Republican myth about FDR Depression Busted

[ArmednSafe]

According to Keynesians, when the economy takes a dive from the unsustainable trajectory that they set it on with artificially low interest rates, the government needs to take money from productive people making things that people want and spend it on making things people don't want. For example, they concluded that the problem with the economy was that there weren't enough new cars. So, they started a program where you could destroy your working car and get tax money for a brand new one. morons

[macgeek2004]

@IntrepidSI

1st of all, you're projecting Fox News and it's viewers onto MSNBC and _it's_ viewers, and that's just a lie and you know it. You couldn't _possibly_ be stupid enough to actually believe that, so stop saying it.

2nd, the Stimulus *DID* work. It prevented the recession from turning into a DEPRESSION. The only reason why it didn't work any better than it did ("half-work", if you will) was because the Republicans neutered it. If Obama had gotten a Stimulus of the original size he wan

[macgeek2004]

@s0beit

And FDR was the one who brought us out of the depression w/the New Deal and WPA. By the time WWII arrived, we were nearly out of the depression. (WWII just brought us the rest of the way out and propelled us onto becoming a super-power.)

[s0beit]

The 1929 crash happened because of 5 long years of federal reserve expansion of credit. It's all over the textbooks, look it up, it's undeniable that they did this and the crash of the 1920s did not (they also did not do this during the 1920s depression) and this is a huge, huge myth. I'm not saying its intentional and i hate that FOX even brings it up because FOX and neocons are huge spenders in public works and other areas (army is a huge one), it's a myth just the same.

[IntrepidSI]

I know some of you hate to watch anything but MSNBC, or as I like to call it, the ministry of Propoganda for the DNC, but that is not what anyone said.

They said that FDR's policies did not get us out of the Depression, it was WWII that did that.

Did FDR have some great policies, sure. He also had a lot that did not..

And here we are a year after the stimulus spending and the unemployment rate is 9%. Not 8%, as promised, but unmoving at 9%.

[sciencedoggy]

My family would have died without the money they earned working for the WPA. ANd so would most of your families. Since the massive tax cuts for the wealthy began under Reagan, the wealthy take their tax breaks and use it to ship the jobs over seas. If you are under 50, go ask your grand parents if they had a WPA job, and if they say yes, ask them what they would have done without it.

[harj2009]

FDR was good in the regulation he created the new deal economy

[DarthMaul8065]

Read Sowell's works for more information on whether FDR prolonged the Great Depression. Sowell provides facts.

[brgzz]

This is Communist propaganda. You should listen to this video closely.

For example, cutting taxes won't help Americans, because the money they keep in their pockets (their own money), will just be spent on higher gas prices.

So, if taxes are higher, then you don't have to pay higher gas prices? What a sham. this is Communist propaganda, and the MSLSD network is a propaganda machine. Think about it dude. Cheers~

[sciencedoggy]

@brgzz prove it.

[brgzz]

@sciencedoggy Just did that buddy. Cheers~

[illKiller6]

It's okay, people who wrongly think FDR prolonged the depression. He welcomes your hatred XD

[oJKBo]

Haha yeah the 'myth' of FDR worsening the depression is no more. It's a fact lol.

[TOAOSpot]

Marvelous propaganda and the line "Don't know much about history" is a marvelously ironic commentary on the entire piece.

[meesllk]

Hi Xasew,

you are wrong in your view. Productivity is not related to the price of the goods produced ; productivity is determined by the number of units produced by a factor of production - a factor could be labor, capital, land, or technology. If prices of goods/services drop from over-supply or a crash brought about by free-market failure, then this is caused by these defects in the system. Labor productivity would remain constant, so why screw workers with wage cuts ?

[meesllk]

Hi deltapunk21

In your own video, you claimed that fannie mae and freddie mac were the only ones peddling sub-prime mortgages, well there were many private companies doing this, including big wall street companies. Capitalism and free markets have systemic defects which leave the entire banking system vulnerable to collapse. What are the consequences of such a banking collapse ? A wipe out of savings, no money for spending, no money for investing, a vicious cycle of cuts and job losses etc.

