Last year Paul Krugman won the Nobel Prize in Economics and he achieved deityhood in India. Before starting I wanna make it clear that I have opposed Paul Krugman’s crackpot theories(or as people prefer to call them “Krugpot” theories), long before he won his Nobel Prize. The problem isn’t Krugman’s Nobel Prize(although it is a problem but not for this article), but the pontification and glorification of Nobel Laureates in India.
I have been criticizing Krugman for his theories on Orkut for a long time now, and people(especially Indians) used to listen to all that with a rational mind, until he won the Nobel Prize. Now suddenly, if I criticize Krugman’s theories, I can’t do it because now he is off limits. I have to be at least as established as him if I wanna criticize his theories.

Why is that? Why do people in India cannot believe that you might be right if you are criticizing a Nobel Laureate, the reason is because in India its really difficult for anyone to get a Nobel Prize, once in many many years a Nobel Prize comes along, and we believe that if anyone has got Nobel Prize, he must have done something really really right in that field. Getting a Nobel Prize in India is literally like achieving Nirvana.^[1] You become God once you win a Nobel Prize.

The problem is in America getting a Nobel Prize is commendable but no big deal, especially if its a Nobel Peace Prize or a Nobel Prize in Economics(Nobel Prize in Physics, Chemistry and other natural sciences are ok). Take for example in 2006 Nobel Committee gave Nobel Peace Prize to Professor Muhammad Yunus, now since he is also a banker, suddenly any criticism of the Economics of Grameen and Microcredit are also off limit in India. You cannot point out that if by giving credit to poor people you can really make money, then Bank of America would have been on a full time job of making money like that. The sheer fact that Market does not put any money on poor people in quasi-socialist countries demonstrates the fact that there is no realistic expectation of profit in there.^[2]

Imagine if Barkha Dutt from NDTV receives Nobel Peace Prize for her work in Journalism, do you realize what your reaction is going to be like(almost all the Indians have an opinion about Barkha Dutt^[3]). Similarly, just because Paul Krugman has won a Nobel Prize does not make him a God who can never be wrong.

Paul Krugman won Nobel Prize for his stupid theories about trade which back in 17th century was known as Mercantilism, the same theory against which revolutionaries in America revolted against, these are the same theories which have been rebutted in 18th century, now Paul Krugman redefines them, and wins a Nobel Prize.
Funny thing is Paul Krugman hasn’t been supporting those theories for a long time for now. His latest area of focus is how wars started by Democratic presidents create prosperity, and how wars started by Republican presidents create recession.

I am willing to have discussions on Paul Krugman’s stupid theories, but at least stop treating him as god, and undermining other people’s argument just because they haven’t been awarded a Nobel Prize.

UPDATE: Here is a Paul Krugman quote frmo 2002.

To fight this recession the Fed needs more than a snapback; it needs soaring household spending to offset moribund business investment. And to do that, as Paul McCulley of Pimco put it, Alan Greenspan needs to create a housing bubble to replace the Nasdaq bubble.^[4]

Footnotes:

1. Nirvana the ultimate desirable state of a soul in Hinduism [↩]
2. The Myth of Grameen: Jeffrey Tucker’s criticism of Grameen [↩]
3. http://barkhadutt.wordpress.com/ [↩]
4. Dubya’s double dip, New York Times [↩]