Worst President of the U.S.?

No, that's not the only thing. The depression was already geared up to be bad. Why do you think it was so bad in other countries? Hoover wasn't in charge there.

I'm not saying he didn't do anything, but nothing he did was nearly on the scale of FDR.

See above. I don't care how it got bigger, but it was already going to be big.

If you want to expand your company, then first you need to build new factories or hotels or warehouses or fishing wharves or whatever your business is and then hire new people. However, during the depression people's confidence was down which meant companies didn't want to grow, they just wanted to maintain until the economy stabilized.

Also, Sly's link, perhaps you should read it: http://www.massey.ac.nz/massey/fms/...ice/Speeches/2011/Why-have-a-minimum-wage.pdf

I'm not saying he didn't do anything, but nothing he did was nearly on the scale of FDR.[/quote]

I agree. You see how Hoover's "modest" expenditures screwed the economy during his presidency? How would FDR's outrageous spending make it better? It just doesn't make sense when you actually think about it.

It wasn't going to be big, at least not any bigger than a recession before that. Hoover made it big. You should care how it was made worse, because when you realize that it was Hoover and FDR's big government ideologies that caused it, then you'll reevaluate your stance on economics.

Companies always want to grow, it just isn't as safe to do so in a recession. If companies have the opportunity to grow at relatively low risk, such as building factories when it's cheap or hiring cheap labor, then they'll do it. Keeping wages high during a recession means that companies can't hire more people. You see how that would raise unemployment, right?

Are there cookies in it?

It doesn't, but it did help. If Hoover screwed the economy so bad and then FDR spent even more, not even the economy will be able to naturally fix itself unless there is a full stop on spending, but when FDR even let off on spending it went back down the shitter.

My stance on economics is that the government should control all big companies....so I won't reevaluate. I know Hoover's ideologies made it worse, and I'm fairly certain FDR's made it better. I don't know how, but the statistics point that way.

Right, it isn't safe to do it in a recession so there is no opportunity to grow at relatively low risk.

No, I wouldn't actually try and crash your computer

Correlation =/= causation. Just because FDR stopped spending, doesn't mean that one caused the other. It did fix itself, because we aren't in the Great Depression anymore.

At least I'm making my point that Hoover screwed it up. Hopefully, when you realize that FDR's policies were the same as Hoover's policies, you'll see how foolish it is to argue for big government spending.

There can be opportunity when the value of workers decline enough to a point that hiring them isn't a huge risk to a company. By keeping wages high, the government made sure that that never happened, and so employment didn't go down.

I meant chocolate chip...

But you have no proof that it was fixing itself and I have proof that FDR's spending directly correlated with the state of the economy.

I feel like you're repeating the same thing over and over again.

No, that's not how it works. Wal Mart isn't going to go out and higher tons of workers just because they are willing to work for a couple dollars an hour. They'll hire the same amount because they still have the same amount of jobs to do.

My bad, my mind was on computer troubles.

I don't have proof the economy was fixing itself? That's what the economy does. It has always fixed itself! Every economic theory ever says the economy fixes itself.

I am, because you're not accepting the logic of it.

They won't have the same jobs to do if Walmart expands. 1933 era Walmart wouldn't expand because workers would demand more wages relative to the state of the economy.

Reality tells me that the economy fixed itself relatively rapidly because of FDR's spending, or at least that as spending went up the economy got better and as spending was cut the economy got worse.

The logic is very general. Its saying an apple is an apple. Well yeah its an apple but its a different kind of apple. Or perhaps a more apt description is comparing a Rottweiler and a Chihuahua. They're both dogs but....

What are you going to do when your workers can't support themselves? Walmart is making products and selling them at the same price but no one is buying it because no one has any money because the wages are so low.

I misspoke. When I said theory, I meant school of thought. Every single capitalist, regardless of whether they're a Keynesian or an Austrian or whatever, knows that the economy fixes itself. It's fact.

