jduster

I am not going to disparage laizess-faire or libertarianism; I will save that for another post. For this post, we will assume laisezz-faire is the correct ideology.

It's easy for the president to do nothing when nothing needs to be done. Coolidge and Harding were for limited federal government in a time period where that was the norm.

Coolidge was actually not laisezz faire; he was just a constitutionalist. On the state level in Massachuetts as governor, he regulated the economy like god commanded him to. Harding was less right-wing than Coolidge and actually somewhat progressive too; he signed into law a maternity welfare program.

It's easy to say that they were peacemakers instead of warmongerers too because no big crisis where many people would support military action ever happened. if one did, how sure you can be that they wouldn't intervene? coolidge strongly supported WW1 remember. and libertarians wouldn't call the wartime presidents fascists if they had presided over peace.

Viperlord

I'd probably consider Wilson tied for the worst of the five with Harding, but FDR and TR easily defeat Harding and Cooldige in my mind.

DIVUS IVLIVS

*snorts*

The economic policies of the Roosevelt administration, deficit spending, tax increases, increased fiscal regulation and all, were precisely what was responsible for the period of economic growth from 1933-37 that was at that point the single greatest period of economic expansion in American history (it would soon be positively dwarfed by the tremendous boom unleashed by the Fourth New Deal during the war years), the growth from 1938-40 was a handy continuation of it, and the brief recession that came in between from 1937-38 coincided, by no coincidence, in the single period where FDR briefly abandoned the very economic policies that you wrongly criticize, largely due to political pressures and his attempts to form a new coalition to outmaneuver the isolationists. The Keynesian politico-economic policies that were pioneered by FDR, and were advanced by later great economic presidents such as John F. Kennedy, are precisely what have been responsible for the greatest periods of economic prosperity in our history. It is something to be thankful for that President Obama has learned from these examples, and is trying to move in the same direction. The failed economic policies of presidents such as Hoover, Bush, Reagan, and Coolidge (the "roaring twenties" had precisely nothing to do with the laissez-faire approach of those years) are to be entirely distinguished from those of presidents such as Roosevelt, Kennedy, and to an extent Clinton. Progressive taxation is precisely what was responsible for maintaining the greatest period of prosperity for the middle class, from thr 1940s to the 1970s, a lesson that lawmakers in recent years have forgotten with disastrous results.

As for the Court Packing Scheme, while certainly unconventional it was an entirely understandable approach to a reactionary court that was standing squarely in place of continuation of the New Deal policies that had and would do so much good for the American people. It would of course later turn out to be completely redundant, as by 1940 FDR had been able to appoint eight justices to the Supreme Court, but the attempt in its context was entirely understandable.

murphy

It is interesting and laughable that you completely discount those presidents that presided thru years of prosperity and congratulate those that ran the country into the ground. Reagan took over a disaster left him by Carter and as his administration progressed the "misery index", inflation and unemployment improved significantly. I well recall paying 14% interest for my first mortgage in early 1980, as well as earning 18% on my money market fund. Reagan did a great job reducing taxes, government interference etc. Revenues soared, but so did spending, primarily due to the Democratic contolled congress. Those were good years. Actually, Bush was not my cup of tea, too big of a spender, but his economies, for the most part far exceed what we have today. BTW the economy started tanking after the Dems took over Congress.

To say it is understandable and forgiveable for the court packing scheme is ludicrous. It was a blatant power grab and an attempt to bypass the constitution. The Constitution can be changed, but not this way.

Keynesian economics don't work and never will. This country is not great because of Government.

JFK also reduced taxes significantly.

