Paul Krugman makes the case for an additional jolt of stimulus from the Obama administration. I do agree with him that the fact that jobs continue to be lost at a very high rate does not mean that the original stimulus failed. It simply means that the original stimulus was insufficient. God knows how high unemployment would be today if the original stimulus had not been enacted.

Since the recession began, the U.S. economy has lost 6 ½ million jobs — and as that grim employment report confirmed, it’s continuing to lose jobs at a rapid pace. Once you take into account the 100,000-plus new jobs that we need each month just to keep up with a growing population, we’re about 8 ½ million jobs in the hole.

And the deeper the hole gets, the harder it will be to dig ourselves out. The job figures weren’t the only bad news in Thursday’s report, which also showed wages stalling and possibly on the verge of outright decline. That’s a recipe for a descent into Japanese-style deflation, which is very difficult to reverse. Lost decade, anyone?

More from Paul Krugman on the potential for wage deflation here.