What Caused the Great Depression?

Another video that's "exactly what it says on the tin." We've been talking around the Great Depression in so many videos, covering bits here and there, that I thought it deserved its own video.

[AnmlPeeweeIsHere]

I was told at school today that Hoover was an uber laissez faire capitalist. Boy were they wrong.

[VikoTheBassist]

When we learned about this in school, the way we learned about this was that "Herbert Hoover's laissez-faire approach to economic reform did nothing to help the economy, but FDR's New Deal was what got us out of it. And people say public school teaching isn't biased.

[seensnakes]

separation of bank and state.  educate the masses about money creation, end the fed, end fractional reserve lending.  Let Congress take responsibility.  And the people that vote this politicians in. 

[litigioussociety]

The answer to the title question is government. The only valid responses thereafter are "explain" or "provide more details." Any teacher that responds "wrong" is an ignoramus.

[shanedk]

"And leaving the bank and economy alone to let them "fix themselves" seems like an almost childish notion."

It may seem that way, but every time that's been tried it's worked beautifully. It worked in the US in 1921 and 1946, and even in the recent crisis that's what Iceland did and they recovered nicely while everyone else stagnated.

[SCmaro]

The difference between an economist and a great economist is the ability to foresee unintended and indirect consequences to a given action within the economy.

[spamface]

Inflation is taxation without legislation or representation. Taxation is theftation.

[shanedk]

YouTube moved EVERYBODY to Google+. And it's absolutely still linked to the shanedk channel. Sorry, but that IS NOT AN EXCUSE.

"LOL It must be nice to have so much free time at such a young age."

I'm 45, MORON.

[shanedk]

Thank you so much for the kind words. First, if you're going to use this in something like a classroom environment, I recommend this version: /watch?v=Ff1picZAWc0 It's basically this video minus the snark.

Second, there are ways of downloading YouTube videos. Google "YouTube Downloader HD." "Freemake Video Downloader" is another good one. Enjoy, and if you think it's worth something there's a donate link on my channel page.

[shanedk]

The Great Depression by Murray Rothbard, and Free to Choose by Milton and Rose Friedman.

[tacticalbacon]

Shane, if you somehow see this comment, I'd like to say that this video format is much better than what you're doing now. It's a lot easier to take you seriously, and this is generally much easier to follow and is more informative.

[seensnakes]

despite the misery brought about by joblessness, despite the homelessness and the great lost of personal wealth we find that the people did not have a direction to remedy the problem. Instead we got a leader who confiscated the gold from the good people and sent it in trainloads to Fort Knox. Today we are not certain if the gold is there. We got a leader that did not go after the criminals who counterfeited gold notes. The American Public were given the Federal Reserve Notes "pay bearer on demand" and "This note is legal tender for all debts, public and private, and it is redeemable in lawful money at the United States Treasury, or at any Federal Reserve Bank" far in excess of the actual gold supply. There were an excess of 71 billion of those paper notes but only 3 billion in gold reserves. The banks had expanded the nations money supply with the multiplicity effect of the fractional reserve lending scheme. In times of economic uncertainty gold was a secure means of transaction. But, then, it was made illegal to possess, because financial institutions counterfeited loans.

[ThereIsAlwaysaWay]

This argument is flawless, I 100% agree as long as we remember that the Fed was at that time, and still is, private and owned by bankers, or bankers friends. The government has only a power of suggestion. The Fed take its own decisions.

[shanedk]

"If you owned real estate or stocks you sure did."

If you own ANY liquid assets you did. They even took it from your future paychecks. That's how money creation works.

[shanedk]

"WW2"

Caused by government. Who on EARTH would blame THAT on the free market???

"Irish potato famine"

Nope, caused by government again.

"vaccinations"

Ah yes, now that IS something the free market brought us, through free market organizations like the March of Dimes where Salk invented the polio vaccine.

"slavery in the US"

Instituted and enforced by government. The free market, by contrast, brought us the Underground Railroad.

[danlad]

"The new money printed during WW2 finally got us out of the great depression." hmm sounds like keynesianisim.

[shanedk]

I know, right? He went from "You have to look at the middle class" to "The middle class has no specific definition" almost without missing a beat!

[shanedk]

"Im Australian and i cant tell you how many people in my country still view the US economy as a ''free'' market''"

Point out to them that the US ranks #10 ("Mostly Free") on the Index of Economic Freedom, while Australia is #3 and is one of only 5 countries rated "Free."

[shanedk]

Um, you DO realize that the Fed doesn't actually set the rate, right? They don't have a magic interest rate wand that they wave and it instantly goes where they want it. They "set" it by manipulating the money supply, creating money if they want to lower it and removing money if they want to raise it. All we can see are the results--but since there are a LOT of things that determine interest rates, it doesn't always get set where they want it.

[shanedk]

"but I'd be just like you if I said that none of his failures were a result of the previous presidency of Bush."

Bush is responsible for the things he did while in office. Obama is responsible for the things HE did while in office. You CANNOT blame Bush for things OBAMA did in office. (Unless we can then blame Bush's presidency on Clinton.)

"And I don't EVER want to be like you. Ever."

You don't ever want to be an honest, rational person? Yes, you've made that abundantly clear.