Paul Krugman argues that it’s hard to tell the difference between the economies of the UK and France these days. He seems to be cherry-picking the numbers to make a point about the value (or the lack thereof) for austerity policies (the UK favors it, France less so). That’s an important discussion, but before you can have a productive debate it’s essential to look at the numbers clearly. Krugman cites GDP data across the past several years, but this isn’t very convincing for arguing that the nations are one and the same when it comes to macro trends of late. When you move closer to the recently published numbers, a different perspective emerges.