skews13
Diamond Member
- Mar 18, 2017
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If people believe they are getting along fairly well in their quest for the good things in life, they may be far less susceptible to movements that threaten democracy. But when nations fall into economic distress, public life can turn into a nightmare. And that is what has happened to America.
Were it not for the Great Recession that started in 2008 — and the “jobless recovery” that followed — the magnitude of our nation’s current crisis would be far less urgent than it is.
The problem of maintaining full employment in recessions and depressions preoccupied the people who lived through the Great Depression, World War II, and the postwar aftermath. The New Deal ameliorated some of the bitterness and suffering of the Depression, but only wartime conditions brought America full-fledged recovery. By 1943, the economic consequences of the military effort were impossible to ignore. Government spending was so colossal that America actually suffered from a labor shortage — at least on the home front. Anyone who wanted a job during World War II had a job...
Both parties have forgotten the lesson of the Great Depression