No, WWII Did Not End The Great Depression

Economy | Information | History | Online | Facts | World | Global | Money

1. He says that what happened during WWII, despite full employment and a huge increase in income for the poorest members of society, wasn't a recovery because "real wealth" wasn't being created .
   He then turns around and says 2009-11 wasn't a real recovery because, despite the fact that "real wealth" was being created, income shrank .7% for the poorest members of society.
   The fact that he is using opposing standards to judge the two "recoveries", invalidates whatever argument he was trying to make.
2. This is not as simple as it seems. I can see both sides of the argument having some merit. War puts humans in positions of need and need spurs innovation. But at the same time war destroys accomplishments and past knowledge. War is part of who we are as a species.
3. In the great depression, income inequality and wealth inequality was an an all-time high. Tight money policies limited the amount of physical currency in circulation, and that was increasingly going to, and being stored by, the wealthy. During the war, we gave the people with all the money a 94% tax rate, and that money flooded into industry, who used it to build new plants and pay more workers, and it flowed into the pockets of 10 million soldiers.
4. War can be the Geo-political, social, innovative and economical infrastructure for future economical gains. But so can every day adventure capitalism and public funding. Its easy to identify progress made from great conflicts or arms races. But the vast majority always lie hidden. If war itself fuels an economy its because the people are willing to do more for less.
5. This was good till it got foolish. Reality is that if we had not spent on WW ll or the Cold war we would be speaking if we were alive to speak German or Russian right now.
6. Aviation, Jet Engine, the whell, powder, etc was invented without the pressure of War Technological development...
7. War is good for an economy if you're not in it and you're selling the tools of the trade
8. what ended the great depression?
9. The problem with invoking the Broken Window Fallacy is that the "window" was broken in foreign economies. It would be as if the glazier was in the next town over. His town gets foreign demand and keeps all its windows.
10. Why the F*K does it have to be *poor brown people? Why not just people? I'm a paid subscriber, so I'm on board with everything you do, but this language needs to find an end. We don't need these identity adjectives to accurately describe the situation. The two have no correlation unless you want to paint a giant picture of history, which will STILL be too subjective to count for squat, nah-mee?
    
    Let me help you out for future broadcasts: Oligarchs bomb people, in places, and it's bad. Blamo. Donzo.
11. You're making a mistake in the case of WW11. Every case is specific; there is no "general principle". At the end of WW11 the United States had 28,000 Tonnes of Gold. You can look this up; it's not a misprint. We bankrupted the British Empire and took over as the surviving modern industrial power. It's certainly not going to work for the loser. Germany was utterly destroyed, and despite huge amounts of military and Food aid to Soviet Russia, ( our ally in the War, for those educated in the US), The Soviet Union was very, very, badly damaged. The Roman Empire was in the "War Business"; which consists of stealing everything from the areas you conquer; and they did very well at it; for a few hundred years. We now are "playing at being a world Empire"; but the USA is already broke; which is not a good place to start from, and has many other problems. The kinds of wars that we're indulging in at the moment are definitely self-destructive; but this is not understood by the maniacs who control some of the levers and wheels behind the public "government" of the US. WW11 had a great deal to do with ending the Depression and my parents explained this to me in detail from the point of view of ordinary working people. I was born about 22 months after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour, when we got into "the war business", full time. By the way, for the historically challenged, look up the fact that Hitler declared War on us !! Even though he had told his insiders and top generals that he understood he had to finish his European Actions before the United States got involved; because Germany could never fight the USA; so was he crazy? Yeah, I'm afraid so. It's always an individual cases by case analysis; there isn't any general principle that "war is bad for the economy"; or "war is good for the economy:"; and looking for simple answers usually doesn't work.
12. From what I understand, Bastiat's broken window fallacy does not apply. Keynsians do not claim war activities create wealth (if they did the broken window fallacy would apply) but that they stimulate aggregate demand.
13. The Commies have a system where they get rid of the garbage, the old, infirm, diseased, diabetic and sick. They just kill them. They don't treat them. Everyone has eaten all the trash and sodas and junk food and we have 60 million diabetics in the USA and many in London. France eats a lot of fried shit but they drink a lot of red wine. Drink red wine and leave the whiskey alone. Red wine tastes good and it's good for you.
14. War makes money. All the tanks, helicopters, jets, humvees, munitions, and then all the components that is used to build all this shit. What the fuck does it matter anyway. They just print more and more money. What about how much the drugs destroy.
15. Wars destroy and that is what they are supposed to do. THe depression started when the Jews started it and ended when they ended it.
16. Calm your ego and maybe people will listen.
17. This is an absolutely fascinating video. It is amazing how many things I believed were shown to be simply false in this single video... truly an eye opener. Thanks James.
18. No. Applying Frederic Bastiat's Broken Window Fallacy to WWII, war generally, and defense spending generally works. And it's a good way to refute war mongers. But it is not true that the war did not end the depression. Ending the New Deal ended the depression. The war ended the New Deal.
    
    When America went to war, the Roosevelt administration had to relent on its socialist policies of Depression. Roosevelt said it himself in your own clip. The war provided sufficient interference with the New Deal (aka F'kg America) to allow the nation to get on with the war.
    
    So while the war did not end the Depression by violating the Broken Window Fallacy, nor proving Krugman or Keynes right, it did cause a sufficient interference with the New Deal to allow the nation to keep a few flames alive.
    
    The Depression then ended, as you report after the war - and after the 'reset' had sufficiently damaged the New Deal to provide new opportunities and new expectations. Had the Democrats gone wholly back to the New Deal, the nation would have revolted, and the drones might have awoken.
    
    One other flaw in all the arm-chair theories here: We were the China of the Age. Our poverty during the depression was a manifestation of central planning. While Germany and Japan moved forward, we too moved forward to some extent. Technical progress continued, albeit slowly, and those connected to power hardly noticed the 'lazy' men who refused to work for less than nothing on empty bellies. When the war started, the only nation with any significant industry on our side was Britain. When we were finished, only Britain and Japan had anything standing. And the Japs only had an industry left because we nuked them, and their socialist central planners relented (wow, what a concept).
    
    Notice - if this is correct. (And it's my grandfather's opinion from living through the times). The Depression could have ended at any time: Roosevelt simply had to relent on enforcement of the New Deal. The war was not necessary to ending the Depression - but it was the force that cracked Roosevelt's elitist, bigoted, megalomania.
    
    I agree it's sad and tragic that millions must die to stop a Left-wing looney from keeping people enthralled by government strangulation. And I agree - it's not necessary in theory - I can think of two good examples of small reforms without war: China and India. China relented in 1980, and India relented circa 1990. Like America they gave only a small fraction of the population a few economic rights to retain a portion of what they produced. You might say - they decided not to break their kneecaps and all their windows when they paid less than all they have for 'protection.' And the results have been amazing.
    
    Obviously, we sit wondering what would be the result if the government had no such powers over anyone.
    
    This distinction is important. If we slash Defense Spending, only to spend the same monies on socialism and government, we may unleash 'hell' on ourselves - and still provide no relief to the world for the misdeeds of government and its banks / banks and their governments.
    
    If my thesis is correct, we must slash government, and then Defense Spending, and experience actual reductions in government to experience the post-WWII benefits of less government.
    
    Just sayin...
19. Thank you
20. your country is only as good as its people