You would have gotten relief programs, fireside chats, and rhetoric about government action in any case. That was part of what the country wanted and what governments do in time of crisis. That was also enough to make a lot of us hate FDR.
But the particular experiments, the "the counterproductive attempts at centralized planning and the relentless scapegoating of business" weren't necessary and "helped keep unemployment well above ten percent until World War II intervened."
When people talk about these things a lot of the time they aren't so focused on the details. It's just a left-right thing, and we love or hate politicians based on where they are on the political spectrum, not on the specific details of their policies.
But the point isn't so much to slam FDR for being a liberal or Reagan for being a conservative -- that's not going to change now -- but to ask whether changes in their policies might have brought better results.
That some or even much of the New Deal was inconsequential or beneficial in some way does not mitigate its overall negative impact. Conversely, its failures do not invalidate its successes. So, great post at the Ross Douthat blog.
To my mind, the worst of the New Deal was its price/wage controls and other economic interventions (the Blue Eagle in all its forms). So, too, were the Wilson, Truman, and Nixon price controls. But none of those others are much blamed for the horrible legacies of those policies. None of them should escape it.
By ranting about Social Security we miss the real failure of the New Deal in its price/wage controls. Similarly, by calling Truman “brave” for Hiroshima or the ‘48 election, we excuse his own back-ass abuse of price/wage controls, which ruined so much innovation and competitive force in the American economy of the Forties, Fifties, and beyond. In damning Wilson’s League of Nations we forget the horrible impact of his nationalization of the economy during WWI. In elevating Nixon’s China policies, or blaming all things on Watergate, we lose sight of his role in the energy “crisis” and general economic retardation of the 1970s.
With these confused and mixed legacies, the good and bad of an Administration get mixed as well, and the particulars go bland. There should be no — zero — excuse for any central fixing of prices. None. And no “good” achieved by way of some corollary policy can excuse it. The worst of the 20th century comes of these malicious attempts to control markets through some central order as to how much something should cost or who much someone should get paid.
We might also recognize those Presidents who avoid or crush movements for such interventions. For starters, we must thank our current President for squashing all talk of price control over gasoline. Hillary called for it in ‘05. Another person in office might have taken it on. The negative can be just as strong as the positive act.