"The spending for all the weapons and supplies used in WWII nominally got us out of the depression"
only spending some of what has been saved helps an economy.
1 - Note the "nominally" in my post. I didn't argue that it helped the economy, only that it helped measurements of the economy.
2 - I'm sort of with you on borrowing not helping the economy. Certainly not in the long run. In the short run its not impossible, that it can help it a bit, but usually only at the expense of a negative hit later on. Also even the short run benefit is questionable for a number of reasons, "crowding out", loss of confidence in the government to deal with its debt, anticipation of inflation and/or higher taxes as a way to try to deal with the debt, inefficiency and political interference from all the extra government spending, etc.
i don't see how purchases before WWII are related to WWII.
Purchases before we entered WWII, are not necessarily purchases before WWII. Even the purchases before WWII where done in anticipation of the war. Also note that I did not claim that these purchases where a net benefit to the world, or to everyone involved (except in the indirect sense that they helped keep our allies going and helped win the war, which was a huge benefit, but an indirect one), only that they helped the US. They where US sales to other countries. There money was coming to us to purchase our goods. If the US government had bought the same goods, they would have to tax Americans to pay for it, causing harm while their trying to stimulate (or in this case trying to prepare for war, but some would argue its a good stimulus), but if the UK buys these goods, it taxes British tax payers, which doesn't hurt Americans, at least not in a large or direct way.
any cessation of government meddling in any economy would be good for it regardless if there was a war or not.
Agreed. And the war was not necessary to end this meddling (and in fact caused rationing, another type of meddling, to be enacted), but it did in fact lead to this end. It likely would have happened anyway, but it happened sooner because of the war.
yes, but the time could have been shorter if the markets were left to themselves..
I agree.
i believe that recessions and depressions won't even happen if markets are kept free.
I don't agree with that. Or with the idea that they will be less severe with freer markets. But I think they might be shorter in many cases, and the growth rate between recessions will tend to be higher. Overall living standards will be higher with less intervention by government. |
