Posted on 02/05/2009 7:48:09 AM PST by Shellybenoit
"Compare and contrast, what international trade mistakes made by Presidents Herbert Hoover and Barack Obama helped lead the US into great depressions?"
If President Obama is not careful that may very well be a question on future Social Studies Tests.
Back in 1930 The Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act was signed into law. It raised US tariffs on over 20,000 imported goods to record levels. The Smoot-Hawley Act almost completly halted U.S.-European trade the start of the Great Depression. Although the tariff act was passed after the stock-market crash of 1929, historians consider the political rhetoric leading up to the passing of the act a factor in causing the crash and the recession that began in late 1929, and its passage a factor in deepening the Great Depression. Unemployment was at 7.8% in 1930 when the Smoot-Hawley tariff was passed, but it jumped to 16.3% in 1931, 24.9% in 1932, and 25.1% in 1933.
As it stands today, the "stimulus" bill before the Senate has a Buy American protectionist provision that has the potential of launching an international trade war and deepen the recession we are facing today:
(Excerpt) Read more at yidwithlid.blogspot.com ...
I quite agree that Bernanke “has done it again,” with “it” being the opposite error of monetary contraction. He has flooded the market with money, as if to re-inflate the bubble.
Next ask yourself ‘why’ they are flooding the market with money.
Hint: it has to do with “free trade”.
Bloody hell you are a one note wonder.
I’ll bite. Go ahead and explain.
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