Joseph Stiglitz  Joseph E. Stiglitz, former chief economist at
the World Bank and chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers
under President Clinton, was recently awarded the Nobel Prize in
Economic Science. He teaches economics at Columbia University.
Recent Articles  That Was Then  We live in an upside-down world
where Republicans defend deficits and Democrats attack them.
These are seemingly opposite views. But both have led,
mistakenly, to cuts in social investment as well as to
needlessly slow economic growth and high unemployment. For years
Republicans tried to slay Keynesian economics, the idea that in
an economic downturn, one should run deficits. During the
Clinton years, they even pushed for a balanced-budget amendment
to the Constitution, which would have enshrined the principles
of fiscal prudence (and precluded the Bush deficits). In those
years, the Democrats were accused of being fiscally
irresponsible because they sensibly believed that in times of
recessions, a deficit was good policy. All