# Ron Paul's Plan **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [October 18, 2011, 11:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082 "2011-10-18T23:43:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 13
**Author:** ![Strassia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e8c25b/32.png) [@Strassia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Strassia)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2011, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/242 "2011-10-26T14:56:29Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > Of course there would be a short correction after you cut spending that’s pretty straightforward. I was using hyperbole when I said we shipped troops overseas. I’m well aware of the build up to WWII. FDR was doing everything he could to get us in the damn war. If his policies were causing such a great recovery why would he be itching to get in the thing? Are you contending that the drop in unemployment between 1934 and 1937 was due to war build up? Are you also contending that the reason the U.S. entered the war was for an economic boost? ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 6:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/243 "2011-10-27T06:58:57Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > They even taught me in HS that the New Deal was a failure, never thought I’d hear otherwise. Would it be rude or condescending to inquire about this high school? Where? Public or what? I’m also curious about your age, and the repertoire of books, magazines and/or web resources you study to form your conclusions. ---
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/244 "2011-10-27T15:24:44Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > Would it be rude or condescending to inquire about this high school? Where? Public or what? > > I’m also curious about your age, and the repertoire of books, magazines and/or web resources you study to form your conclusions. I’m quite curious about this myself. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/245 "2011-10-27T16:23:54Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > Would it be rude or condescending to inquire about this high school? Where? Public or what? I was taught the same thing in a Florida public high school. Maybe “failure” is the wrong word, but the line was definitely that it was WWII that ended the GD. ---
**Author:** ![Strassia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e8c25b/32.png) [@Strassia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Strassia)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 5:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/246 "2011-10-27T17:54:14Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > I was taught the same thing in a Florida public high school. Maybe “failure” is the wrong word, but the line was definitely that it was WWII that ended the GD. I don’t think it can be argued that the U.S. economy did not fully recover until the start of WWII. Of course I have never understood how that argument works against Keynesian stimulus. It just shows how much government spending is required and how little direct return matters. I still think that the U.S. would have been better off spending that money on infrastructure (energy, transportation, and educational). Not that I think we should have stayed out of WWII, but there is less return on munitions and paying people to die and kill than there would be on paying people to dig and refill holes. And the real benefit of WWII to the U.S. economy was the total devastation it visited on all our economic rivals. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/247 "2011-10-27T18:18:11Z")
I am not taking a position on the argument (though I happen to agree with you). I’m just throwing that out there since **septimus** was asking. ---
**Author:** ![Strassia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e8c25b/32.png) [@Strassia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Strassia)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 7:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/248 "2011-10-27T19:39:02Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > I am not taking a position on the argument (though I happen to agree with you). I’m just throwing that out there since **septimus** was asking. I guess my point it is one thing to say that the economic effects of the Great Depression lasted until WWII and another to say that the New Deal was a failure. But it might be easy to hear the first and assume it meant the second. ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/249 "2011-10-27T19:41:29Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > Would it be rude or condescending to inquire about this high school? Where? Public or what? > > I’m also curious about your age, and the repertoire of books, magazines and/or web resources you study to form your conclusions. I went to a magnet public HS in a working class suburb of Baltimore,MD, generally considered to be the best in the area. Though the school would have less to do with my education on the subject than the political bias of the instructor. I’ve heard both sides of the issue from different instructors. I haven’t studied the issue as much as I would like that’s why I said I would get back on the subject. The sources I have consulted have been conflicting. I know I read somewhere that in a poll, modern economists were split almost 50/50 on whether they agree or disagree with the following statement: The policies of the New Deal served to lengthen or deepen the effects of the Great Depression. ---
**Author:** ![PigArcher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/bcef8e/32.png) [@PigArcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PigArcher)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/250 "2011-10-27T19:43:37Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > I know I read somewhere that in a poll, modern economists were split almost 50/50 on whether they agree or disagree with the following statement: The policies of the New Deal served to lengthen or deepen the effects of the Great Depression. cite? ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/251 "2011-10-27T19:48:29Z")
> [@Strassia](#): > > I guess my point it is one thing to say that the economic effects of the Great Depression lasted until WWII and another to say that the New Deal was a failure. But it might be easy to hear the first and assume it meant the second. That depends on what the intended outcome of the New Deal was. If it was meant to get us out of the Depression I’ve taken the stance in this thread that it did not. If the intent was to provide relief to as many people as possible I think it would be hard to argue it didn’t do that. ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/252 "2011-10-27T19:54:49Z")
