[lbo-talk] More premature Obama/FDR comparisons, this time from Newsweek

Doug Henwood dhenwood at panix.com
Fri Nov 14 03:49:25 PST 2008


On Nov 13, 2008, at 11:10 PM, B. wrote:


> The new president may think his only task is to rescue the economy.
> But like FDR, he may have to save capitalism itself.

The economy is bad and likely to get worse, but a moment's perspective please. When FDR took office, the unemployment rate was 25%, GDP was down 25%, and 10,000 banks had failed - all after four years of Hoover and the Fed doing little or nothing. Now, the unemployment rate is approaching 7%, GDP is off about 2%, 20 banks have failed, and Washington is throwing hundreds of billions at the problem. The comparisons are pretty interesting to a political psychologist, for sure.

Doug



More information about the lbo-talk mailing list