I posted this on another thread but at the risk of duplication I am posting on this one. FDR's Secretary of the Treasury, Henry Morgenthau, wrote in his diary in 1939;

"We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work. I have just one interest, and now if I am wrong somebody else can have my job. I want to see this country prosper. I want to see people get a job. I want to see people get enough to eat. We have never made good on our promises. I say after 8 years of this administration, we have just as much unemployment as when we started, and enormous debt to boot. "

You infer that Obama is moving in the right direction. Obama is spending this country straight to bankruptcy. Look at any entitlement actuarial reports, it is literally impossible to pay the debt load. In a few short years, the interest on the debt will be more than tax proceeds. We are headed off the cliff and a study of the numbers and common sense is all you need to see it. Europe is moving away from this model. Riots breaking out because government cannot meet their promises. The welfare state has hit the wall, we need to wake up.

DIVUS IVLIVS

You credit the Reagan administration with economic occurences that actually had nothing to do with his wrong-headed policies, and were actually caused by a series of factors that were primarily Keynesian in nature, and which included the actions of the Carter administration on the front, particularly the appointment of Paul Volcker to the Chairmanship of the Federal Reserve, whose policies were what really ended Stagflation and allowed for the "Morning in America" that Reagan took credit for even though he had precisely nothing to do with it.

Keynesian economics is in fact the best school of economic thought to date in its interpretation of the functioning of the markets, and its record of success outstrips that of any other economic philosophy.

I hate to burst your bubble, but Keynesian economics, developed from the original theories of John Maynard Keynes, is a lot more complicated and nuanced than simply adovocating big government, although government regulation of the economy is a part of it, not as an end in itself, but due to the positive results that it achieves. John F. Kennedy did indeed promote a tax cut as a part of his economic policy (ultimately it was enacted by Lyndon Johnson) - it was a Keynesian tax cut, and it was massively successful. You are deluding yourself if you think that the simple act of cutting taxes is a sound economic strategy - tax policy is simply one facet of overall fiscal policy, which functions best when it follows essentially Keynesian principles. JFK, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama all pursued (and in Obama's case is still pursuing tax cuts for the middle class (as a matter of fact the current president has in his first two years as president already managed to cut taxes for the middle class more than Bush managed in eight years), and because their tax cuts were part of a level-headed economic policy in tune (for the most part) with Keynesian principles, each was quite successful. They differ in this regard from the ideology-driven tax cuts of disastrous economic presidents such as Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush, each of whom enacted tax cuts that were weighted towards the wealthier brackets, and which resulted in virtually no positive economic results apart from being responsible for running up large deficits.

Under Franklin Roosevelt, from 1933-40 the country experienced the greatest period of economic expansion in its history. Unemployment remained high, but many aspects of the economy had in fact by 1937 surpassed the levels they had reached at their high point in 1929. This was the direct result of FDR's Keynesianesque politico-economics, which worked to regulate the economy and strengthen the government and social programs, build a safety net, work to build the modern middle class, and lay the foundations for a progressive tax policy of the kind that America would enjoy for the next forty years, until it was assaulted by the Reagan administration with disastrous effect. The progressive tax system that America had during the period from the 1940s to the 1970s was the reason that this was the period in which the country achieved the lowest disparity of wealth in its history, and it was no coincidence that this coincided with the greatest period of extended economic prosperity.

The main reason that the economic recovery that took place during the Roosevelt years was not even greater than it was was that the president's hands were tied by political realities, which prevented him from spending anywhere near as much as he needed to (and at one point even forced him to try and balance the budget, with disastrous results), or exerting the level of control of the economy that he desired. Fortunatly, the most brilliant politician in American history was able to devise a means around this: maneuerving the country into WWII, which had the dual benefit of fulfilling his foreign policy goals and giving him the political means to make use of the resources he had lacked during his first two terms to banish the last vestiges of the Great Depression. The result was the Fourth New Deal - the most successful set of government economic policies in our history and the greatest of history's multiple vindications of Keynesian economics. By employing military spending as deficit spending on an unprecedented scale and by exerting government powers over a wartime economy, FDR was squarely responsible for an economic expansion that put that of the previous years into the pale. In economic terms we are for all intents and purposes still riding the wave that was originally unleashed by the New Deal.

