Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Great Myths of the Great Depression

Sometimes we have to step back and look at history as it was, not as the liberal revisionists in our universities want us to believe. Those that worship "big government" would learn a lot by reading this historical study of the causes of the great depression.

Article:
Great Myths of the Great Depression
By LAWRENCE W. REED | Jan. 1, 1998
(Editor's note: This publication was updated in April 2010.)

Students today are often given a skewed account of the Great Depression of 1929-1941 that condemns free-market capitalism as the cause of, and promotes government intervention as the solution to, the economic hardships of the era. In this essay based on a popular lecture, Mackinac Center for Public Policy President Lawrence W. Reed debunks the conventional view and traces the central role that poor government policy played in fostering this legendary catastrophe.

Contents


introduction
A Modern Fairy Tale
The Great, Great, Great, Great Depression
Phase I: The Business Cycle
Central Planners Fail at Monetary Policy
The Bottom Drops Out
Buddy, Can You Spare $40 Million?
Phase II: Disintegration of the World Economy
"The greatest spending administration in all of history"
You Tax Me, I Tax You
Free Markets or Free Lunches?
Phase III: The New Deal
"Nothing to fear but fear itself"
New Dealing From the Bottom of the Deck
Blue Eagles, Red Ducks
The Alphabet Commissars
An astonishing rabble of impudent nobodies"
Signs of Life
Phase IV: The Wagner Act
An Unfriendly Climate for Business
Whither Free Enterprise
Postscript: Have We Learned Our Lessons?
Endnotes

Great Myths of the Great Depression

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