Monetary policy

[Brad De Long]

>There are, however, even more direct indications that a first-class 
>political issue is at stake here. in the great depression in the 
>1930s, big business consistently opposed experiments for increasing 
>employment by government spending in all countries, except Nazi 
>Germany. This was to be clearly seen in the USA (opposition to the 
>New Deal), in France (the Blum experiment), and in Germany before 
>Hitler. The attitude is not easy to explain. Clearly, higher output 
>and employment benefit not only workers but entrepreneurs as well, 
>because the latter's profits rise. And the policy of full employment 
>outlined above does not encroach upon profits because it does not 
>involve any additional taxation. The entrepreneurs in the slump are 
>longing for a boom; why do they not gladly accept the synthetic boom 
>which the government is able to offer them?

In the United States today Kalecki's question is a non-starter: the 
National Association of Manufacturers is among the most pro-inflation 
and low interest rate-desiring organizations in the country...

Brad DeLong