Dear Friends,
It seems to me, the worldwide depression of the 1930s is often attributed to the 1929 stock market crash, Smoot-Hawley trade restrictions leading to a trade war, the failure of American Bank, or the Fed’s subsequent failure to save it… but I believe the real issue was domestic economic policy. Roosevelt ran against Hoover as a fiscal conservative to Hoover’s profligacy. He attacked boondoggles like the “Hoover Dam,” even renaming it to Boulder Dam. When in power however, FDR tripled down on big government in every way. From boondoggles like the CCC to economy stifling regulations, FDR unchained government’s ability to chain an economy. This wasn’t only in the US though. Much of the world was experimenting with progressivism with devastating results.
Some of the smartest people in the room have blamed everything but government policies for the depression. Oh, tangentially, they might say the trade war was a cause, but that was foreign, not domestic policy. Because experts can’t admit experts are often wrong. In fact, to this day, many experts don’t understand why those progressive policies didn’t do the trick? They should have. The Keynesians claim FDR didn’t spend enough on boondoggles, the monetarists claim the Fed was the culprit, even as the neoclassical economists say the collapse of world trade was the cause. They disagree on much, but they all agree… the experts evolving the world to a centrally planned economy could NOT have been the problem. Central planning being a cornerstone of progressivism and most are progressives at heart.
Progressivism is an ideology that believes communism is the correct goal, but revolution is the incorrect means. They want to evolve free market nations to communism via the institutions. First call it socialism, then fairness, and finally social justice. Progressives are crypto-communists. Wilson’s progressivism had a short interlude in the 1920s under Coolidge, but came right back under Hoover and then Roosevelt. The boom of the Roaring Twenties was considered an aberration, and worse, progressives claimed it was the excessive growth in GDP and standard of living that led to the Depression! Even convincing Coolidge himself that his national wealth creation… made the US poor! That’s like convincing someone that drinking milk broke their leg… not the fall out of the tree.
Some of the policies that drove the US and the world into a named depression, The Great Depression, were the chicken case, destroying food during a famine, building a raisin reserve, price fixing, rent control, gold confiscation, and of course… Wickard v. Filburn. Where the government usurped farmer’s right to decide what they are allowed to plant on their own land. Central planners would take up that burden. The Interstate Commerce Clause of our Constitution was tapped for that usurpation. That decision shod the progressive’s for their long march through our institutions. Meanwhile, the Weimar government in Germany was busy tanking their economy. With the industrial powerhouses of Germany and the US offline, due to progressivism… the world’s economic train ground to a halt.
Experts understand their power rests in their reputations, so they are loathe to call attention to their past failures… like the Depression. Wilson tried central planning that led to a major recession. Then Coolidge and his laissez-faire policies took government’s hands off the throat of the economy. This created an economic boom. Hoover and Roosevelt both went full retard progressive and the economy tanked. Proving the experts wrong about central planning. Nevertheless, today the progressives have completed their long march through our institutions and we accept absurdity at face value. That’s why Covid happened, the 2008 market crashed, and Russiagate erupted. Progressivism failed then, it fails us today, and it will fail tomorrow. You can count on it. So why keep making the same mistakes?
Sincerely,
John Pepin
