Ramesh, you make a very fair point on my correspondent’s economic comparison. Unemployment, like other economic indicators, is a vector and not just a numerical value. If the numbers are not bad now, they’re probably on their way to being worse — just about everyone thinks so right now.
But just how bad are they going to get? If Chuck Schumer is whining about Herbert Hoover now, when the numbers really aren’t that bad, he might not have anything left to say when things are bad. His comments and the headlines about the Great Depression are as asinine now as they were during the 2004 election cycle. They do not evince any economic understanding or concern for good policy, they’re just part of the hyperbolic election-year rhetoric that wearies all of Washington’s inhabitants.
The point is not that times are good, only that they’re not that bad. “Bad” is usually considered to be well above full employment. Judging by the arguments being advanced for extending unemployment benefits, you’d think we’re living in Zimbabwe – or even Michigan.