Reagan vs Obama

[percysunshine]

I see that Bripat is on a roll again.

 

[sinister59]

Cut them to what? What were the top rates? Should we go back to the rates under his administration?

Why do you want to raise taxes? Just curious.

Section 8 - Powers of Congress

The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

That might help.

The government makes it's money that way. If it's not meeting it's debt obligations..then it has to increase revenue or cut spending.

And you guys love the big shiny military we spend so much on..and we guys love the peeps (You know..Americans?) we spend so much money on.

So? Whatcha gonna do..

jack ass's though it would be years before china interude a stelf fight . and they did that last year .
big shiny military ?

the military is paranoid , but thats its job .
without military researching all the time our technology would be years behind .
no Internet , no flat screens tv really the silicon chip would fine it hard without military research money .

not to mention spinal cord injuries , blood advancement ,
the VA here is really laked , but the research part of VA improves surgery , they they gave us a lot .
but no problem we will always have a government , it a question of who's .

 

[Sallow]

Why do you want to raise taxes? Just curious.

Section 8 - Powers of Congress

The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

That might help.

The government makes it's money that way. If it's not meeting it's debt obligations..then it has to increase revenue or cut spending.

And you guys love the big shiny military we spend so much on..and we guys love the peeps (You know..Americans?) we spend so much money on.

So? Whatcha gonna do..

jack ass's though it would be years before china interude a stelf fight . and they did that last year .
big shiny military ?

the military is paranoid , but thats its job .
without military researching all the time our technology would be years behind .
no Internet , no flat screens tv really the silicon chip would fine it hard without military research money .

not to mention spinal cord injuries , blood advancement ,
the VA here is really laked , but the research part of VA improves surgery , they they gave us a lot .
but no problem we will always have a government , it a question of who's .

You can do all that without the military.

See:Space program.

 

[8537]

The two economies are not exactly comparable, of course. Manufacturing jobs, to which workers can be quickly summoned back, make up a much smaller percentage of the total jobs today. Inflation fell sharply in and after the ’81–’82 recession, while it is increasing today. Housing prices had not suffered nearly the hit they have taken in recent years, adversely influencing people’s perception of their ability to spend money. The microprocessor revolution was much less advanced then than now, when firms contemplating expansion are more likely to look to investing in new technology than in new employees (although the new technology will create more jobs in the long run).

In other words, Reagan's policies worked while Obama's haven't worked. All the excuses you are making for Obama are the result of his policies. Inflation is higher because Obama is debasing the currency.

Huh? The dollar is stronger now than it was in 2008.

Technology is not advancing because Obama is punishing corporations for investing.

The housing market is in the tank because Obama's regulations make it harder for banks to loan money.

Holy shit! You might recall that what got us into this mess was banks making it to easy to borrow money. The answer to easy money isn't to make money easier.

 

[8537]

They fell because Reagan got rid of Carter's silly price controls and rationing schemes. Now they are rising because Obama refuses to allow oil companies to drill anywhere.

YOu haven't a solitary clue what you're talking about. Price controls and rationing were a Nixon policy.

 

[8537]

the military is paranoid , but thats its job .
without military researching all the time our technology would be years behind .
no Internet , no flat screens tv really the silicon chip would fine it hard without military research money .

not to mention spinal cord injuries , blood advancement ,
the VA here is really laked , but the research part of VA improves surgery , they they gave us a lot .
but no problem we will always have a government , it a question of who's .

Rarely does a conservative speak so forcefully of the innovative and dynamic power of government to advance technology, create markets and expand our economy.

 

[Trajan]

Do you deny that almost all if not all of the Reagan recovery occurred AFTER the 1982 tax increase?

Please, deny that.

Strawmen are based on fallacy.

That was not.

Please..concentrate.

do me a favor sallow? don't get snarky .......it won't end well, trust me.

oh and -
A straw man is a component of an argument and is an informal fallacy based on misrepresentation of an opponent's position.[1] To "attack a straw man" is to create the illusion of having refuted a proposition by substituting it with a superficially similar yet unequivalent proposition (the "straw man"), and refuting it, without ever having actually refuted the original position.[1][2]

he builds them and knocks them down with such regularity its boring now.

