I disagree with both assessments. It was a period of astonishing invention and adoption of new technology. The technological unemployment that would be expected from the internal combustion engine and electric light and power was offset in part by the consumer spending on the wonderful new devices made available. That same technological unemployment was hidden for a long while by the mobilization for WWI in Europe (which borrowed and bought heavily in the US) and a bit later the mobilization in the US itself. And then a while longer because Europe was prostrate after the war and still buying and borrowing in the US.
When all those disguising exogenous (?) things played out, agriculture collapsed and we arrived at the Great Depression. Followed by the same secular stagnation which we now experience. The Great Depression was more a technological unemployment event that a Smoot-Hawley tariff mistake or a blunder by the Fed. Gene > On Dec 8, 2015, at 1:15 PM, Charlie <[email protected]> wrote: > > L.P. writes, "We are in a period more like the late 1800’s or the early > 1900’s. It is a period of both expansion and retrenchment." > > As an economic assessment, this is fundamentally wrong. The late > 1800s-early 1900s contained the possibility, prospect, and finally the > achievement of vigorous growth and real mass reforms. Such reforms are > no longer possible under U.S. capitalism, and they are fast vanishing in > western Europe. China is not on the list yet; it will run into the same > barriers as the "developed" countries in a few decades. > > (The political economy of this problem is analyzed in The Hollow > Colossus, http://www.hollowcolossus.com ) > > _______________________________________________ > pen-l mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
