Less than a decade after his Newsweek columns ended, the New Economics, which he had extolled as a permanent addition to knowledge, was in flight from the ideological assaults of Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. Despite his faith that voters would not allow a return to depression, Thatcher’s third election victory, in 1987, came just after unemployment in the United Kingdom had peaked at three million, the highest level since the 1930s.
但这是萨缪尔逊最后一次成功的预言。他的《新闻周刊》专栏结束不到十年，被他赞美为永久知识增量的新经济学就在里根和撒切尔夫人的意识形态攻势下狼狈不堪。尽管他坚定地认为选民不会允许萧条回归，但1987年，在英国失业人数达到300万的20世纪30年代以来的历史高峰时，撒切尔仍获得了第三次选举胜利。