My best work on the topic is linked here. Scott isn’t a critic but a fan, who wrote the foreeward to this version. The original was published in ‘97, with no “Koch” connection whatsoever, so no need to drag them into it. Source: Amazon.com share.google/Vnz45jHIhA42...
And now he’s blocked me, presumably so as to continue misrepresenting my work without fear of having his tactics exposed. Way to go, Eric!
(For “later” please read “latter.)
Another thing Eric does—in his review, not here—is to accuse me of “ignoring” the New Deal’s achievements apart from its contribution to recovery. He does so even after recognizing my _stated_ aim of only assessing the later contribution. It’s as if he wants to rule-out any such assessment!
Just to be clear, the words Eric puts in quotation marks aren’t my own, a practice generally frowned upon, for good reason.
File under: dishonest paraphrase. _False Dawn_ isn’t about “business” recovery: its about general recovery from the Great Depression and policies that did and didn’t promote it. Of course such recovery was a Democratic objective, making it legitimate to assess New Dealer’s success at achieving it.
My conversation with Marginal Revolution’s Tyler Cowen on the New Deal, the Great Depression, donkeys, and much more: m.youtube.com/watch?v=IDXN... Pass it on!
@delong.social @caroline-fohlin.bsky.social @jpkoning.bsky.social @tkehoe.bsky.social @danrohde.bsky.social @gsignoret.bsky.social @t0nyyates.bsky.social @fvelde.bsky.social
Hear that and many more of my heretical claims about the New Deal and the Great Depression in this recording of my discussion of _False Dawn_ with the @iealondon’s @TomClougherty: m.youtube.com/watch?v=_zptz7…
“Had FDR done all of the things Keynes said he should do, and none of the things Keynes said he shouldn’t do, there would have been—I have no doubt—a much more rapid recovery, a recovery that would have been complete sometime in the last half of the 1930s.” 1/2
George Will devoted a whole column to @georgeselgin.bsky.social, FALSE DAWN, and our bipartisan dreams about the New Deal:
www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/202...
What, you missed my “Conversation with Tyler” yesterday about _False Dawn_, my book on New Deal and the Great Depression? No worries: you can now watch it on YouTube: m.youtube.com/watch?v=01YC...
Washingtonians! There are still a few seats available for my Conversation with Tyler about _False Dawn_, this Friday at the Cato Institute. Join us if you can. www.cato.org/events/false...
If you’ll be in the London area at the start of October, consider coming to the IEA to hear me talk about _False Dawn_. iea.org.uk/in-conversat...
BlueSky could use a “sort of like” button, for back-handed compliments!
bsky.app/profile/geor...
Criticize my views all you like—but please (1) don’t misrepresent them, and (2) spare me the ad hominem stuff! If my arguments are wrong, there are better ways to show it than by pointing out where I (used to) work, or what political ideals I (supposedly) hold.
Finally, you imply that my libertarianism drives my arguments. Might it just be the case that your own anti-libertarianism makes you biased against me, to the point of causing you to misrepresent my opinions?
Just a thought.
As for my arguing that private arrangements could handle interbank clearing and settlement instead of CBs, why not? They have done so often in the past, and still do it in many places to some extent even today. It’s not that complicated, after all!
If you can find any statement by me contradicting my claims here, I will eat my hat!
And I understand as well as anyone who got through a macro principles course (and with no need for help from any MMTer) that taxes are contractionary.
By the time FDR took office, I think it was inevitable that then-established U.S. gold standard had to go. Moreover, I’ve long argued that the interwar gold exchange standard was a house of cards.
Every authors’ worst fear! And though I have great respect for DeLong’s work, I cannot say the same for Rauchway, who seems keen on perpetuating myths, such as that FDR embraced Keynes’s ideas, and that the New Deal was a program well thought out when FDR took office.
Eccles was a keen proponent of fiscal stimulus. Alas, he was just a keen an opponent of monetary stimulus. And since he was Fed chair, in practice his influence was mainly on the anti-stimulus side.
Just about every view you attribute to me here, apart from the ad-hominem stuff (where I work; my supposed politics) is untrue, except the part of not being able to run the US economy. I humbly confess to that.
A kind review of _False Dawn_ for the WSJ by Judge Glock. www.wsj.com/arts-culture...
Administration officials are comparing the tariff-induced downturn to “detox” therapy. A more precise analogy would be to leeching.
Thanks for this generous praise, Mike!
Yours truly on the Strategic Bitcoin Reserve Boondoggle: www.bostonglobe.com/2025/03/18/o...