Let's use your logic, with your analogy. I was bitten by a Chihuahua. Your remedy to fix it is to be bitten by a Rottweiler. In a few months both bites healed. Therefore, the Rottweiler's bite must have cured me!

That's exactly the kind of logic that lead Ford and Hoover to support wages. In fact, during Hoover's presidency, real wages increased during the depression because he kept wages high, while prices went down. So, if you had a job, you were doing pretty well from 1929-1933. Of course, the consequence of this was that businesses couldn't hire workers, which lead to the 30% unemployment rate. Normally, a recession causes wages and prices to diminish, usually wages a little more. During the Hoover administration, however, wages were kept high while prices went down.

Fun Fact! I was rereading the chapter in my book about Hoover propping up wages to give a proper response, and came across this tidbit about the post WW1 recession, that lasted 2 years. In 1921, unemployment peaked at 11.7% and had fallen to 6.7% by the next year, and then 2.4% by 1923. All that with no propping up wages, no New Deal, and no public works.

Yes, of course the economy can fix itself.

No, once again you have greatly generalized my statement.

If wages are lower than prices, then nobody is going to afford anything and the economy will stagnate.

You were saying it can't.

Then explain to me how policies that were used at one point in time screwed the economy, while those same policies used more fixed it. It's the same as the Chihuahua's small bite vs. the rottweiler's big bite.

That would work if people were being paid a nickel a day, but they weren't.

I never said it can't.

I can't. I'm no economist. But I have sources and statistics to prove it whereas you're going off theory and using outdated very small recessions as examples.

So your telling me if you were expected to live off 2$ a day in today's economic world you would still have money left over to buy company products? Or what if you were paid in company dollars?

What I meant was that you have no proof. I didn't say it was impossible or definitely not happening, but so far you haven't provided any proof for it.

Yes most of them were small just in general, and absolutely tiny next to the Great Depression. The historical precedent you're using is not comparable. It doesn't matter what caused it, it simply was too big to be comparable to former recessions. Government intervention did in fact help the economy, just in a different way.

Thank you. That's what happens when there is no minimum wage. If you're not ok with it, why would you want that kind of system to still exist?

Oh man I fucked up that quote this morning. Waking up at 6 AM should be a crime against nature.

The proof is that the economy always fixes itself. Every capitalist theory knows that the economy, if left alone, will eventually fix itself. What Keynesians believe is that by government spending and stimulus, they'll be able to fix it faster.

They were small comparatively, but they were actually normal recessions. The Great Depression was really big, obviously. The history is comparable because the Great Depression didn't just become big for no reason, Hoover's policies made it big. It didn't at all.

Because in a regular recession, 90% people get paid enough money to live, and 10% of people aren't paid. In the Great Depression, 70% people got paid slightly more money to live, while 30% people aren't paid at all. I'm going with what helps the most people.

Key word.

Not only Hoover's policies made it so big.

And you can conclusively prove the minimum wage caused this?

This is where I ask what you think made it big, and then you say you're not an economist?

Yeah, and I did. If companies pay higher wages, they won't hire more workers. Thus, coupled with the smaller companies that can't afford to pay their workers that much and so go out of business, you get unemployment.

The Gold Standard which greatly impeded the government's ability to pump much needed liquidity into the markets and ensure that credit markets continue to function. Also just the general panic and loss in consumer confidence coupled with Hoover's panicked reaction ensured that everyone was too scared to invest.

And I had my argument against this. We obviously aren't getting anywhere.

Oh dear god... The gold standard had nothing to do with the economy failing. FDR took us off the gold standard so he could print money in a time of great deflation in an effort to raise prices.

You're argument is that people wouldn't have enough money to survive if Hoover didn't prop up wages, except that makes no sense whatsoever.

For Hoover I meant. It very much restrained Hoover from simply pumping money into vital parts of the economy which is pretty much what FDR did.

People would have barely enough money to survive and therefore would not have any money to spend on goods and services and generally be consumers. You need consumers to have a stable economy.

"Simply pumping money" doesn't work. It just inflates the currency.

People need to buy things to survive, like food or clothing or housing.