Your cries of woe about the economic policies of President Obama, or "Obamanomics" as they have been termed (to go along with Clintonomics, Reaganomics, and Nixonomics), echo precisely the cries that came from critics of the proposed Keynesian solutions to the remnants of the Great Depression in the time of FDR, the plans for spurring economic growth formulated by the Kennedy administration, and numerous others, which often came from members of the very administrations that planned those brilliantly successful policies (both FDR and JFK employed fiscal conservatives on frequent occaison to carry out very liberal fiscal policies, often for political purposes. In both cases the men they tasked with enacting their barnds of Keynesian economics into policy wailed, but carried out their assignments dilligently, and in both cases the presidents were vindicated by the results). Economic history teaches us that "belt-tightening" is a disastrous economic approach that can only exacerbate poor economic conditions, which in the long run leads to an even greater fiscal loss. A full span of Keynesian economics, including spending, middle-class tax cuts (as a short term measure), government regulation, social programs, and the promotion of aspects of the welfare state are precisely the correct response to conditions of the kind that we find ourselves in today, and it is something to be devoutlythankful for that President Obama seems to recognize this.

jduster

I don't disagree that deficit spending can improve economic outcomes. It is the spending that it is on what matters. FDR greatly respected the money of the tax payers and worked tirelessly to make sure every dollar was spent wisely. Obama, on the other hand, is not doing enough to eliminate waste from the government. Kennedy believed that federal government programs in combination with a healthy private market was a recipe for economic success. The Kennedy tax cut proved that supply-side economics was not just a myth (though making taxes lower than they are now is like trying to put a bucket in an empty well). My overall point is that Kennedy policies didn't harm the private sector, but Obama's policies aren't making business owners and investors confident, or even confortable.

DIVUS IVLIVS

I am sorry jduster, but I have to correct you on the point of John F. Kennedy. The myth that the Kennedy tax cut (which was ultimately pushed through by LBJ) is somehow a confirmation of supply-side economics is just that - a myth, as is the line from certain conservative pundits that JFK's economic policies were in any way similar to the supply-side economic philosophy, and it is a myth that is built upon a misunderstanding of economics, particularly Keynesian economics, and of JFK's economic thinking and policies.

John F. Kennedy was most definitely a Keynesian economic president, and he is in fact regarded correctly as having been the first such. Although Franklin D. Roosevelt built much of his economic policy around what would later be identified as Keynesian ecnomic thought, it would be erronous to describe him as having been influenced by Keynesian theory, as in his day Keynesian economic theory cannot really be said to have existed yet. FDR read economist John Maynard Keynes' magnum opus: "The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money" when it was published three years into his presidency, in 1936, and he knew Keynes personally, meeting him several times throughout the 1930s and '40s, but he developed his policies largely independently, and in many ways deserves to be ranked as a pioneer in Keynesian economics just as much as Keynes himself. Whereas Keynes articulated the theory of this economic school of thought, FDR demonstrated how it might be translated in practical terms into policy, effectively engineering Keynesian politico-economics to go along with Keynesian economic theory (indeed, considering that Keynes was still engaged producing The General Theory during the first three years of Roosevelt's presidency, and spent much of the rest of it refining his insights into a coherent theory, it may well be accurate to say that FDR was one of the influences upon the development of Keynesian economic theory, just as Theodore Roosevelt's writings may have had an influence on Alfred Thayer Mahan on the subject of Naval Strategy).

If Franklin D. Roosevelt was more of a pioneer than a student of Keynesian economics, it can be safely said that John F. Kennedy was the first President of the United States who could be described as the latter, and indeed one of the most potent aspects of his domestic legacy as president was the firm establishment of the Keynesian Revolution into the structure of American economic policy, after having been abandoned for eight years by Dwight Eisenhower, and to an extent prior to that by Harry Truman. JFK resembled FDR (whose example he would frequently follow in regards to economic policy, including the frequent practice of employing capable conservatives to carry out liberal policies) in having a brilliant grasp of fiscal policy, and upon becoming president moved quickly to put his own stamp on the politico-economics of the government - seeking to loosen the money supply through the ending of the tight fiscal practices that had prevailed throughout the 1950s, and the instituting of a series of textbook Keynesian economic practices across the full span of the government's economic portfolio. Conservative critics, including former President Eisenhower, cried woefully that the Kennedy administration was going to sink the economy by spending the country into debt, but JFK's policies were justified by the results that they produced, which were highly positive, as the American economy began what would prove to be a six-year period of expansion in which economic growth would be at an average rate of 5.5% per year, with consistent improvement in the various facets of economic performance, from real wages to production levels. Such a sustained boom was the second greatest period of peacetime growth in American economic history after the results of FDR's first three New Deals, which had been the greatest in modern history, and has never since been repeated.