[meesllk]

This would create an economic depression. This was presidents hoovers dark legacy. But hey, deltapunk21, you would still have a free-market, but it would be shattered and destroyed and remain depressed for years and possibly decades. But hey, you would have your free-market, your little toy to play with.

[deltapunk21]

Its not a rpeublican myth you fools, stol lying about the statistics and gaming the debate by mischaracterizing history and what happened. Hoover and his democrap buddies got what Roosevelt VP said was us on the "road to socialism" higher taxes, increased spending, and public work projects and more and more gov interference. FDR came in and drank down on it casuing massive food shortages, high inflation, destruction of wealth all over the place, and the utter collapse of our standard of living.

[DarthByss]

David Shuster has no interest in historical facts. Their are MOUNTAINS of evidence that PROVE FDR prolonged the Great Depression with his New Deal. Notable historians like Gary Dean Best, John Braeman, Mark Leff, Paul Moreno, Jim Powell, and Burton Folsom, Jr all not only use Congressional archives, but economics to prove that the FDR myth is just that, a myth. It's as true as the earth revolving around the sun. But MSNBC has never been known for reporting or facts for that matter.

[deltapunk21]

Shuster is a fascist liar and a shill for big gov and the democraps who own and operate it.

[TheEVEInspiration]

LOL,

As if the down level says anything how well the economy is running.

And GDP includes government spending, money that is either borrowed or taxed.

Zero sum game people!

[RenShiWu]

Led us out of the Depression? Huh? No, he was president long enough that World War II came along and ameliorated the Great Depression. Unemployment never dropped below 17% until World War II. It was at 33% at one point. The Great Depression witnessed the greatest contraction of industrial output in history. Read Amity Shlaes' "The Forgotten Man" or Burton Folsom's "New Deal or Raw Deal?" to get the straight dope about myths and the Great Depression.

[buzzadler]

these people (both the left and the right) are terribly ignorant. Do the laws of physics change if the physicist is a republican? Do the laws of chemistry or biology or geology change because the scientist is a liberal? of COURSE NOT. It's like saying, if i drop a penny out of my hand, if I'm a republican, gravity will force the penny to the floor. But if I'm a liberal, the laws of gravity don't apply, and the penny will float in the air - not because of science, but because of politics????

[buzzadler]

these idiots are clueless. this is exactly why i don't have a TV anymore. I read books written by REAL ECONOMISTS instead of watching propaganda like this. Economic Science has nothing more to do with left and right than peanut butter or swordfish. FDR's own treasury secretary was quoted as saying (paraphrase) "we've been spending money for 8 years, and the unemployment rate is still the same" There's no such thing as a "republican" economists.,

[Xasew]

Depression of 1920-21. Ever heard of it? Its first year was worse than the one of the Great Depression.

Didn't need stimulus, didn't need inflation. It just cured itself. FDR fans might want to look into that.

[RedSandStudios]

@Xasew Yeah and then look what happened in 1929. Hmmmm?

[Xasew]

@RedSandStudios

The 1929 Crash happened, because 9 years prior to it a depression didn't need stimulus to go away?

Did you even have a point?

[djdk89]

@Xasew It was a total different situation depressions don't always cure it self.

[Xasew]

@djdk89

They don't cure themselves when the government intervenes.

[djdk89]

@Xasew The depression in the 1921 was cause from not enough work. the great depression was cause by the housing bubble and agricultural disasters and deregulation. Government usually intervenes like the 1980 recession just with tax cuts.

[Xasew]

@djdk89

Not enough work? Was that a joke? How about thinking through the implications of that statement? Did they abolish scarcity for a few years?

Artificially propping prices up in labor and agriculture, destroying world trade through Smoot-Hawley, monetary manipulation, bailouts, stimulus through public works and so on... Those didn't have anything to do with the Great Depression?

