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| Author: | Amity Shlaes, Senior Fellow for Economic History |
|---|
February 18, 2009
Politico
In his Feb. 13 Ideas piece, "Revisionists' Blind View of New Deal," Matthew Dallek takes issue with me and my book, "The Forgotten Man." The gist of his article is that the New Deal "worked." The gist of "The Forgotten Man," which has been out for nearly two years, is that neither Herbert Hoover nor Franklin D. Roosevelt promulgated policies that worked, especially not in the sense that we use the word "work" today.
Today, our government is reacting with warnings of catastrophe at a point when unemployment is 7 percent or 8 percent. New Deal-era unemployment averaged, even by more sympathetic analyses, well into the teens. Today, we expect the Dow Jones Industrial Average to return to its high within a few years. In the 1930s, it never did. Today, we expect companies to invest in the future. Then, net domestic private investment was at times negative.
It seems best to address Dallek's allegations point by point.
Dallek says: "Shlaes cited unemployment figures that excluded Americans who had New Deal-generated jobs."
This is inaccurate. "The Forgotten Man" and articles after it cite Bureau of Labor Statistics unemployment figures. These include the many permanent jobs created by the New Deal, such as tax collector, Agricultural Department employee and staffer at the Tennessee Valley Authority. "The Forgotten Man" does not include a second set, the part-time make-work jobs of the New Deal relief programs. That is because the Bureau of Labor Statistics data do not, either.
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