By 1962 however, the President had determined that his economic policy would require a bold new move if the boom was to be sustained, and he was determined to make a concerted economic assault upon poverty in the nation. He therefore began consulting with his advisors as to what form this should take. Kennedy had a number of ideas for how he could keep the economy growing and make inroads into poverty, but he was severely limited in the action he could take by his political situation, which remained in a number of critical respects dangerously weak.

Although JFK was an enormously popular president, particularly after the country united behing him during the Cuban Missile Crisis, the buildup of this popularity dated to after he had been elected president, and therein lay the rub. In 1960 he had defeated Richard Nixon by a razor thin margin in one of the closest presidential elections in history. Although his campaign strategy had secured a comfortable win of 303 in the Electoral College, the margin in the popular vote had been miniscule - only a few thousand votes seperated him from Nixon, and it was widely rumored that a large number of those votes had been purchased through liberal use of the Kennedy fortune (though Nixon was in no position to protest, as his own campaign had stolen just as many votes in states that he carried) - and Nixon had in fact won more states. In other words, Kennedy did not possess much of a mandate for bold actions, and this weakened his position in his dealings with Congress, which would have been hard enough even if he had won in a landslide. Like Harry Truman before him, and Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton (until 1994), and Barack Obama after him, JFK had to deal with a Democratic Party that was not unified under its leader. The huge majorities that the Democrats held in both Congress and the Senate throughout the 1960s paint a deceptive image of a Democratic President's ability to pass an agenda through the Legislature. Historically, the modern Democratic Party since its formation in the Great Depression era (largely through the coalition-building efforts of Franklin Roosevelt) has never been as unified a political entity as the Republican Party, thanks to the ideological and geographic divisions running through it. The Party has distinct liberal, moderate/centrist, and conservative wings, as well as a number of mavericks who shift between each of the three groups, and all of these factions stubbornly refuse to act in concert under the direction of a party leader without a strenuous effort and a lot of concessions from said leader. Indeed, it is accurate to say that in its modern history the Democratic Party has only been truly unified under a leader on three occaisons: under Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson, each of whom managed to unite and direct the party through sheer power of personality and political genius, and from 1994 - 2000 under Bill Clinton, when after the devastating defeat of the '94 Midterms, the battered remnants of the party rank-and-file were willing to put aside their differences and unite under the banner of a strong leader (Clinton), in order to ensure the survival and recovery of the Party's political fortunes.

During JFK's presidency, the Democrats most certainly were not unified - the large number of conservatives within their ranks would vote with the Republicans on many of the issues that mattered to the President, and economic policy would likely be one. Many of these legislators that he would have to win over had polled higher in their own districts than he had, and they felt that they owed him nothing. By considerable wheeling and dealing, Kennedy was able to win a certain amount of legislative capital that he could expend - partially by translating his personal popularity and successes in other areas into legislative clout, partially through his successful involvement in the 1962 midterms, when the Democrats picked up a number of seats, including a handful of liberals who would provide critical votes for the president's agenda, and partially through running a successful Congressional Relations operation, complete with active dispensation of the metaphorical Three Bs that more often than not proves to be the grease that makes the legislative machinery run smoothly. What remained to be decided was what this capital could be expended on.

