Thomas Sowell on Keynesian economics, progressive liberalism, and the results

[Jason]

"For the first 150 years of the United States, there was no policy of federal intervention when the economy turned down. No depression during all that time was as catastrophic as the Great Depression of the 1930s, when both the Federal Reserve System and Presidents Herbert Hoover and Franklin D. Roosevelt intervened in the economy on a massive and unprecedented scale. Despite the myth that it was the stock market crash of 1929 that caused the double-digit unemployment of the 1930s, unemployment never reached double digits in any of the 12 months that followed the 1929 stock market crash. Unemployment peaked at 9 percent in December 1929 and was back down to 6.3 percent by June 1930, when the first major federal intervention took place under Herbert Hoover. The unemployment decline then reversed, rising to hit double digits six months later. As Hoover and then FDR continued to intervene, double-digit unemployment persisted throughout the remainder of the 1930s.

Conversely, when President Warren G. Harding faced an annual unemployment rate of 11.7 percent in 1921, he did absolutely nothing, except for cutting government spending. Keynesian economists would say that this was exactly the wrong thing to do. History, however, says that unemployment the following year went down to 6.7 percent -- and, in the year after that, 2.4 percent. Under Calvin Coolidge, the ultimate in non-interventionist government, the annual unemployment rate got down to 1.8 percent. How does the track record of Keynesian intervention compare to that?"

I think he's quite accurate here.

[guitarfool2002]

As the generation who lived through these years continues to pass away (even the youngest of the WW2 vets is now over 85), it worries me that the narrative of firsthand personal experience will fall victim to a failure to report the facts and figures in order to "shape" that narrative as it's told to future generations.

The success or lack thereof of the "New Deal" is one of those cases. There are certain hard truths about what was happening in the 30's with the US economy and government intervention that are simply being ignored or washed out of the narrative. Some of the figures in the quote posted above are one of those points you won't see reported. The narrative wants to suggest the New Deal got everything back on track, gave jobs to anyone who wanted them, and basically the government intervention in the economy throughout the 30's saved the nation.

Consider reading and researching how many times the Supreme Court and other appeals courts intervened and effectively halted the Roosevelt Administration as they tried to go even farther into taking control of the US economy through the federal government under the New Deal umbrella. Research the facts and numbers behind the economy from the second half of the 1930's leading into WW2, and see how after all of the New Deal interventions and programs, the economy was headed for a "double-dip" recession if not worse. Research the kinds of jobs being offered by the WPA and CCC, and what goals the long-term structure of those jobs if there were any were being met and supported.

This topic strikes a nerve, because while it's not suggesting that the plan was a total bust or totally ineffective, there has been so much over-crediting, hyped-up praise, and a general sense of Roosevelt and the New Deal "saving" the country and putting everyone to work suggesting in the period of 1933-1940, we went from a nation of men on the streets selling pencils and apples to a nation of happy workers in a strong economy thanks to FDR and the New Deal...it's simply not the case. And as people who lived through it continue to die of old age, that kind of dishonest narrative might have more of a chance to become the version future generations are taught to believe.

Yet watch any Depression documentary, pick up a high school level US history textbook, you'll probably see a B&W newsreel of men in tattered suits lining up for a bowl of soup, you'll hear an old song like "Brother Can You Spare A Dime" or some sad blues tune on the soundtrack, in the books you may see a man sitting on the street holding a tin cup full of pencils for sale. Then FDR steps in...cue the music "Happy Days Are Here Again"...men back to work, wearing WPA badges filling in potholes, hammering boards or pouring a foundation...and the sun came out again in America.

It wasn't that simple. Nor did it work out as smoothly as those narratives want to portray it.

Keep posting the numbers - so they don't get washed out of the story. 

[Jason]

I think history will eventually show that Roosevelt was effectively the individual who played the biggest part in destroying the United States. If you read some of his executive orders from his first term...that's some scary sh*t. Not even Hoover was as damaging.

I just want to know why it became fashionable for government to try and fix problems that inevitably corrected themselves. Sowell is no slouch with statistics (and no wonder people call him a self-loathing black man on top of it); the numbers add up. The Great Depression could have been ended much sooner if Hoover and Roosevelt stayed away and let the economy recover. That's something you won't see in any history textbook.

And the belief that "World War II saved the U.S. economy" is just bollocks.

[Pinder's Gone To Kokomo And Back Again]

What idiot ever throught WW2 saved anything???

Stephen Ambrose?

Maybe, but he also sold a whole lot of books pimping that line, so who knows.

America has always been a lie in the greatest sense of the word. Going through a whole lot of trouble to beat down sacred cows just means you were drinking the cool-air yourself at one point, while some of us were not....

Question is: so, what do we do? ....... Some people are still trapped in liberal bashing as evidenced here, while others are busy blaming the right-wingers and praying to a giant Obama poster. ....... the rest of us have long vacated the crib.

