Archive for the 'USH: The Crash, Depression & New Deal' Category
Thursday, May 27th, 2010
Read these four articles on the Crash of 2008-2009.
- Capitalist Manifesto, Zakaria (5 pages)
- Franklin Delano Obama, Krugman (1 page)
- FDR’s Lessons for Obama, Kennedy (2 pages)
- Barack Hoover Obama, Baker (9 pages)
All four authors are very highly regarded.
You should also read this “truly terrifying data about the real state of the U.S. economy“. If nothing else, take a few minutes to peruse the data tables (you will find such data useful when constructing your essay).
After you have read all of the articles you are to type a 1500 word (2 page, normal font and margins), single spaced essay which, in no particular order:
- assesses what the Obama administration has done hitherto
- evaluates historical precedents
- prescribes a solution for the Obama administration
- warns the Obama administration of potential pitfalls
- cites all sources given above but does not abuse quotes (no more than 10% of your essay can be quotes)
We will discuss your essays in class. Oh, and don’t be surprised if there is a multiple choice and matching quiz on all of the readings. Good luck.
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Friday, February 26th, 2010
Johnny Hodgman is, well, hard to describe. He is overzealously hilarious in an understated way. He is a self-proclaimed genius who knows everything about anything. All tongue-in-cheek. Anyhoo, here is his satire on the depression life and the films about it.
John Hodgman – Hobo Matters
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Friday, February 26th, 2010
Here is a 60 minute documentary from our friends at PBS. It is part of the highly regarded American Experience Series. There are 6, 10 minute sections.
1 of 6 "After the Crash" Depression & Bonus March PBS American Experience 1990
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Tuesday, July 7th, 2009
I have an unfortunate sense that the “green shoots” in the economy that everyone is talking about are nothing but dandelions. Sure, forcing $1 trillion of taxpayer money—in direct capital, guarantees, and diminished cost of borrowing—into the banking sector has permitted the major banks to claim solvency for the moment. Yet we should not forget that this solvency has come not through a much needed deleveraging of the banking sector but rather from a massive transfer of the obligations of private banks to the public, with the debt accruing to future generations. And overall loan quality at U.S. banks is still the worst in 25 years and deteriorating at the fastest pace ever.
It’s a terrible mistake to confuse the momentary solvency of the financial sector and the long-term health of our economy.
While we have addressed the credit collapse, we have not begun to tackle the far more daunting, and more significant, structural problems in the economy. Instead of focusing on the green shoots, let’s examine the macro data that will determine our national prosperity in the next generation. These data are terrifying.
Be scared by Spitzer
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Tuesday, July 7th, 2009
Alas for countless pundits and inspirational speakers, it is apparently not the case that the Chinese word for crisis is spelled by joining the characters for danger and opportunity. But that common fallacy nevertheless captures an important metaphorical truth: whatever the perils it brings with it, a crisis can be a grand opportunity. Among those who have understood that truth was Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Writing to his fellow Democrats in the 1920s, Roosevelt noted that their party could not hope to return to power until the Republicans led the nation “into a serious period of depression and unemployment.” The Great Depression soon brought a far longer and deeper period of woe than F.D.R. foresaw. But the crisis of the 1930s also provided an object lesson in the relationship between economic danger and political opportunity — a lesson Barack Obama is now trying to follow. Obama, too, came to office in the midst of an economic crisis, and in the solutions he has offered, it appears he has often looked to the example of F.D.R., whose presidency — and the very idea of activist government that it represents — is very much back in the public mind this year. Roosevelt pushed through policies that aimed not just to deal with the immediate challenge of the Great Depression but also to benefit generations of Americans to come. Pulling off a similar feat will require Obama to persuade Americans to see opportunities in the present crisis as well.
More from Time
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Tuesday, July 7th, 2009
Three months into his presidency, Barack Obama has proven to be every bit as charismatic and intelligent as his most ardent supporters could have hoped. At home or abroad, he invariably appears to be the only adult in the room, the first American president in at least forty years to convey any gravitas. Even the most liberal of voters are finding it hard to believe they managed to elect this man to be their president.
It is impossible not to wish desperately for his success as he tries to grapple with all that confronts him: a worldwide depression, catastrophic climate change, an unjust and inadequate health-care system, wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the ongoing disgrace of Guantanamo, a floundering education system.
Obama’s failure would be unthinkable. And yet the best indications now are that he will fail, because he will be unable-indeed he will refuse-to seize the radical moment at hand.
More from Harper’s Weekly
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Sunday, June 14th, 2009
Fareed Zakaria, once again, hits the nail on the head.
Here is his essay on the 2008-09 crash.
The first 2/3 of the essay is a clear and concise explanation of the economic and political decisions that got us to where we are. Then he adds a much-overlooked dimension to the discussion when he asserts:
“Throughout this essay, I have avoided treating this economic crisis as a grand morality play—a war between good and evil in which demon bankers destroyed all that is good and true about our societies. Complex historical events can rarely be reduced to something so simple. But we are suffering from a moral crisis, too, one that may lie at the heart of our problems.
Most of what happened over the past decade across the world was legal. Bankers did what they were allowed to do under the law. Politicians did what they thought the system asked of them. Bureaucrats were not exchanging cash for favors. But very few people acted responsibly, honorably or nobly (the very word sounds odd today). This might sound like a small point, but it is not. No system—capitalism, socialism, whatever—can work without a sense of ethics and values at its core. No matter what reforms we put in place, without common sense, judgment and an ethical standard, they will prove inadequate. We will never know where the next bubble will form, what the next innovations will look like and where excesses will build up. But we can ask that people steer themselves and their institutions with a greater reliance on a moral compass.”
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Sunday, March 8th, 2009
Listen to one of the the following This American Life programs which do a brilliant job of making the recent economic crisis comprehensible. Prepare 2+ pages of notes for submission (pause recording when necessary–this is complex stuff). Be prepared to present your findings in class.
The Giant Pool of Money
Another Frightening Show About the Economy
Bad Bank
The Watchmen
Questions to Consider:
- Why did the financial markets recede in the past couple of years? Whose fault is this? To what extent is the U.S. government to blame for the crash? To what extent are credit-crazy Americans to blame? How important is it to assign blame?
- Are we amidst an economic crisis, a financial crisis, both or neither?
- Many people blame George W. Bush for the crash. Are there valid reasons to do so?
- Some suggest that the greed inherent in Western cultures make such economic crashes inevitable. Is this a valid assertion?
- Are economic crises in capitalism “natural”? Was this crash a “necessary market correction” as some suggest?
- What types of changes do we need to make to minimize the deleterious impact of market crashes? Are fierce regulations enough or do we require for systemic solutions?
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Sunday, February 1st, 2009
The pundits were quick to evaluate Barack Obama’s election in light of African-American political traditions going back to the civil rights movement and even Reconstruction, but they have turned increasingly to lessons from the history of the New Deal. Read on from The Nation.
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Sunday, January 18th, 2009
Suddenly, everything old is New Deal again. Reagan is out; FDR is in. Still, how much guidance does the Roosevelt era really offer for today’s world?
The answer is, a lot. But Barack Obama should learn from FDR’s failures as well as from his achievements: The truth is that the New Deal wasn’t as successful in the short run as it was in the long run. And the reason for FDR’s limited short-run success, which almost undid his whole program, was the fact that his economic policies were too cautious.
Read more from Paul Krugman
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