Keynesian Economics and the Great Depression

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1. even fiscal conservative Ross Perot knew trickle down didn't trickle. "people who don't make anything can't buy anything." Ross Perot.
2. That socialist swine Roosevelt prolonged the depression for his own political benefit, the liberal media did his bidding...and the dull witted cheered and said give us more!
3. The root problem of our system has been explained by theoreticians such as Sismondi and Thompson in the past. It is underconsumption. Keynes emphasises the need for government spending so as to boost income for the middle and lower classes and through the multiplier of consumption to regenerate economic motion. The economy is a process of countless individual decisions, however, an economy that lacks spending in grass roots level eventually is led to sclerosis.
4. What incentive will people have to work and create wealth, if they are taxed unfairly? Also, America is not early 20th century Russia, there is an uncanny amount of opportunity for all in America. That opportunity did not exist in pre 20th century Europe, but does today in America. So stop acting like low tax rates are the reason why children are starving, and families are homeless.
5. You're calling the wrong person 'idiot'. I'm all for paying taxes, it's Jeffmagic that says it's cruel for the state to take money from people by force. "Violence is most certainly used to raise tax revenue. Why would people pay if they were not afraid of men with guns coming to lock them up if they refuse?" Learn to read before you start calling names. 
6. You are an idiot. Try not paying taxes, a guy with a gun will come take you to jail, asshole.
7. That's just a stupid argument, you're saying violence is used because police come and lock you up when you refuse to pay tax. It's called breaking the law, so of course there going to come and arrest you. Some people pay tax because they believe it's the right thing to do. But a lot of people like you are greedy and don't care about those who are more unfortunate than you, so I guess it's only right you get locked up and put in a cell - We don't need people like you in our society. 
8. Violence isn't used in forcing people to pay tax. Well not in any modern democracies that I know of. The point I'm trying to make is that paying tax should be mandatory for those who can afford to do so.
9. It's inhumane to take money from the rich, and redistribute it to the poor. The poor had a option before they were born to either be rich or to be poor, and they chose it upon themselves to be poor. People against taxes are the scum of the Earth, who are responsible for creating such a unequal society. If you can afford to pay more tax then it is only fair you do so.
10. Often misunderstood. Austrian economists consider it cruel to keep people poor by taking THEIR money & applying it towards making money for Crony Capitalists. Spending other peoples money is fascism & cruel to the poor. Keeping people dependent on the govt. is profitable for certain factions of govt. but not good for the overall good of mankind. Liberals often trick the public by saying that "others" don't care about the poor but in all actuality Liberals keep people poor because its profitable.
11. I don't see how making everyone suffer is a better solution. That is a giant appeal to sympathy.
12. What bothers me the most about those who believe in Friedman/Hayek/Mises socioeconomic theories, is the refusal to admit that those theories are inherently cruel and inhumane. To permit the suffering of countless citizens(and may I remind you they aren't just consumers, there are flesh and blood human beings who have families and people who love and care about them) instead of wanting to implement taxes and government stimulus to do our best as a society to take care of the most vulnerable...
13. its way back up. Fortunately we had FDR, a man who felt that to allow that to happen was unnecessary and inhumane! One will notice that after we abandoned the Gold Prison Cage Standard in 1933 and implemented infrastructural stimulus the economy began to bounce back. With the enactment of Glass-Stegall in 1933, the FDIC was created so as to prevent people from losing their savings to unnecessary bank runs. 
14. @StAugustine79 Would you mind telling the rest of the class what financial bubble you are referring to? One of the main propellants that worsened the Depression was the hesitancy to abandon the gold standard and implement Keynesian deficit spending. The gold standard was the noose that was choking the economy from bouncing back. Granted, if we had waited and allowed millions of more Americans to lose their money to bank runs, lose their homes/farms to foreclosure, the market would SLOWLY CRAWL
15. The catalyst of the socioeconomic decay of the US and Western Europe is not the socialist aspect of the nations, but the deregulated pure capitalism that has been unleashed over the last 30+ years at the behest of Milton Friedman and other economic Libertarians/Conservatives. I can say with without hesitation that the "Trickle Down" economic theory is absolute rubbish. Anyone who advocates yet MORE deregulation is just asking for larger busts that carry larger systemic risk...
16. The Marshall Plan was implemented in Western Europe brilliantly, so the US and Western Europe shared an economic boom that was stable and sustainable, whereas with the economic booms we experience now, they are inherently unstable because of lack of regulation which always leads to a bust(and we all now who gets bailed out when it busts...). 
17. prevent systemic risk. Example: Glass-Stegall prevented investment and commercial banks from merging. So, if you were an investment bank, you could make all the investments you wanted, but if they all went belly up, the damage would be contained to just that entity. It also established the F.D.I.C to: mitigate bank runs, and if a bank suffered significant loses, the money you had deposited was insured. 
18. @BelieversinThings I couldn't disagree more. America's socioeconomic conditions were at its finest between 1945 and 1970 when we had a balanced blend of Capitalism and Socialism. China has such robust economic growth because it has a balance of capitalism and socialism. During that era in the US, the living conditions for ALL Americans rose at a steady and sustainable rate. The ultra wealthy were taxed at a progressive rate, the regulations on the banking sector were just enough to...
19. In order for goods to be consumed they must be PRODUCED. By what right does the government tell individuals what they can and can't produce, how they can and can't produce? They have no right to tell you how to use and dispose of, offer to trade and give away that which is your and no one else's-you need NO ONES PERMISSION to do that. By regulating production, the government has destroyed the economy. Every other country (than the US) has, to some degree regulated production. LOOK AROUND YOU
20. Not gonna lie. I facepalmed at the FDR voice..