Cruz is an economic ignoramus. Smoot-Hawley did not lead to the Great Depression. Fed policy led to the GD, policies that reduced the money supply by 30% and caused large numbers of banks to fail.
Cruz name drops (Smoot-Hawley for “debate” effect and bombs out.... again.
Where are these fabulouso debating skills tonight. Get your policy weeds going, Ted. See where it brings us. Words.
You’re right that the 30% collapse of the US money supply was the proximate cause of the Great Depression, but Fed policy didn’t create the collapse.
Friedman and Schwartz hold the Fed responsible for failing to act once the collapse started feeding on itself but not for causing the banks to fail in the first place. The absence of FDIC and America’s peculiar branch banking law played a large role in making the Depression worse in America than the rest of the developed world.
Smoot-Hawley passed after the Depression was already well underway. And while it didn’t help the situation it wasn’t much different than the Fordney-McCumber Tariff that had been in effect for most of the Roaring Twenties.