 

[Jroc]

the tax rate was nearly 70 percent under reagans first year.

he then lowered it to 50% for most of his term.

He only lowered it further in his last years.

That lowered revenue caused Bush 41 to raise it back up due to debt

Reagan's tax cut were gradual idiot that's the only way he could get it through a democratic congress "lowered Revenue?" never happened...

 

[Toro]

These types of threads are ridiculous. First the OP is disingenuous. There were two recessions during Reagan's first term. Why doesn't the article key off the first recession instead of the second? Next, the recessions are very different. It is now widely acknowledged that inflation was broken by Volcker and the Fed, which was the main reason why interest rates came down, causing a tremendous tailwind for the economy. Reagan did some good things for certain, but he also benefited from forces of which were completely beyond his control. Finally, Reagan fired Volcker, the greatest Fed Chair in history and replaced him with Greenspan, the most incompetent Chairman in history, and the man most responsible for the mess we are in today.

 

[Truthmatters]

Government Taxes and Revenue Chart in United States 1902-2015 - Federal State Local



1981 3126.8 32.48 a
1982 3253.2 33.10 a
1983 3534.6 31.23 a
1984 3930.9 31.07 a
1985 4217.5 31.95 a
1986 4460.1 32.27 a
1987 4736.4 33.40 a
1988 5100.4 32.86 a
1989 5482.1 33.24 i
1990 5800.5 33.23 a
1991 5992.1 33.07 a
1992 6342.3 33.07 a
1993 6667.4 33.39 a
1994 7085.2 33.51 a
1995 7414.7 34.27 a
1996 7838.5 34.85 a
1997 8332.4 35.40 a
1998 8793.5 36.25 a
1999 9353.5 35.83 a
2000 9951.5 36.93 a
2001 10286.2 34.59 a
2002 10642.3 31.00 a
2003 11142.1 30.88 a
2004 11867.8 32.79 a
2005 12638.4 33.58 a
2006 13398.9 35.05 a
2007 14077.6 36.70 a
2008 14369.1 32.73

 

[NYcarbineer]

I'm putting this in Politics because the economic performance is a function of policy, leadership and politics.

Who told you that?



But anyhow, if that's true, whose policy, leadership, and politics functioned to cause the Reagan recession, that started 6 months AFTER he took office,

and lasted for a grueling 16 months DURING his first term?

 

[Jroc]

You are really just too funny, PC. You cite a 1935 Brookings Institution report (the series of economic programs called "The New Deal" took place over three years, through 1936, so any "conclusion" by Brookings would have been premature.) But then you go on to post a link trying to prove that "conclusion" came from Brookings when in fact it's from the right wing American Enterprise Institute dated 2007!!!

"...when in fact it's from the right wing American Enterprise..."
What a great opportunity you have to eat crow, Mags....
...you couldn't be more wrong....and the honorable thing would be to apologize.
Now, you're honorable, aren't you?

You really need to clean your specs....or find out what quotation marks mean. The phrase "on the whole it retarded recovery" is a direct quote from Brookings.


And, before your abject apology, you might wish to ruminate over the following:

"In February 1935, Roosevelt asked Congress that the NRA be extended another two years. Congress did vote for an extension, but only for one year because of all the complaints. Despite Richberg’s efforts, opposition to the NRA grew stronger and stronger by the time the U.S. Supreme Court struck it down as unconstitutional on May 29, 1935.

Economists at the Brookings Institution reported, “The NRA on the whole retarded recovery.” Roosevelt’s Brain Truster Raymond Moley was among the framers of the NRA who later acknowledged the error of their ways. “Planning an economy in normal times is possible only through the discipline of a police state,” he reflected."
Obama’s Link to “Old Iron Pants” by Jim Powell

And:
"Not only, did the NRA provide fewer advantages than unionists had anticipated, but it also failed as a recovery, measure. It probably even retarded recovery by supporting restrictionism and price increases, concluded a Brookings study."
Hist 221 FDR Bernstein « Gil Troy — Courses

So, it was a statement by the Brookings Institute, wasn't it?

And...did you get the reference to a "police state"... you down with that, too?

