Monday, July 11, 2011

Herbert Hoover's View on Fiscal Policy In Depression

link here to article

Brad DeLong posted Hoover's perspective on the 1932 and 1933 federal budgets. He clearly wanted to keep government spending in line with revenues. He wanted to balance the federal budget during the depression.

Brad posted Hoover's remarks because a conservative pundit has been claiming that Hoover was not attempting to bring federal spending in line with tax revenues. Hoover's commitment to balancing the budget is pretty clear. It is not that different from what some conservatives are proposing today. Some have even raised the idea of a balanced budget amendment to the constitution. Actually, Ronald Reagan proposed a balanced budget amendment during his campaign. He quickly ran up large deficits during his administration by cutting taxes and increasing spending on the military. It may be good politics to propose a balanced budget amendment but its unlikely that it would ever be enacted.

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