While Jonathan Alter demonstrates his ignorance of economic principles, George Will uses his latest Newsweek piece to expose more silliness connected with so-called federal stimulus measures:
During the Depression years of hunger, the New Deal ordered the slaughter of 6 million pigs. The theory (see President Roosevelt’s May 14, 1935, speech on the Agricultural Adjustment Act) was, believe it or not, that one cause of the Depression?in 1935, people were selling apples on the streets; 20.1 percent were unemployed?was a “problem of overproduction.” Government, FDR said, could keep production and consumption “in reasonable balance” so that farmers could charge “reasonable prices,” as government intuited them. Last week Congress was importuned to have the government pay for the slaughter of dairy cattle in order to raise milk prices. Cows should die in Wisconsin so that mothers in Watts will pay a higher price?one that government deems “reasonable”?for milk for their children? The dairy lobby sees opportunity in a New Deal 2.0.
Fortunately, while the government, by its frenzied fidgets, is creating uncertainties that are certain to hinder recovery, the economy is responding to reality. Chrysler and the UAW have at long last agreed to terminate the preposterous “jobs bank,” wherein laid-off workers receive almost full pay and benefits without working. A Wall Street Journal headline: PRICE CUTS SPUR HOME SALES. FALLING prices attract buyers?who knew?