Isn't it a wonderful education you get here?


Did I just ruin your evening?

You don't have the capability of "ruining" any part of my day. I'm way beyond allowing anyone to do that. But I figured you'd post more of your selected comments in order to prove your point. It seems that Brookings report generated the needed vehicle for Republicans to fall back on to support their criticism of Roosevelt at the time.

What I find ironic is the same criticisms of Roosevelt's NRA are the same ones made today over Obama's stimulus program. While the free-market ideology always sounds good, looks good in papers produced by academics and think-tanks, no one has yet been able to say for sure what the economy of the 1930's depression era would have resembled if government had NOT infused large amounts of money by way of massive projects that put people back to work. A simple chart pulled from the annals of the time show the dramatic drop in unemployment as a result of Roosevelt's New Deal. And I will continue to maintain that a job is a job is a job, without which people don't have money to buy things that create profits for businesses and ultimately regenerate money back into the Treasury by way of taxes as a result of profits.

Wow!! 7 years and unemployement still 18% quite an accomplishment..


FDR's policies prolonged Depression by 7 years, UCLA economists calculate

Two UCLA economists say they have figured out why the Great Depression dragged on for almost 15 years, and they blame a suspect previously thought to be beyond reproach: President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

After scrutinizing Roosevelt's record for four years, Harold L. Cole and Lee E. Ohanian conclude in a new study that New Deal policies signed into law 71 years ago thwarted economic recovery for seven long years.

"Why the Great Depression lasted so long has always been a great mystery, and because we never really knew the reason, we have always worried whether we would have another 10- to 15-year economic slump," said Ohanian, vice chair of UCLA's Department of Economics. "We found that a relapse isn't likely unless lawmakers gum up a recovery with ill-conceived stimulus policies."

In an article in the August issue of the Journal of Political Economy, Ohanian and Cole blame specific anti-competition and pro-labor measures that Roosevelt promoted and signed into law June 16, 1933.

"President Roosevelt believed that excessive competition was responsible for the Depression by reducing prices and wages, and by extension reducing employment and demand for goods and services," said Cole, also a UCLA professor of economics. "So he came up with a recovery package that would be unimaginable today, allowing businesses in every industry to collude without the threat of antitrust prosecution and workers to demand salaries about 25 percent above where they ought to have been, given market forces. The economy was poised for a beautiful recovery, but that recovery was stalled by these misguided policies."

Using data collected in 1929 by the Conference Board and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Cole and Ohanian were able to establish average wages and prices across a range of industries just prior to the Depression. By adjusting for annual increases in productivity, they were able to use the 1929 benchmark to figure out what prices and wages would have been during every year of the Depression had Roosevelt's policies not gone into effect. They then compared those figures with actual prices and wages as reflected in the Conference Board data.

In the three years following the implementation of Roosevelt's policies, wages in 11 key industries averaged 25 percent higher than they otherwise would have done, the economists calculate. But unemployment was also 25 percent higher than it should have been, given gains in productivity.

Meanwhile, prices across 19 industries averaged 23 percent above where they should have been, given the state of the economy. With goods and services that much harder for consumers to afford, demand stalled and the gross national product floundered at 27 percent below where it otherwise might have been.

"High wages and high prices in an economic slump run contrary to everything we know about market forces in economic downturns," Ohanian said. "As we've seen in the past several years, salaries and prices fall when unemployment is high. By artificially inflating both, the New Deal policies short-circuited the market's self-correcting forces."

The policies were contained in the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA), which exempted industries from antitrust prosecution if they agreed to enter into collective bargaining agreements that significantly raised wages. Because protection from antitrust prosecution all but ensured higher prices for goods and services, a wide range of industries took the bait, Cole and Ohanian found. By 1934 more than 500 industries, which accounted for nearly 80 percent of private, non-agricultural employment, had entered into the collective bargaining agreements called for under NIRA.

Cole and Ohanian calculate that NIRA and its aftermath account for 60 percent of the weak recovery. Without the policies, they contend that the Depression would have ended in 1936 instead of the year when they believe the slump actually ended: 1943.