After some debate, Kennedy and his economic advisors settled upon a policy of a Keynesian tax cut that he believed would spur the economic growth that he sought, and by its success theoretically win him the additional legislative capital to advance further, more ambitious parts of his legislative ambitions: a New Deal-style series of social programs and reforms that JFK envisioned as being a "War on Poverty" - a phrase that he coined (this quest would of course ultimately be taken up by Lyndon Johnson) - which could come after he was reelected, hopefully with a great enough margin to win the mandate that he had lacked in his first term.

Contrary to what some people believe, a Keynesian tax cut is a very different economic policy to a Supply-side tax cut, just as Keynesian economics and Supply-side economics are radically divergent schools of economic thought (the most basic difference between them being that Keynesianism is a powerful and sophisticated set of theories that form the most accurate interpretation of the workings of the markets today, whereas Supply-side economics defies both logic and the laws of arithmatic). A tax cut in and of itself belongs to no particular economic theory - it is simply a tool of policy, to be used according to one's interpretation of the markets. John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama - all at various points during their presidencies made use of tax cuts, with highly varying degrees of success, and all had very different and personal views on economics (the possible exceptions are Reagan and Bush, whose disastrously flawed economic views conformed in many respects). The key lies in the economic interpretation that the decision to employ a tax cuts is based upon, for its validity will determine its success.

Far from being a supply-side cut (which is based upon the theory that economic activity is spurred by business investment), the Kennedy tax cut, which became the Revenue Act of 1964, was a demand-side cut, resting upon the Keynesian theory that economic activity is spurred by public consumption. Economic history teaches that the Keynesian interpretation of the markets is the best economic theory to base tax policy on: the supply-side tax cuts of Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush had little to no positive impact, and a good deal of negative impact, whereas the Keynesian tax policies of John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton contributed to the two greatest periods of economic growth in the latter half of the 20th Century.

Keynesian economic theory is broadly divided into two competing schools of economic policy: that of Progressive Keynesianism, and Regressive Keynesianism. Progressive Keynesianism is generally asociated with "positive" economic actions - such as engaging in financial regulation, social programs, spending policies, etc. Regressive Keynesianism by contrast centers around "negative" economic policies, such as tax cuts. Both are based on the same economic theories, but certain Keynesian economists will argue amongst themselves as to which forms of Keynesianism perform better at spurring economic growth, although they agree that both work far better than any other brand of economics.

Politico-economics however, as the name suggests, is not about settling upon the best possible policy, but about settling upon the best policy that it is politically possible to enact. This is why although Kennedy was by personal inclination a Progressive Keynesian, he settled upon the use of a Regressive Keynesian tax cut as the centerpiece of his economic strategy from 1962 - 1963.

Far from doing anything at all to "prove that supply-side economics was not just a myth" (from a rational economic standpoint, it most assuredly is a myth), the Kennedy tax cut is one of the great vindications of Keynesian economics of recent economic history.

You may wish to peruse this article for further detail:

http://www.slate.com/id/2093947

__________________________________________________ ______________

As for Obama, the charges that his policies have failed to inspire confidence in business leaders is one that harkens all the way back to FDR and the New Deal, which did far, far more along the lines that Obama has been going down that have made business leaders "uncomfortable" than Obama himself has come even close to managing thus far. Business leaders in the 1930s regarded the New Deal with abhorence, and loudly protested that it would prove to be crippling for the private sector. They found no sympathy whatsoever with President Roosevelt, who forced them to take their medicine, in the form of new economic regulations and programs that turned out to be the complete opposite of a disaster for the private sector - instead they turned out to be a boon.

The charge that Obama's policies have somehow harmed the private sector are as spurious as those made against FDR. The fact is that our economy at the moment is in serious need of regulation, which will help the functioning of the economy, not hinder it, and if there is a flaw in the president's policies, it is that they are not even nearly strong or large enough in many respects.

Paulinus

Well at the slight risk of a detour from the OP what do people make of this analysis?

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/11/op...gman.html?_r=1

Viperlord

We are not worthy. *Bow*

DIVUS IVLIVS

*bows in return*

Thank you.