What is a political argument you could say for what FDR did to help Americans out of the great depression?

Answer 1

Absolutely. I watched a PBS documentary on this just the other day. They said that if it wasn't for FDR's New Deal, we might have ended up a 3rd world country.

Answer 2

The New Deal essentially ended with the midterm elections of 1938, when Roosevelt's attempt to purge his Democratic party of conservatives backfired. The Republicans bounced back, retaking six Senate and 81 House seats, along with the governorships of five states considered safely Democratic. The shift gave the Republicans enough clout to join with their anti-New Deal Democratic colleagues to block legislation emanating from the White House; and they did just that, burying the New Deal under a series of hostile congressional votes.

The deal had been good for America while it lasted. The net of social and economic programs his administration created staked Roosevelt's claim to salvaging American capitalism and reinvigorating the nation's faith in democracy. After all, the President's massive reform effort had redefined the relationship between the United States and its citizens by giving Americans unheard-of federal guarantees, both economic and social.

The New Deal did not pull America out of the Great Depression, World War II would take care of that, but FDR's bold programs certainly went a long way toward lifting the nation out of its deepest economic doldrums. Its permanent institutional reforms gave Americans a greater sense of economic security and social justice. In the end, both Roosevelts, Franklin and Eleanor, convinced their countrymen that they really did have nothing to fear but fear itself, at least at home. For there was indeed something to fear across the Atlantic.

Answer 3

There are plenty of hagiographic historians willing to say good things about the New Deal. But if you want to read up on the latest economic analysis of the programs, FDR's Folly: How Roosevelt and His New Deal Prolonged the Great Depression (2003) is a great book. It shows how Roosevelt's New Deal programs actually prolonged the depression in the US by about 6 years, as well as leading to a significant loss of rights.

Not to mention the fact that many of the programs were a form of Fascist corporatism, like the NRA. I know fascism is a loaded term, but at the time, it didn't mean death camps or mass execution. Many intellectuals, including Hugh Johnson, the head of the NRA himself, thought it was a good idea.

And how could I fail to mention the trillions of dollars of unfunded obligations to Social Security? The fact that this massive debt is kept off the books hides its true insolvency from the public. No one has any idea what a train wreck we have coming, and now that the law requiring the government to pay Social Security to illegals is on the verge of passing, it will only get worse.

CJ above is referring to the multiplier effect, but that is just a fancier version of the Broken Window Fallacy. It assumes that the money taken by government, with its inherent inefficiencies, would not have been spent elsewhere. The loss of that money spent in the private sector has a "divider effect" that totally negates the so-called multiplier effect, and introduces additional efficiency losses.

Answer 4

no, all your PBS crap is produced by socialist morons. everything FDR did deepened and worsened the depression. only two years of it were under hoover. fdr had it for 9 years. the only thing that ended the depression was WW2. his works program only tricked illiterate poor people into worshipping the scumbag. all throughout the thirties, he allowed the federal reserve to contract the money supply, when any real economist knows that you must increase the money supply, and particularly the credit supply to fix a dead economy. all he needed to do was repeal smoot hawley, and the economy would have been immediately fixed, as it was the cause of the depression. the stock market crash was not the cause of anything. the market has crashed and panicked several times since, and it does not cause a depression

Answer 5

Call it what ever you want but the result was the same , FDR practiced deficit spending as defined by Keynes.


Historians agree that Keynes influenced U.S. president Roosevelt's New Deal, but disagree as to what extent. Deficit spending of the sort the New Deal began in 1938

Answer 6

It is an economic argument for the New Deal:

Government spending increases aggregate demand for goods and services. $1 spent by the governement has an effect of adding greater than $1 to the economy because that $1 is spent by the Gov't, then spent by the person who recieved it from the gov't and so on. Anyway, it was necessary at the time.

Answer 7

The biggest thing that stopped the world wide depression was the outbreak of WWII. The soldiers got paid, the factories which built weapons made money. The government mandated what needed to be made, and people were happy to ablige.

Answer 8

FDR's New Deal brought a middle class to America. Before that it was basically poor and rich.

Answer 9

FDR was a national socialist and a 10 martini a day drunk.

Answer 10

We're still paying back the money borrowed by the FDR administration, WITH INTEREST.

He just kicked the depression down the road to us, and our children, and our grandchildren, and their children etc. etc. etc...