Roosevelt's role in lifting the nation out of the Great Depression has been so revered that Time magazine readers cited it in 1999 when naming him the 20th century's second-most influential figure.

"This is exciting and valuable research," said Robert E. Lucas Jr., the 1995 Nobel Laureate in economics, and the John Dewey Distinguished Service Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago. "The prevention and cure of depressions is a central mission of macroeconomics, and if we can't understand what happened in the 1930s, how can we be sure it won't happen again?"

NIRA's role in prolonging the Depression has not been more closely scrutinized because the Supreme Court declared the act unconstitutional within two years of its passage.

"Historians have assumed that the policies didn't have an impact because they were too short-lived, but the proof is in the pudding," Ohanian said. "We show that they really did artificially inflate wages and prices."

Even after being deemed unconstitutional, Roosevelt's anti-competition policies persisted — albeit under a different guise, the scholars found. Ohanian and Cole painstakingly documented the extent to which the Roosevelt administration looked the other way as industries once protected by NIRA continued to engage in price-fixing practices for four more years.

FDR's policies prolonged Depression by 7 years, UCLA economists calculate / UCLA Newsroom

 

[Trajan]

"...when in fact it's from the right wing American Enterprise..."
What a great opportunity you have to eat crow, Mags....
...you couldn't be more wrong....and the honorable thing would be to apologize.
Now, you're honorable, aren't you?

You really need to clean your specs....or find out what quotation marks mean. The phrase "on the whole it retarded recovery" is a direct quote from Brookings.


And, before your abject apology, you might wish to ruminate over the following:

"In February 1935, Roosevelt asked Congress that the NRA be extended another two years. Congress did vote for an extension, but only for one year because of all the complaints. Despite Richberg’s efforts, opposition to the NRA grew stronger and stronger by the time the U.S. Supreme Court struck it down as unconstitutional on May 29, 1935.

Economists at the Brookings Institution reported, “The NRA on the whole retarded recovery.” Roosevelt’s Brain Truster Raymond Moley was among the framers of the NRA who later acknowledged the error of their ways. “Planning an economy in normal times is possible only through the discipline of a police state,” he reflected."
Obama’s Link to “Old Iron Pants” by Jim Powell

And:
"Not only, did the NRA provide fewer advantages than unionists had anticipated, but it also failed as a recovery, measure. It probably even retarded recovery by supporting restrictionism and price increases, concluded a Brookings study."
Hist 221 FDR Bernstein « Gil Troy — Courses

So, it was a statement by the Brookings Institute, wasn't it?

And...did you get the reference to a "police state"... you down with that, too?

Isn't it a wonderful education you get here?


Did I just ruin your evening?

You don't have the capability of "ruining" any part of my day. I'm way beyond allowing anyone to do that. But I figured you'd post more of your selected comments in order to prove your point. It seems that Brookings report generated the needed vehicle for Republicans to fall back on to support their criticism of Roosevelt at the time.

What I find ironic is the same criticisms of Roosevelt's NRA are the same ones made today over Obama's stimulus program. While the free-market ideology always sounds good, looks good in papers produced by academics and think-tanks, no one has yet been able to say for sure what the economy of the 1930's depression era would have resembled if government had NOT infused large amounts of money by way of massive projects that put people back to work. A simple chart pulled from the annals of the time show the dramatic drop in unemployment as a result of Roosevelt's New Deal. And I will continue to maintain that a job is a job is a job, without which people don't have money to buy things that create profits for businesses and ultimately regenerate money back into the Treasury by way of taxes as a result of profits.

Wow!! 7 years and unemployement still 18% quite an accomplishment..


FDR's policies prolonged Depression by 7 years, UCLA economists calculate

Two UCLA economists say they have figured out why the Great Depression dragged on for almost 15 years, and they blame a suspect previously thought to be beyond reproach: President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

After scrutinizing Roosevelt's record for four years, Harold L. Cole and Lee E. Ohanian conclude in a new study that New Deal policies signed into law 71 years ago thwarted economic recovery for seven long years.

"Why the Great Depression lasted so long has always been a great mystery, and because we never really knew the reason, we have always worried whether we would have another 10- to 15-year economic slump," said Ohanian, vice chair of UCLA's Department of Economics. "We found that a relapse isn't likely unless lawmakers gum up a recovery with ill-conceived stimulus policies."