[guitarfool2002]

What idiot ever throught WW2 saved anything???

I'd recommend you choose your words with a little more care, or clarify the point to avoid a misunderstanding of it.

[Pinder's Gone To Kokomo And Back Again]

What idiot ever throught WW2 saved anything???

I'd recommend you choose your words with a little more care, or clarify the point to avoid a misunderstanding of it.

Correction: what idiot ever thought WW2 saved anything?

Thank you for pointing that out. Typing on miniature virtual keyboards is still a challenge to me.

[guitarfool2002]

The typo wasn't the issue. If you're commenting on the notion/idea that WW2 saved the economy, that's one thing. If it's going beyond that, a clarification might be needed to avoid misunderstanding.

[Mike's Beard]

Well WW2 did stop some nutbag from committing anymore mass genocide - that's got to be viewed as a good thing, right?

[guitarfool2002]

Well WW2 did stop some nutbag from committing anymore mass genocide - that's got to be viewed as a good thing, right?

That's closer to what I'm getting at, I'd like to give him a chance to clarify the statement first before anything develops out of a misunderstanding, it's only fair.

[Pinder's Gone To Kokomo And Back Again]

Well WW2 did stop some nutbag from committing anymore mass genocide - that's got to be viewed as a good thing, right?

That's closer to what I'm getting at, I'd like to give him a chance to clarify the statement first before anything develops out of a misunderstanding, it's only fair.

I wasn't making some hyper explicit point. Rather I was commenting on TRBB's seeming mission to knock down every historical act/action/movement coveted by who he sees as "The Left" as shining examples of whatever the hell it is he takes offense to. My point was that such a mission only makes sense if he himself or whoever he's expecting to read such statements didn't already know damn well how complicated, un-black & white and, frankly, full of sh*t,  American history has been and is.... I am very aware of what good was accomplished via WW2 but there is a lot more to the story than the fawning "Saving Private Ryan' "Greatest Generation" hype we've been force fed.

[guitarfool2002]

I am very aware of what good was accomplished via WW2 but there is a lot more to the story than the fawning "Saving Private Ryan' "Greatest Generation" hype we've been force fed.

I want to share two photos:



This was my Dad, the one on the right was taken after he completed boot camp and was ready to get his orders, when his mother and father went to visit him. The one on the left is where he was eventually sent, on Saipan, in 1945. He's the taller guy on the left.

When he reported to be inducted, he had just turned 18 less than two months prior, and his train ride to the training base was on Christmas Eve 1943. He left a few months into his senior year of high school. When he got to Saipan, he was 19 years old, as shown in the photo with the airplane.

I think he accomplished and did more before turning 21 than I'll quite possibly do in my whole life, as did his brother and all his friends who did the same thing. He was fortunate to come back home.

To me, he was indeed part of the "Greatest Generation", and the notion of giving those men some attention and thanks is worth all the fawning one possibly could do. I guess if those who are cynical about this could have seen the look in his eye when someone would spot him walking around a store or anywhere else wearing his Navy hat with his squadron group number on it, and would ask him about it or even offer a thank you and a handshake, you might understand it on a different level.

That's the personal side of it. Again, I'd recommend choosing the words a little more carefully with these issues.

[SMiLE Brian]

I think Pinder means to look at WW2 without the rose-collored glasses that many people view it today. War is hell and WW2 had mankind inflicting some of the worst horrors ever conceived in the struggle between nations and ideas.

[guitarfool2002]

I think Pinder means to look at WW2 without the rose-collored glasses that many people view it today. War is hell and WW2 had mankind inflicting some of the worst horrors ever conceived in the struggle between nations and ideas.

I'm aware of that, my Dad and uncles lived it and lived through it. That's fine, but "fawning" and "hype" not to mention the word "idiots" are loaded terms, and that's why I offered not only a chance to clarify, but also a chance to see one of those real people who if I'm reading it correctly is being "fawned over" and hyped...You see, hype suggests something unwarranted, and the term Greatest Generation has become - right or wrong - a term given to those guys like my Dad who were actually "IN" the war and saw it firsthand. So it would make sense I'd get a little tense if it feels like someone is trying to denigrate what they actually did because that commentator doesn't like the media hype or Hollywood imagery that was created around it. There are real people, and there is imagery - separate the two when making a point, and avoid misunderstandings.

And I'll gladly force feed his story and do so in a fawning way to anyone who tries to suggest that what he went through and did before turning 21 is unworthy of such "hype". But that's family.

[Pinder's Gone To Kokomo And Back Again]

I am very aware of what good was accomplished via WW2 but there is a lot more to the story than the fawning "Saving Private Ryan' "Greatest Generation" hype we've been force fed.

