Google tells me the great depression start date was August 1929. When I ask when was black thursday, it says September 1929. Britannica puts Black Thursday on October 24, 1929.
August, September, October 1929, somewhere in there. Okay.
For context, from Britannica:
Great Depression, worldwide economic downturn that began in 1929 and lasted until about 1939... Although it originated in the United States, the Great Depression caused drastic declines in output, severe unemployment, and acute deflation in almost every country of the world.
From an essay titled Liberalism and Labour, given as a speech by John Maynard Keynes in 1926:
As things are now, we have nothing to look forward to except a continuance of Conservative Governments, not merely until they have made mistakes in the tolerable degree which would have caused a swing of the pendulum in former days, but until their mistakes have mounted up to the height of a disaster. I do not like this choice of alternatives.
From an essay titled A Programme of Expansion, written by John Maynard Keynes in April 1929:
It is not an accident that the Conservative Government have landed us in the mess where we find ourselves. It is the natural outcome of their philosophy:
"You must not press on with telephones or electricity, because this will raise the rate of interest."
"You must not hasten with roads or housing, because this will use up opportunities for employment which we may need in later years."
"You must not try to employ every one, because this will cause inflation."
"You must not invest, because how can you know that it will pay?"
"You must not do anything, because this will only mean that you can't do something else."
"Safety First! The policy of maintaining a million unemployed has now been pursued for eight years without disaster. Why risk a change?"
"We will not promise more than we can perform. We, therefore, promise nothing."
This is what we are being fed with.
They are slogans of depression and decay—the timidities and obstructions and stupidities of a sinking administrative vitality.
Prescience? No. To call it prescience cheapens it. Keynes understood the economy as no one since has done.
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On the meaning of "understanding" I came across something the other day, from Nicholas Varsanyi, on Werner Sombart (1863-1941) the German economist sometimes described as a "cyclical history buff".
From page 12 (or 15 of 203) in A Study of Werner Sombart's Writings by Nicholas A. Varsanyi (1963):
"Culture is made by man, whereas nature is given to man... Man's way in dealing with cultural concatenations Sombart calls "Understanding". Cultural phenomena are said to be understood, because they are a product of the mind, of the spirit. This, it is said, is: "to understand something from inside." Nature, in its many manifestations, man does not understand. He sees it "from outside", he only "comprehends" it."
I say again, Keynes understood the economy as no one since has done.
On the "cyclical history" thing, according to Wikipedia, Sombart "described four stages in the development of capitalism from its earliest iteration as it evolved out of feudalism, which he called proto-capitalism to early, high and, finally, late capitalism — Spätkapitalismus — in the post World War I period." He had that exactly right, far as I can tell.
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