Paul Krugman: Distortions Fuel Paranoia About Inflation

I've been thinking about how we talk about - or don't talk about - the desirability of low inflation targets.

As I noted recently, the International Monetary Fund's World Economic Outlook report makes a compelling case for raising the target above 2 percent - but avoids saying so explicitly, resorting to coded euphemisms. Meanwhile, inflation paranoia is very much a partisan thing. In my notes for a recent class at Princeton, I listed the signatories of an open letter to Ben Bernanke, then the chairman of the Federal Reserve, from 2010 warning about dollar "debasement" from quantitative easing; it's obvious that everyone on the list is a highly committed Republican, and some people with the right ideological credentials are on board even though they have no relevant professional credentials. (William Kristol and Dan Senor, monetary experts?)