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The difference between between WWII and ND is efficiency. When war started, we knew exactly what to spend the money on. No debating over who gets what. Politics was pretty much not an issue in WWII spending. Apply this to Obamas stimulus and you have everyone arguing and money going every which way. No focus on actually stimulating the economy.
Actually there WAS lots of debate over how to allocate resources. The difference was the government was spending SO MUCH more money that it could afford to pursue many different avenues at once - but don't for one minute think that that meant that all that money was spent efficiently or that there wasn't debate about how to best spend the money. There was tons of wasteful spending in WWII. The only difference is that people didn't moan and groan about it so much because they recognized the severity of the situation - but that doesn't mean there wasn't waste. Again, it had NOTHING to do with efficiently, it had to do with spending VAST sums of money. Cost concerns took a distant back seat to doing what was necessary - and so the government spent FREELY. That's not to say that the President and Congress didn't fret about it, - they DID - quite a bit actually, but in the end they agreed to spend WHATEVER WAS NECESSARY to achieve the desired results (even though they knew there was wasteful spending in the budgets). The amount of deficit spending for WWII dwarfed that for the New Deal - and out of that record deficit the US emerged the most powerful and prosperous nation on earth.
No, we're just going to have to THINK BIGGER than FDR did.
It was the government SPENDING of WW II that put the final nail in the coffin of the Depression - not the FIGHTING.
Ken
I normally enjoy your posts, but you are so wrong.
The New Deal did not end the Depression. It did not. End of story.
WWII was something different. WWII was NOT part of the New Deal. Yes, it required huge expenditures, price controls and the like. It also created huge labor shortages. Your linkage between the two is innaccurate.
All of it worked because people finally had something to rally around- a choice between preserving democracy or submitting to fascism. War economics, as crazy as they could be, worked here for the same reason they worked in the USSR during the war- people wanted them to and the alternative was unthinkable.
FDR did not end the Depression. Hitler, Tojo and Mussolini ended it.
And where is FDR relevant anyway? We are not in anything resembling the Great Depression. We are in a classic recession as we have been before and will be again. Its not fun, its not pretty, its disheartening. But its not permanent. Presidents do not cause them and they do not end them. The economic cycle is just that.
Were FDR alive, he would not stop throwing up at how his people have become a bunch terrified children seeing bogeymen in every corner.
So you're agreeing that their is no direct correlation between the ND and end of the depression?
No, the point you missed was over the absurdity of using the up's and down's of any emotion-driven market as a measure for the effectiveness of economic policy. In such a world, you would conclude that New Deal policies simply swamped those implemented after the tulip collapse, but you'd also have to take up the idea that 1929 stock prices had been inflated to unsustainable levels, such that return to those levels would by definition have been a senseless gauge to go by.
The FDR revisionists simply need to stand up to the utter hollowness of their arguments. They will ONLY discuss for instance the END of the Depression because they can claim that the true END didn't come until after the war started, so it must really have been that war that did it. Try discusiing what happened along the way. What happened to GDP? What happened to National Income? What happened to consumer confidence? What happened to the burgeoning socialist movement and calls for scrapping capitalism altogether? The New Deal saved your free-market a$$e$, created a social contract that hundreds of millions have benefitted from, and laid the groundwork for the rise of the middle class that eventually led to your being as comfortable as you are today.
By contrast, right-wing policies have been consistent failures and achieved nothing.
I read leading economist are split 50/50 on whether the new deal was effective or not.
Why didn't they come to the city data forums to consult our economic experts?
Because we all know everyone on city data is an accomplished economist.
I read leading economist are split 50/50 on whether the new deal was effective or not.
Why didn't they come to the city data forums to consult our economic experts?
Because we all know everyone on city data is an accomplished economist.
Oh really? Well do you mind letting us in on who you read?
A link or source would be great........................I won't hold my breath.............I've seen this ruse too many times before.....LOL
First ask yourself how we got into this mess.
Then once you get that answer you will know you can't spend your way out of what you spent your way into.
In other words the solution to the problem is not the government, the problem is government and I dont care who the president its.
And where is FDR relevant anyway? We are not in anything resembling the Great Depression. We are in a classic recession as we have been before and will be again.
You are either unaware of the nature of the current crisis or are utterly ignorant of economic history. There are no post-WWII recessions that serve as a parallel to this one, and while they aren't here yet, all those Great Depression-like conditions you seem to insist upon are on the immediate horizon. Sensible people would wish to ward those off, which, of course, is impossible if one waits until they actually get here before doing anything about them.
I misspoke, academic economist around the country on whether it lengthened the great depression or not.
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