Can you point to a single relevant deregulation during the 1920s?

[flanksteak2]

@Xasew It didn't cure itself, the money supply was massively expanded beginning in the early 20's.

[Xasew]

@flanksteak2

The recovery began well before the Fed started its open market operations. Not to mention most of the monetary expansion took place in the latter half of the 20s.

[flanksteak2]

@Xasew Oh good.

Was it a worldwide phenomenon? Or just local here to America?

What were it's causes?

[Xasew]

@flanksteak2

"...worldwide phenomenon..."

Are you asking about to the recession or the recovery?

[flanksteak2]

@Xasew The recession. Was it worldwide as it was during the great depression?

[Xasew]

@flanksteak2

Yes, it was. That's to be expected, as everyone partially financed WW I through inflation. Not only was there a general recession/depression, but the economies of Germany, Poland and Hungary pretty much imploded in the early 20s. Russia, who at the time was a big player in the global economy, was completely devastated by civil war and its aftermath. Japan in fact tried to fight the recession by propping prices up and (not surprisingly) it failed horribly.

[Bellator656]

2prt. "...This contrasts sharply, for example, with the German practice during the 1930s when persons in the labor-force camps were classed as employed, and Soviet practice which includes employment in labor camps, if it includes it at all, as employment." He is basically saying that anyone who was employed by emergency programs were counted as unemployed because any one working for the WPA falls to the same category as internees in Mauthausen or the gulag. Partisan piffle. Partisan stats.

[Bellator656]

Now, in his notes he Lebergott noted that "these estimates for the years prior to 1940 are intended to measure the number of persons who are totally unemployed, having no work at all. For the 1930s this concept, however, does include one large group of persons who had both work and income from work—those on emergency work. In the United States we are concerned with measuring lack of regular work and do not minimize the total by excluding persons with made work or emergency jobs..."

[sschmidt2009]

This from a guy, Daniel Gross, who wrote, "Pop!: Why Bubbles are Great for the Economy."

Yes, I'm sure. Mythbusters from David Shuster and this guy. Good thing we have non-political pundits these days.

[ApopkaDave]

While the dow quadrupled, and the rich got much richer, unemployment never went under 15% and those who were employed worked for pennys risking life and limb on FDRs projects. FDR recovered the economy with the blood of the poor.

[Bellator656]

Nonsense. By 1937, the unemployment fell below 10 %. Every year, with the exception of a short recession, the economy expanded and unemployment diminished under FDR. Inequality, also, decreased.

[motina10]

Then it crashed again. A depression in a depression. The following year (1938) it went back up to 20%.

[Bellator656]

Yes, unfortunately FDR listened to conservatives and decided to cut spending, triggering the recession. And, no the unemployment didn't return to 20%. Following the 1937 recession, unemployment rose slightly to about 13 %.

[motina10]

Cut what spending? The unemployment rate in 1938 was almost 20% The rest of the world was around 13% Wikipedia gives 19.1% to be presice.

1933 - 24.9%

1934 - 21.7%

1935 - 20.1%

1936 - 16.95

1937 - 14.3%

1938 - 19.0%

1939 - 17.9%

[Bellator656]

No. Those figures include one large group of persons who had both work and income from work—those on emergency work. The real numbers were much lower.

[motina10]

I am sure the real numbers would actually be higher. Your argument doesn't make sense either. Oh well.

[Bellator656]

No, the real figures were lower. The figures you cite were constructed by the economist Stanley Lebergott in the 60s. He argued that anyone employed by government emergency work programs should be counted as unemployed for the same reason that anyone in the Gulag or in Nazi work camps should have been measured in as unemployed. His argument is ideologically charged and therefore should be disregarded. The real unemployment figure was almost ten percent lower in 1937.

[motina10]

Ideologically charged, LoL! The Bureau of Labor Statistics provided Stanley Lebergott  the numbers.