I want to share two photos:



This was my Dad, the one on the right was taken after he completed boot camp and was ready to get his orders, when his mother and father went to visit him. The one on the left is where he was eventually sent, on Saipan, in 1945. He's the taller guy on the left.

When he reported to be inducted, he had just turned 18 less than two months prior, and his train ride to the training base was on Christmas Eve 1943. He left a few months into his senior year of high school. When he got to Saipan, he was 19 years old, as shown in the photo with the airplane.

I think he accomplished and did more before turning 21 than I'll quite possibly do in my whole life, as did his brother and all his friends who did the same thing. He was fortunate to come back home.

To me, he was indeed part of the "Greatest Generation", and the notion of giving those men some attention and thanks is worth all the fawning one possibly could do. I guess if those who are cynical about this could have seen the look in his eye when someone would spot him walking around a store or anywhere else wearing his Navy hat with his squadron group number on it, and would ask him about it or even offer a thank you and a handshake, you might understand it on a different level.

That's the personal side of it. Again, I'd recommend choosing the words a little more carefully with these issues.

C'mon man! My grandpa survived the Battle Of The Bulge and never talked about the war and would change the channel if a war movie came on ..... He was a proud veteran yet was deeply conflicted about WW2.... which to me seemed like the most sensible way to be ....  I shook his hand many a time, and had a deep respect for HIM: not the damn war!.... It pays not to get the two mixed up..... I wasn't mincing my words and can use whatever words I feel like using. This is not a courtroom! Please quit using such cheap tactics to knock down my posts, and stop pretending not to be able to read between the lines a bit. If you misinterpret something I say by some margin and the conversation goes in an unanticipated direction due to this small misinterpretation: well, that's the great risk of conversation, isn't it and can sometimes be half the fun.

[guitarfool2002]

Same experience here - he was proud, he liked when people thanked him, but at the same time there was a deeper feeling that no one can really touch or understand that wasn't there. Surely not war films, or anything else of the sort. Or people who glorify the notion of war over the realities of it. What he said most often was along the lines of "We did what we had to do", or "we did our jobs", and that was how he explained on a personal, mundane level how it was for him. Basic, simple as that, we did our jobs. He did tell me stories when I'd ask, I'm grateful for that and to have heard them so I can pass them on in return. But obviously many of his peers did not want to share much about it, preferring to look ahead and move forward - absolutely. And as far as Brokaw's book, he thought it was a good idea to tell the stories of these people for posterity and for history's sake, I think, but also rejected parts of it at the same time, including some of the promotion around the book. And he didn't care for Brokaw...or Jennings, or Rather for that matter...     

But, again, that's separating real people from ideology and imagery, as well as media promotion.

Use whatever words you choose but keep in mind someone might take offense on the surface to the "idiots" kind of comments, especially around certain more sensitive issues. And if someone might read the comments as trying to lessen the experiences of both my Dad and your Grandpa, real people, where they may not have been intended that way at all, it could be a case of the person reading into it the wrong way as well as a case where different wording could have been used.

2-way street, and all of that stuff. Who has the gavel?

[Pinder's Gone To Kokomo And Back Again]

Same experience here - he was proud, he liked when people thanked him, but at the same time there was a deeper feeling that no one can really touch or understand that wasn't there. Surely not war films, or anything else of the sort. Or people who glorify the notion of war over the realities of it. What he said most often was along the lines of "We did what we had to do", or "we did our jobs", and that was how he explained on a personal, mundane level how it was for him. Basic, simple as that, we did our jobs. He did tell me stories when I'd ask, I'm grateful for that and to have heard them so I can pass them on in return. But obviously many of his peers did not want to share much about it, preferring to look ahead and move forward - absolutely. And as far as Brokaw's book, he thought it was a good idea to tell the stories of these people for posterity and for history's sake, I think, but also rejected parts of it at the same time, including some of the promotion around the book. And he didn't care for Brokaw...or Jennings, or Rather for that matter...    

But, again, that's separating real people from ideology and imagery, as well as media promotion.

Use whatever words you choose but keep in mind someone might take offense on the surface to the "idiots" kind of comments, especially around certain more sensitive issues. And if someone might read the comments as trying to lessen the experiences of both my Dad and your Grandpa, real people, where they may not have been intended that way at all, it could be a case of the person reading into it the wrong way as well as a case where different wording could have been used.

2-way street, and all of that stuff. Who has the gavel?

Well put, my friend.

Yeah, my grandpa would talk about it every once in a while, but more like little things, like if we'd be camping or if I had army toys or whatever, he'd give me little details.... He had that distant, quiet but distracted thing I've noticed a lot of vets have (my stepdad and two uncles are Vietnam vets) .... That and a great deal of pride.

OSD has the gavel, but I doubt he'd give it back willingly

[guitarfool2002]

Great post. I agree and share the same feelings and experiences. Except maybe on the gavel...