In his column for the New York Times, Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman suggested that in multiple ways the COVID-19 pandemic that has killed over 600,000 Americans has been a good thing for right-wing extremists looking to make a buck any way they can.
Hard right conservative politicians and extremist gadflies have for years made a living by railing about "big government" and cashing in on fears of loss of freedoms by spinning reality in a way that inflames their followers and builds their following.
However, as economist Krugman notes, there is a financial component that gives extremists an added reason to push anti-vaccination conspiracies: hawking alternative remedies and supplements that, in the long run, could imperil those same followers' health.
As the columnist explained, "...there is an economic element to political extremism, just not what you'd think. Right-wing extremists, and to some extent even more mainstream conservative media, rely on financial support from companies selling nutritional supplements and miracle cures — and that financial support is arguably a significant factor pushing the right to become more extreme."
Adding, "Consider where we are right now in the fight against Covid-19. A few months ago it seemed likely that the development of effective vaccines would soon bring the pandemic to an end. Instead, it goes on," Krugman suggests that vaccine refusers are ripe for the plucking, writing, "they're also turning to life-threatening alternatives."
Noting the sudden and inexplicable rise of a horse deworming paste that has been embraced by the anti-vaccine right, Krugman says it goes deeper than that.
"As the historian Rick Perlstein has pointed out, there's a long association between peddlers of quack medicine and right-wing extremists. They cater to more or less the same audience," he wrote before elaborating, "That is, Americans willing to believe that Barack Obama was born in Kenya and that Italian satellites were used to switch votes to Joe Biden are also the kind of people willing to believe that medical elites are lying to them and that they can solve their health problems by ignoring professional advice and buying patent medicines instead."
Case in point, several well-known conservative commentators who double as pitchmen for the highly-profitable supplement industry.
"Alex Jones of Infowars has built a following by pushing conspiracy theories, but he makes money by selling nutritional supplements," he wrote. "It's also true, however, for more mainstream, establishment parts of the right. For example, Ben Shapiro, considered an intellectual on the right, hawks supplements. Look at who advertises on Tucker Carlson's Fox News show. After Fox itself, the top advertisers are My Pillow, then three supplement companies."
Pointing out that in 2014, Alex Jones was raking in "more than $20 million a year in revenue, mainly from supplement sales," Krugman asked, "Do these financial rewards induce pundits to be more extreme? It would be surprising if they didn't — as conservative economists say, incentives matter."
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