In an article in the August issue of the Journal of Political Economy, Ohanian and Cole blame specific anti-competition and pro-labor measures that Roosevelt promoted and signed into law June 16, 1933.

"President Roosevelt believed that excessive competition was responsible for the Depression by reducing prices and wages, and by extension reducing employment and demand for goods and services," said Cole, also a UCLA professor of economics. "So he came up with a recovery package that would be unimaginable today, allowing businesses in every industry to collude without the threat of antitrust prosecution and workers to demand salaries about 25 percent above where they ought to have been, given market forces. The economy was poised for a beautiful recovery, but that recovery was stalled by these misguided policies."

Using data collected in 1929 by the Conference Board and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Cole and Ohanian were able to establish average wages and prices across a range of industries just prior to the Depression. By adjusting for annual increases in productivity, they were able to use the 1929 benchmark to figure out what prices and wages would have been during every year of the Depression had Roosevelt's policies not gone into effect. They then compared those figures with actual prices and wages as reflected in the Conference Board data.

In the three years following the implementation of Roosevelt's policies, wages in 11 key industries averaged 25 percent higher than they otherwise would have done, the economists calculate. But unemployment was also 25 percent higher than it should have been, given gains in productivity.

Meanwhile, prices across 19 industries averaged 23 percent above where they should have been, given the state of the economy. With goods and services that much harder for consumers to afford, demand stalled and the gross national product floundered at 27 percent below where it otherwise might have been.

"High wages and high prices in an economic slump run contrary to everything we know about market forces in economic downturns," Ohanian said. "As we've seen in the past several years, salaries and prices fall when unemployment is high. By artificially inflating both, the New Deal policies short-circuited the market's self-correcting forces."

The policies were contained in the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA), which exempted industries from antitrust prosecution if they agreed to enter into collective bargaining agreements that significantly raised wages. Because protection from antitrust prosecution all but ensured higher prices for goods and services, a wide range of industries took the bait, Cole and Ohanian found. By 1934 more than 500 industries, which accounted for nearly 80 percent of private, non-agricultural employment, had entered into the collective bargaining agreements called for under NIRA.

Cole and Ohanian calculate that NIRA and its aftermath account for 60 percent of the weak recovery. Without the policies, they contend that the Depression would have ended in 1936 instead of the year when they believe the slump actually ended: 1943.

Roosevelt's role in lifting the nation out of the Great Depression has been so revered that Time magazine readers cited it in 1999 when naming him the 20th century's second-most influential figure.

"This is exciting and valuable research," said Robert E. Lucas Jr., the 1995 Nobel Laureate in economics, and the John Dewey Distinguished Service Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago. "The prevention and cure of depressions is a central mission of macroeconomics, and if we can't understand what happened in the 1930s, how can we be sure it won't happen again?"

NIRA's role in prolonging the Depression has not been more closely scrutinized because the Supreme Court declared the act unconstitutional within two years of its passage.

"Historians have assumed that the policies didn't have an impact because they were too short-lived, but the proof is in the pudding," Ohanian said. "We show that they really did artificially inflate wages and prices."

Even after being deemed unconstitutional, Roosevelt's anti-competition policies persisted — albeit under a different guise, the scholars found. Ohanian and Cole painstakingly documented the extent to which the Roosevelt administration looked the other way as industries once protected by NIRA continued to engage in price-fixing practices for four more years.

FDR's policies prolonged Depression by 7 years, UCLA economists calculate / UCLA Newsroom

FDR's policies prolonged Depression by 7 years, UCLA economists calculate

Two UCLA economists say they have figured out why the Great Depression dragged on for almost 15 years, and they blame a suspect previously thought to be beyond reproach: President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

blasphemy!!!!!heretic!!!!

 

[Toro]

The UCLA study uses an incomplete data set which underestimates the number of jobs created during the New Deal.

 

[Trajan]

These types of threads are ridiculous. First the OP is disingenuous. There were two recessions during Reagan's first term. Why doesn't the article key off the first recession instead of the second?

because he kept Volcker on and Reagan is responsible....and it had to be done. So he did it or that is allowed Volcker to do it....