> [@kenetic](#): > > cite? [http://money.usnews.com/money/business-economy/articles/2008/04/11/did-the-new-deal-work](http://money.usnews.com/money/business-economy/articles/2008/04/11/did-the-new-deal-work) My side lost 51-49 fwiw ---
**Author:** ![Strassia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e8c25b/32.png) [@Strassia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Strassia)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/253 "2011-10-27T20:21:15Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > That depends on what the intended outcome of the New Deal was. If it was meant to get us out of the Depression I’ve taken the stance in this thread that it did not. > > If the intent was to provide relief to as many people as possible I think it would be hard to argue it didn’t do that. There are two problems with your first statement. 1) The New Deal was compromised when FDR started losing support in 1937\* and shifting his focus to foreign affairs. 2) even crimped as it was, the New Deal was moving the economy in the right direction when it was completed subsumed by the effect of mobilizing for war. While both of those reasons mean that New Deal did not end the Depression, neither mean it was a failure, either. \*Part of the issue in 1937 was something we still hear today: “X worked, now lets get rid of it!” Just this year I have heard that applied to the EPA and unions. Some of the same thing was happening in the late thirties. As unemployment was starting to come down their was a lot of pressure to scale back all the programs that had reduced it. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/254 "2011-10-27T20:26:34Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > That depends on what the intended outcome of the New Deal was. If it was meant to get us out of the Depression I’ve taken the stance in this thread that it did not. > > If the intent was to provide relief to as many people as possible I think it would be hard to argue it didn’t do that. Well, to be fair, most economists think it was the stimulative spending of WWIi or the monetary policies of the 1930’s ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/255 "2011-10-27T20:32:54Z")
> [@Strassia](#): > > \*Part of the issue in 1937 was something we still hear today: “X worked, now lets get rid of it!” Just this year I have heard that applied to the EPA and unions. Some of the same thing was happening in the late thirties. As unemployment was starting to come down their was a lot of pressure to scale back all the programs that had reduced it. You can also see this thinking at play in the debates or vaccination and fluoridation, with the difference that those things have worked so well that opponents don’t realize why they are necessary. That’s the curse of almost any preventive program. ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/256 "2011-10-27T20:45:30Z")
> [@Strassia](#): > > There are two problems with your first statement. 1) The New Deal was compromised when FDR started losing support in 1937\* and shifting his focus to foreign affairs. 2) even crimped as it was, the New Deal was moving the economy in the right direction when it was completed subsumed by the effect of mobilizing for war. While both of those reasons mean that New Deal did not end the Depression, neither mean it was a failure, either. As I’ve said I will be back after I obtain a more in depth understanding of the issue. You are just rehashing earlier arguments. If the New Deal was so crimped, how can you justify declaring it a success when the “movement in the right direction” could just as well be attributed to market forces? You can’t have it both ways and say the New Deal worked during it’s height and after it’s subsequent scaling back. ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/257 "2011-10-27T20:55:03Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > Well, to be fair, most economists think it was the stimulative spending of WWIi or the monetary policies of the 1930’s Cite? How do these economists explain what happened after the war when spending was cut? Or what happened in the post war depression of 1920 that only lasted a year when spending was also cut? ---
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/258 "2011-10-27T22:12:36Z")
> [@Strassia](#): > > I guess my point it is one thing to say that the economic effects of the Great Depression lasted until WWII and another to say that the New Deal was a failure. But it might be easy to hear the first and assume it meant the second. This is the issue. I mean, IIRC, even Paul Krugman makes the argument that the Great Depression really didn’t end until WWII. That’s a very different thing than asserting that the New Deal was a failure, or to make the assertions that **WillFarnaby** made in this thread, which included the charge that “there was no economic recovery until the war” and that there was no improvement in private sector employment during the New Deal. I think it really depends on how you define the Great Depression being “over”. Again, by the standard of GDP, it would have been over by 1936, but there’s certainly more to it than that. Nevertheless, the 1930s provide a nice little experiment in stimulus versus deficit reduction when you look at the course of the economy and of employment before and after 1937. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2011, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/259 "2011-10-27T23:29:18Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > Cite? > > How do these economists explain what happened after the war when spending was cut? Or what happened in the post war depression of 1920 that only lasted a year when spending was also cut? After WW II there was a very large amount of pent up consumer demand, because large items like cars and refrigerators were almost impossible to get during the war, since the factories had been converted to the war effort. There was also a lot of savings during the war from war bonds and from the lack of places to spend money. My father bought a car immediately after returning from Europe, but he could only do so because he had a job which gave him priority. Truman, in **Plain Speaking** was quite concerned with a postwar recession similar to the one after WW I, and so fiscal policy was structured to be stimulative, not that much was required. As for ending the Depression, the stimulus helped significantly but was not nearly big enough considering the loss of wealth. ---
