Economics Nobel Prize winners and text-book authors, against Trump(ism)

Paul Krugman and Jonathan Gruber had a very interesting video conversation a few weeks ago, about the (officially) so-called Big Beautiful Bill. Krugman won an Economics Nobel Prize and is the co-author of a famous textbook on introductory economics. Jonathan Gruber participated in the design of Obama’s health care reform and is the author of an excellent undergraduate textbook on public economics. Paul Krugman’s Substack is one of the best resources of the resistance. I strongly recommend it.

The Nobel Prize Joseph Stiglitz has also written numerous op-eds criticizing the Trump adminstration and his attemps to erode democracy in the USA. He was one of seven Economics Nobel Prize winners co-authoring an article in French newspaper Le Monde arguing in favor of a wealth tax, a taboo for those supporting Trump and his tax-cutting policies. Other signatories included Daron Acemoglu (also author of an introductory economics textbook), Esther Duflo and Abhijit Banerjee.

I could listen in person to the almost desperate criticisms of Banerjee to Trump on occasion of a recent visit of his to Barcelona.

Justin Wolfers is one of the economists that has been more active in the traditional and social media denouncing the policies of the current US administration. He is also the author of another introductory economics textbook.

All these textbooks are mainstream, traditional economics textbooks. Of course, if you use more innovative materials such as those in CORE, with its focus on fairness (in addition of efficiency), climate change, inequality and other big global challenges of our time, you would not find any reason to support the crazy policies of Trump and what is left of the Republican Party.

This trend has to be put in the context of science, in this case social science, necessarily being used to resist policies that defy reason. It is true that 22 Nobel Prize winners endorsed Kamala Harris and that was of little use.

Economists have moved to the left and the right has moved further to the right (or to the autocratic and xenophobic wilderness), because reality has a well-known liberal (progressive, in Europe) bias, as Paul Krugman says.

How to connect this scientific mobilization with grassroots and political mobilization is a challenge that cannot be postponed. Climate change, tariffs, immigration… all these are areas where there is a scientific consensus in economics that defies the policies of the Trump administration (and the trumpists beyond the USA) and that aligns with the interests of the vast majority of citizens.

Strictly economic damage is not the main reason to oppose Trump, although there is a scientific consensus on the economic damage that his economic policies will cause. But good economists are not only concerned about purely economic or financial indicators, they are also concerned about wellbeing and freedom. These are lessons that one can learn from other Economics Nobel Prize winners such as Amartya Sen or Kenneth Arrow. Their ideas are today the new orthodoxy and are more important than ever.