Next, the recessions are very different. It is now widely acknowledged that inflation was broken by Volcker and the Fed, which was the main reason why interest rates came down, causing a tremendous tailwind for the economy. Reagan did some good things for certain, but he also benefited from forces of which were completely beyond his control. Finally, Reagan fired Volcker, the greatest Fed Chair in history and replaced him with Greenspan, the most incompetent Chairman in history, and the man most responsible for the mess we are in today.

yes, I don't think thats in dispute. krugman said same, and the point he made was that as well was that Reagan had such a deep ditch to dig out of a lot of that growth was almost presumptive....so?

and from an earleir post- as I said obama had a number of key advantages Reagan never had;

Not if you use comparative analysis. what was the debt vs gdp %ratio in 1986?

and some more comparisons;

Reagan never had a supra majority, he never had reconciliation majority, he had the senate for just 2 years, the house never, there by granting himself a blank check and the infusions of cash to do with what he pleased ala....


Its 21 months now, we are averaging 2.8%,in the end, we pay for results.

 

[Trajan]

The UCLA study uses an incomplete data set which underestimates the number of jobs created during the New Deal.

are you saying the chart is inaccurate?

 

[8537]

"...when in fact it's from the right wing American Enterprise..."
What a great opportunity you have to eat crow, Mags....
...you couldn't be more wrong....and the honorable thing would be to apologize.
Now, you're honorable, aren't you?

You really need to clean your specs....or find out what quotation marks mean. The phrase "on the whole it retarded recovery" is a direct quote from Brookings.


And, before your abject apology, you might wish to ruminate over the following:

"In February 1935, Roosevelt asked Congress that the NRA be extended another two years. Congress did vote for an extension, but only for one year because of all the complaints. Despite Richberg’s efforts, opposition to the NRA grew stronger and stronger by the time the U.S. Supreme Court struck it down as unconstitutional on May 29, 1935.

Economists at the Brookings Institution reported, “The NRA on the whole retarded recovery.” Roosevelt’s Brain Truster Raymond Moley was among the framers of the NRA who later acknowledged the error of their ways. “Planning an economy in normal times is possible only through the discipline of a police state,” he reflected."
Obama’s Link to “Old Iron Pants” by Jim Powell

And:
"Not only, did the NRA provide fewer advantages than unionists had anticipated, but it also failed as a recovery, measure. It probably even retarded recovery by supporting restrictionism and price increases, concluded a Brookings study."
Hist 221 FDR Bernstein « Gil Troy — Courses

So, it was a statement by the Brookings Institute, wasn't it?

And...did you get the reference to a "police state"... you down with that, too?

Isn't it a wonderful education you get here?


Did I just ruin your evening?

You don't have the capability of "ruining" any part of my day. I'm way beyond allowing anyone to do that. But I figured you'd post more of your selected comments in order to prove your point. It seems that Brookings report generated the needed vehicle for Republicans to fall back on to support their criticism of Roosevelt at the time.

What I find ironic is the same criticisms of Roosevelt's NRA are the same ones made today over Obama's stimulus program. While the free-market ideology always sounds good, looks good in papers produced by academics and think-tanks, no one has yet been able to say for sure what the economy of the 1930's depression era would have resembled if government had NOT infused large amounts of money by way of massive projects that put people back to work. A simple chart pulled from the annals of the time show the dramatic drop in unemployment as a result of Roosevelt's New Deal. And I will continue to maintain that a job is a job is a job, without which people don't have money to buy things that create profits for businesses and ultimately regenerate money back into the Treasury by way of taxes as a result of profits.

Wow!! 7 years and unemployement still 18% quite an accomplishment..


FDR's policies prolonged Depression by 7 years, UCLA economists calculate

Two UCLA economists say they have figured out why the Great Depression dragged on for almost 15 years, and they blame a suspect previously thought to be beyond reproach: President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

After scrutinizing Roosevelt's record for four years, Harold L. Cole and Lee E. Ohanian conclude in a new study that New Deal policies signed into law 71 years ago thwarted economic recovery for seven long years.