[Bellator656]

No, I think he constructed them.

[motina10]

''I think''... interesting. Well your wrong.

[Bellator656]

Says who and why?

The inflated statistics are from Stanley Lebergott's Manpower in Economic Growth: The American Record since 1800.

[motina10]

You accuse him of ideologically driven. he is merely expplaining why the number are the way they are. He still got the numbers from the Bureau of Labor. If anything, this guy is supporting your argument. So is the Bureau being ideologically driven? It is the Bureau who counted those people being unemployed, not him. He explained the why.

[Bellator656]

Again, I quoted his notes. I don't know what the BoL is thinking, but they're using the statistics he constructed. His ideological distortion of the statistics, which inflates the figure of unemployment, is worth pointing out. By 1937, US unemployment figures were below 10 % and it never neared 20 % again if you include the emergency employment programs. If you don't, then you get his inflated, distorted statistics. How is he supporting my position?

[motina10]

''I don't know what the BoL is thinking, but they're using the statistics he constructed.''

No, BoL provided him with the statistics and he is explaining them. It seems the ''ideological distortions'' are the work of the BoL.

[Bellator656]

Well, regardless, the data is distorted and false.

[motina10]

Sure..

[Bellator656]

Yes, and I gave the reason why. Since the BoL figures and Stanley Lebergott's figures are essentially the same, it's safe to assume that they had similar methids. Now refute my argument if you can, I doubt you can. The idea that anyone employed by the WPA, working and receiving money, can possibly be categorized as unemployed, which they were, is highly misleading. The level of unemployment was much lower than what the conservative anti-new dealers argue.

[GateKeeper50hotmail]

Apopka is Seminole for potato - so to Potatohead Dave I respond that under FDR labor gained the right to organize and the minimum wage and 40 hour work weeks were put into law. The poor gained more under FDR than any prior president.

[ApopkaDave]

Tell it to the people who died of "pneumonia" building the Hoover Dam.

[Xasew]

If you knew anything about economics, you'd know that wage fixing was the primary cause of unemployment in the 30s. One can only earn what his productivity grants him. If he earns more than that, someone else has to lose a job for him or work fewer hours.

Unions can't force real wages higher. Normally they accomplish the opposite, without even realizing it.

[meesllk]

Who determines productivity and how is it derived ? Is the speculator who makes millions of dollars manipulating markets that much more productive than the factory worker or factory manager ?

And furthermore, if banks and stock markets cause an economy to collapse, then why do people like you call for wage cuts. Have workers suddenly become less productive as a result of banks and stock markets collapsing ? Your answers please.

[Xasew]

I don't call for wage cuts. I simply want it to be possible for wages to fall if necessary. Productivity is directly related to the price of the goods produced, so workers do indeed become less productive even if they do their job as before. A lot of capital is destroyed during the boom, so that also affects productivity.

[Visfen]

@GateKeeper50hotmail Not the poor who had a productivity under the minimum wage law or were in a situation where they needed to work more than 40 hours.

The middle class and definitely unions benefited from these law, the really poor however did not. Minimum wage and work day laws create unemployment as it limits the tools by which those outside the work market can enter, ie. lowering their standards.

And public work is destructive work, it's the same as the broken window fallacy.

[SkylineTime]

David Shuster is such a douchebag. How anyone can actually believe that he is a good journalist is beyond me. He is the very definition of Yellow Journalism.

[jpbalkenende]

Yes unlike the greatness of objective journalism that is Fox News or newscorps in egeneral.

[SkylineTime]

I never said anything about Fox. I actually believe that Fox is very right wing. But this guy Shuster is CRAP.

[jpbalkenende]

Fair enough. Just seems like a weird moment to complain about yellow page Journalism when it has been back again since at least 1996.

[GateKeeper50hotmail]

His archive of historical audio recordings are most compelling, and he use them like a rapier to skewer his conservative guest's fatuous comments.