The jerks are saying it’s a recovery, it’s a recovery.-All I can see is a recovery.

Meanwhile there are no jobs today and no jobs in the near future.

The reason why we are here today is that politicians believe they
where blind sided. Everyone was trying to them them the truth
but they where in denial. Personal bankruptcy spike in 2005. Home
foreclosures in 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009. Company and retail forecloses
2008 and 2009. Many did not wake up until October 2008. It’s
the same thing all over again. Politicians and government officials
asleep at the switch and in denial. They won’t wake up until
they are swimming in mass poverty in 2010. A major portion of the
population is headed toward destitution. Educated people included.
Although the decline has slowed the trend in doward.

Thanks for stopping by the site. I agree the Eichengreen stuff is very disturbing given how aggressive the policy response has been post-Lehman. I am not familiar with the Hall-Ferguson book, but I did look at it over at Amazon. It might be something to read for later.

I think its nonsense to say that the job creation and social safety net creation were irrelevant. This is obviously the work of someone with an ideological agenda. For the record, I am not a fan of FDR and do not view the New Deal as an unmitigated success. Nevertheless, a balanced view would admit that the creation of infrastructure jobs was a huge boon to those economies (Think Tennesse Valley Authority) Even the Hoover Dam, started under Hoover can be seen in the same light.

This is what China is doing today and one reason their economy has not fallen off a cliff despite a huge decline in exports to the west.

I cannot find this rec if it was here earlier.
Follow up Q –
on that volume’s summary blurb [over at Amazon] that I find odd:
“As for the New Deal, Hall and Ferguson argue that except for deposit insurance and gold policy, most of it was irrelevant or counterproductive and contributed only to slowing the recovery after 1933.”

Can you comment on those authors’ apparent view that job creation and a safety net apparently had no measurable value for the economy [as well as for morale] during the G D? my parents – both musicians – were children and teenagers of that era, and had many stories to tell about jobs among their elder siblings’ and teachers’ generation – that were entirely due to WPA…

I realize that I am asking you to comment on writings of other authors but hope you can help parse this out for me. thanks, ed

The whole thing is an interesting experiment involving countless factors and players… Too many for me to judge concretely. I’m betting on inflation though, cause it seems much more politically doable and likely than the alternatives.