Disappointing economics coverage at Slate

David Warsh, editor of Economic Principals, is disappointed in the economics coverage on the Slate web site since former Fortune reporter Paul Krugman left Slate for the New York Times.

Warsh wrote, “Perhaps now they will start to think about replacing Krugman. Granted, good economics columnists don’t grow on trees. Slate had strong business writers all along. But Lewis returned to writing books. James Surowiecki moved on to The New Yorker. Daniel Gross, who replaced him, has been consistently interesting, but a look at his blog shows that he is more of a business columnist at heart and, perhaps, more of a blogger at that. (Faint praise? Not since Slate’s Mickey Kaus demonstrated that blogging, too, could be a calling.) Adam Penenberg did a deft job explaining the open source movement once Slate was safely under the wing of the Post, but he is a magazine writer with many other projects in train. And Stephen Landsburg, who writes a monthly column, remains more of a teacher of economics than a journalist.

“To see what sustained coverage of the technology industry might have looked like, had Slate truly been independent, take a look at Shane Greenstein, columnist for IEEE Micro, a magazine of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, the blue-chip organization which describes itself as the world’s leading professional association for the advancement of technology.”

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