"Why the Great Depression lasted so long has always been a great mystery, and because we never really knew the reason, we have always worried whether we would have another 10- to 15-year economic slump," said Ohanian, vice chair of UCLA's Department of Economics. "We found that a relapse isn't likely unless lawmakers gum up a recovery with ill-conceived stimulus policies."

In an article in the August issue of the Journal of Political Economy, Ohanian and Cole blame specific anti-competition and pro-labor measures that Roosevelt promoted and signed into law June 16, 1933.

"President Roosevelt believed that excessive competition was responsible for the Depression by reducing prices and wages, and by extension reducing employment and demand for goods and services," said Cole, also a UCLA professor of economics. "So he came up with a recovery package that would be unimaginable today, allowing businesses in every industry to collude without the threat of antitrust prosecution and workers to demand salaries about 25 percent above where they ought to have been, given market forces. The economy was poised for a beautiful recovery, but that recovery was stalled by these misguided policies."

Using data collected in 1929 by the Conference Board and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Cole and Ohanian were able to establish average wages and prices across a range of industries just prior to the Depression. By adjusting for annual increases in productivity, they were able to use the 1929 benchmark to figure out what prices and wages would have been during every year of the Depression had Roosevelt's policies not gone into effect. They then compared those figures with actual prices and wages as reflected in the Conference Board data.

In the three years following the implementation of Roosevelt's policies, wages in 11 key industries averaged 25 percent higher than they otherwise would have done, the economists calculate. But unemployment was also 25 percent higher than it should have been, given gains in productivity.

Meanwhile, prices across 19 industries averaged 23 percent above where they should have been, given the state of the economy. With goods and services that much harder for consumers to afford, demand stalled and the gross national product floundered at 27 percent below where it otherwise might have been.

"High wages and high prices in an economic slump run contrary to everything we know about market forces in economic downturns," Ohanian said. "As we've seen in the past several years, salaries and prices fall when unemployment is high. By artificially inflating both, the New Deal policies short-circuited the market's self-correcting forces."

The policies were contained in the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA), which exempted industries from antitrust prosecution if they agreed to enter into collective bargaining agreements that significantly raised wages. Because protection from antitrust prosecution all but ensured higher prices for goods and services, a wide range of industries took the bait, Cole and Ohanian found. By 1934 more than 500 industries, which accounted for nearly 80 percent of private, non-agricultural employment, had entered into the collective bargaining agreements called for under NIRA.

Cole and Ohanian calculate that NIRA and its aftermath account for 60 percent of the weak recovery. Without the policies, they contend that the Depression would have ended in 1936 instead of the year when they believe the slump actually ended: 1943.

Roosevelt's role in lifting the nation out of the Great Depression has been so revered that Time magazine readers cited it in 1999 when naming him the 20th century's second-most influential figure.

"This is exciting and valuable research," said Robert E. Lucas Jr., the 1995 Nobel Laureate in economics, and the John Dewey Distinguished Service Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago. "The prevention and cure of depressions is a central mission of macroeconomics, and if we can't understand what happened in the 1930s, how can we be sure it won't happen again?"

NIRA's role in prolonging the Depression has not been more closely scrutinized because the Supreme Court declared the act unconstitutional within two years of its passage.

"Historians have assumed that the policies didn't have an impact because they were too short-lived, but the proof is in the pudding," Ohanian said. "We show that they really did artificially inflate wages and prices."

Even after being deemed unconstitutional, Roosevelt's anti-competition policies persisted — albeit under a different guise, the scholars found. Ohanian and Cole painstakingly documented the extent to which the Roosevelt administration looked the other way as industries once protected by NIRA continued to engage in price-fixing practices for four more years.

FDR's policies prolonged Depression by 7 years, UCLA economists calculate / UCLA Newsroom

Can you explain how the fastest four year period of economic growth in US peacetime history can be considered "prolonging" the Depression?

 

[Trajan]

let me make a statement here on comparisons etc. Lets try a different way of looking at it;


Clinton had a dem. congress for 2 years, in 94 the house flipped, and so did the Senate. ( edit- he had a hostile congress)
He presided over some pretty good economic times.

