynesian spending.What is particularly irksome to me is the way the OECD often uses dishonest methodology to advance the cause of big government:Deceptively manipulating data to makepreposterous claims that differing income levels somehow dampen economic growth.Falsely asserting that there is more poverty in the United States than in poorer nations such as Greece, Portugal, Turkey, and Hungary.Cherry picking years tocreate a false narrative about trends in personal income tax revenue and corporate income tax revenue.Peddling dishonest gender wage data —numbers so misleading thatthey ’ve been disavowed by a member of Obama ’s Council of Economic Advisers.But my disdain for the leftist political appointees who run the OECD doesn ’t prevent me from acknowledging that the professional economists who work for the institution occasionally generate good statistics and analysis.For instance, I ’ve cited two examples (here andhere) of OECD research showing that spending caps are the only effective fiscal rule. And...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - Category: American Health Authors: Source Type: blogs