Paul Krugman: Beyond Fiscal Cliff, an Austerity Bomb

Brian Beutler of Talking Points Memo seems to have been the first to use the phrase "austerity bomb" to describe what's scheduled to happen in the United States at the end of the year. It's a much better term than "fiscal cliff."

The cliff stuff makes people imagine that it's a problem of excessive deficits when it's actually about the risk that the deficit will be too small; also and relatedly, the fiscal cliff stuff enables a bait-and-switch in which people say "So, this means that we need to enact Bowles-Simpson and raise the retirement age!" — both of which have nothing at all to do with it.