Reagan had a hostile congress, he had the senate for 4 ( I was wrong earlier I apologize) years,and he never had the house. By this same point in time after the recession ended, the economy had been ramped up and we were on the mend.


Reps say they deserve credit for the Clinton years because they drove the agenda, dems say hey Clinton was the President, in the long term Clinton gets the nod, no one remembers or cares who had congress really ( though this does count in the short term especially). Reagan? He carrys the whole load, good OR bad.

It is what it is.

They both stamped their era with their persona, good bad or indifferent and they each at the end of the day are responsible for what occured on their watch.



Reagan got handed a shitty deal, Clinton got a mild recession, Obama got a really shitty deal. Obama had what neither had, a supra majority and a reconciliation majority. He didn't need to compromise and looking back at Clinton and Reagan, maybe this was a bad thing.

No matter what happens it is the President that stands on their own in the eyes of history as the delineating factor of the year they occupy the WH.

We elect or 'pay' and grant accolades for performance, come what may. Its their job to mesh the exec., the house and senate and govern.

There for it is curious to me that Reagan barely gets a break from some, Clinton at least in my eyes gets the breaks ( and deserves too), and people scream if Obama doesn't get them all..... If Reagan and Clinton are responsible for their terms, so is Obama.

You can throw it all against the wall, in 81 it seemed like the end of the world, I remember well the doldrums, the shitty economy, rampant inflation, lack of jobs, crushing interest rates , for a wake up call; how would you like to finance a home at 15% interest?

Reagan dealt with his, Clinton dealt with his and Obama must deal with his, each had their own unique set of challenges........at the end of the day we pay them to get the job done.

 

[Trajan]

I'm putting this in Politics because the economic performance is a function of policy, leadership and politics.

Who told you that?



But anyhow, if that's true, whose policy, leadership, and politics functioned to cause the Reagan recession, that started 6 months AFTER he took office,

and lasted for a grueling 16 months DURING his first term?

Reagans, and this has been noted as the Reagan recession by me several times, and by others for some months......happy now?


But wait!!! theres more!!!!

There are folks here, *ahem* that say he didn't have squat to do with it becasue it was successful in what it set out to do and had to be done, so Volcker gets the credit, ala the Volcker recession...sound familiar?



Oh and I am sure it doesn't matter to you, but like, he was you know, shot? 70 days into his term and had a very truncated schedule for 6 months there after...

 

[PoliticalChic]

Oh, and here I thought Clinton made some secret deal with Castro or something that almost brought the entire country to its knees. You know, you could have just SAID what you were talking about, and we could have cleared that up immediately. You also could haved posted a link to any one of hundreds of articles assessing the Brookings analysis, rather than one by a blatantly far-right organization as a teaser. But nooooooooo, it's not your style. You just love to toss out little crumbs hoping to hook a sucker. When or when will I learn your MO?

So, out of all that verbiage designed to cloud the issue...you seem to admit that Democrat Clinton marched shoulder to shoulder with Communist Tyrannt Fidel Castro....


...I see your improvement already!

Ah..so you hate Clinton and love Reagan..

This speaks volumes.

I love posting it.
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R67CH-qhXJs]YouTube - President Ronald Reagan - Address on Iran-Contra[/ame]
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5YOQEZtNE0&feature=related]YouTube - Ronald Reagan Speech about Iran-Contra (Part 2 of 2)[/ame]

He committed treason and lied about it.

1. "He committed treason and lied about it."

Since I like you, I offer the following advice, just so you don't embarrass yourself as you did above...look up the meaning of 'treason.'
Hyperbole is generally reserved for teenage girls.

2. "...so you hate Clinton..."
Again, this hyperbole speaks of one who is less than articulate.
I hate no one.
But I waste no time in revealing their, and your, inequities and transgressions.

3. And, rather than post outside of the subject of the post, how bout offering your carefully considered opinion of the fascist Democrat- Clinton-Reno-Holder attack on Elian Gonzalez in the service of the Communist Dictator Fidel Castro?

It seems that your attack on the great man is higher on you list of priorities than offering any disapproval of the unconstitutional actions of the Left.