**Author:** ![Strassia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e8c25b/32.png) [@Strassia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Strassia)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2011, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/260 "2011-10-28T15:36:20Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > As I’ve said I will be back after I obtain a more in depth understanding of the issue. You are just rehashing earlier arguments. > > If the New Deal was so crimped, how can you justify declaring it a success when the “movement in the right direction” could just as well be attributed to market forces? You can’t have it both ways and say the New Deal worked during it’s height and after it’s subsequent scaling back. Let me try and analogy. Say you are a farmer with a field that can flood. Normally, every few years you get some flooding in early spring that drains in a few weeks, so you never really worry to much about it. But then one year, there is a massive storm that completely floods your field normal rainfall has kept it flooded for a month. So you take the unusual step of renting three pumps to pump out your field. Two days later the water is down by half. The pumps are really expensiveness and the water is going down, so you return two of them. Two days later, the water has stopped going down and in fact has gone up a little. Then it starts going down again, but very slowly. One week later your neighbor accidentally blows up the levy between your properties and your field quickly drains into his lower field. So, would this show that pumps are useless? > [@WillFarnaby](#): > > Cite? > > How do these economists explain what happened after the war when spending was cut? Or what happened in the post war depression of 1920 that only lasted a year when spending was also cut? To add to what **Voyager** said, I refer back to something I mentioned before: The rest of the developed world was destroyed in the war. The U.S. was able to pick up all the manufacturing slack as the rest of the world rebuilt. Look at the in the charts [here](http://unstats.un.org/unsd/trade/imts/historical_data.htm). Between 1938 and 1948 U.S. exports went from 15% of total world exports to 30% (increasing 400% in total dollar value). That advantage slowly eroded as other countries rebuilt. The Marshall plan to rebuild Europe and Japan also helped because one of the conditions of the loans we gave out was that a certain percent had to be spend on U.S. goods. ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [October 28, 2011, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082/261 "2011-10-28T16:59:21Z")
> [@Strassia](#): > > Let me try and analogy. Say you are a farmer with a field that can flood. Normally, every few years you get some flooding in early spring that drains in a few weeks, so you never really worry to much about it. But then one year, there is a massive storm that completely floods your field normal rainfall has kept it flooded for a month. So you take the unusual step of renting three pumps to pump out your field. Two days later the water is down by half. The pumps are really expensiveness and the water is going down, so you return two of them. Two days later, the water has stopped going down and in fact has gone up a little. Then it starts going down again, but very slowly. One week later your neighbor accidentally blows up the levy between your properties and your field quickly drains into his lower field. > > So, would this show that pumps are useless? Of course not, but this is a flawed analogy. You are assuming that the New Deal was “pumping water” out. It is well known what a water pump does. It is unknown what government stimulus does to an economy ( at least it is debated amongst several different schools of thought ). In fact I cited a poll earlier in the thread that says academic economists are split almost 50-50 on the issue. > [@Strassia](#): > > To add to what **Voyager** said, I refer back to something I mentioned before: The rest of the developed world was destroyed in the war. The U.S. was able to pick up all the manufacturing slack as the rest of the world rebuilt. Look at the in the charts [here](http://unstats.un.org/unsd/trade/imts/historical_data.htm). > > Between 1938 and 1948 U.S. exports went from 15% of total world exports to 30% (increasing 400% in total dollar value). That advantage slowly eroded as other countries rebuilt. The Marshall plan to rebuild Europe and Japan also helped because one of the conditions of the loans we gave out was that a certain percent had to be spend on U.S. goods. I understand that. Makes sense to me when coupled with the fact that people accumulated large amounts of unspendable savings during the war. It seems as though people in this thread are going to great pains to ignore my claims about the depression of 1920-21. After WWI spending was cut by more than half according to this [chart](http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/spending_chart_1919_1923USm_12s1li111mcn_F0t). There was no government stimulus required to get us out of that depression and it lasted only a year. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082.md?page=12) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ron-pauls-plan/600082.md?page=14)