It is without debate that the 1940's through the 1960's were America's "golden years" wherein:
Economic growth was nearly double what it is today
Unemployment was half of what it is today
The national debt averaged half of what it is today (relative to GDP)
and
High school graduates could graduate AND GET JOBS without endebting themselves pursuing worthless degrees.
Life was better. The economy was better. And the future much brighter.
Of course, since the 50's were largely the pinnacle economic achievement of free markets, those on the left must attack it. And thus, with the assurance of a ball returning while playing against a wall in one-man tennis, you can reliably predict two common arguments the left will use when trying to tear down those glorious 50's:
1. The highest income tax bracket was 91% in the 50's
and
2. The 50's were "raaaaayccccissss"
The first argument is easily debunked because so few people were in the 91% income tax bracket that its leftist-desired wealth redistributive effects were not realized, nor did it really affect the economy. Additionally, using the REAL tax rate (that would be "spending as a percentage of GDP" for you non-economists out there) shows overall taxation much lower in the Evil Racist 50's than what we have today (25% GDP at state federal and local vs. the 35% we have today, and that includes the Korean War).
But the "But the 50's Were Racist" argument the left uses to chicken-out of this economic debate is particularly obnoxious. For not only is it
a non-sequitir
a red herring
intellectually dishonest
cute
amusing
childish
and ultimately irrelevant to the economic debate (attempting) to be had,
it's down right tiresome. Alas, time to take this pathetic canard down.
The first and most obvious flaw with this argument is the fact that IN NO POINT IN TIME in the history of THE ENTIRE WORLD was there "no problems." ANY point ANYWHERE in history there was always something bad going on.
The roaring 20's? Untreatable cancer.
The industrial revolution? Polio.
Roman empire? Slavery.
The Renaissance? Cheating spouses.
You might as well respond to the argument that "the 80's was an economic miracle" with "yeah, but the Challenger blew up."
Bad things existing or happening during an booming economy does NOT moot the economic production that occurred during those times, NOR the variables/policies that lead to said booming economy.
Two, (and you need to follow the logic on this VERY CLOSELY and CLEARLY):
In claiming racism is a valid enough reason to debunk and dismiss the economic boom of the 50's, this MUST mean that the left believes racism had a causal relationship (in part) with the economic boom. Otherwise they would be intellectually honest and aim for "the best of both worlds." They would say, "well, we should look at what economic policies were in place during the 50's AS WELL AS eliminate the racist policies that plagued the day." However, they don't. They associate and thus imply that RACISM CAUSED THE ECONOMIC BOOM OF THE 1950's and therefore we cannot implement those policies.
Let that sink in.
I know leftists and socialists won't, but let that sink in your brain.
The left (albeit naively, idiotically, and unconsciously) is claiming RACISM CAUSES ECONOMIC GROWTH.
I don't need charts, data, or empirical evidence. This is just HIGHLY FLAWED and INSANE logic. Racism is GOOD for the economy??? And that if we wanted to get the economy booming again we should implement RACIST policies???
I know the left does not advocate such a thing, but their unchecked, emotionally driven "logic" does.
Finally, what's worse is it shows just how little the left views minorities (albeit unconsciously). For this argument to be true - that instituting the economic policies of the 50's would BY NECESSITY bring back "racism" - then minorities would have to have net negative economic NPV's. ie - they would have to be economic sink holes. Not just that they would "produce nothing of value" but actually DESTROY economic value (on par with an estimated 2% GDP per year). And the WHOLE REASON for the booming economy in the 1950's was because "whitey" was keeping blacks (and others) out of the economy, because if minorities were allowed in the economy (or treated as equals) then the economy would tank as if minorities were somehow "saboteurs."
Those aren't my words. Nor (admittedly) are they the conscious words of the left. But, again, it IS their logic and what they are effectively implying.
The truth is the "But the 50's Were Racist" argument is just another TIRESOME, REPEATED, and COWARDLY tactic of the left where they hide the failure of their economic policies behind an unrelated social issue. They cannot debate their economic plan of socialism, wealth redistribution and parasitism on
economic,
logical,
mathematical,
historical, or
empirical grounds,
and thus must take the greatest decade in American economic history and villainize it by tainting it with "racism" (and of course "sexism" as men beat their wives THRICE DAILY and Don Draper banged every secretary in his office in the 50's).
However, foolish as this argument is, there is a STEEP price to pay if Americans turn off their brains and fail to realize the non-sequitur in the left's argument. In dismissing the 50's economic boom "because racism" we REFUSE to look at a point in all of human history where an economy was NEVER BETTER. Poverty was decreasing at the fastest rate in human history FOR ALL PEOPLE. Standards of living were increasing faster than ever. And if we kept this economic miracle up, we would have had income per capita's of over $100,000 today.
The key
The answer
The solution
To nearly all of our economic and financial problems lay in those decades of America's glory years sans, of course, the racism.
Too bad nobody's courageous enough to study them, highlight them, or advocate bringing them back because a bunch of intellectually dishonest parasites calling themselves democrats might falsely accuse you of being a (GASP!) raaaaayyyyyyycccciiiiiisssss!
And no country with an income per capita in the 6 figures is worth that risk, now is it?
Enjoy that decline.
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10 comments:
The 50's happened because all the factories on the Eurasian continent were smoking craters.
So by all rights we should... nuke Japan again.
To create jobs.
Church attendance was very high in the 1950s. I just ran across this finding in an interview of Robert Putnam on the American dream over at Minding the Campus
Somewhat to our surprise, we found that church friends are supercharged friends. That is, you feel greater obligations to members of your religious community than to members of your bowling league. David Campbell and I were quite struck when we could see in the data that the more church friends you had, the nicer you were. By nicer, I mean, I was slightly joking, but you’re more likely to help old ladies cross the street, you volunteer more, you give more. All that stuff is true, and it meets the most rigorous standards of social science—it actually causes it. Having church friends, not actually believing in God, so if you happen to get in a church religious community, but you don’t believe in God—say you go because your spouse is religious ,and you go along ,and you are actually members of that community—that community actually makes you nicer.
So this implies that people were nicer in the 1950s given the high church attendance, thus the multitude of church friends. Oh, and these weren't the Progressive no-doctrine churches of today.
In regards to the highest tax bracket, in 'The Big Change: America Transforms Itself 1900-1950' (1952), by Frederick Allen Lewis, the author offers a very sound discussion of the rise of the expense account as a means of compensation without hitting the high brackets.
i dont know if i'm more jealous of my grandparents that basically lived 1920s to 2000 or my parents who where teeeangers in the late 50s early 60s before the usa really started its nose dive in the late 60s imo.
i mean the grandparents checked out before obama began the "transformation" and the usa still looked like the usa of old as opposed to more like kgb ruled russia, but the parents absolutely live in the goldent age imo. baseball ruled, guys worked AND CAME HOME EVERY NIGHT TO THEIR FAMILY, women ruled the children and not the other way, everybody drank and smoke but mostely in moderation, most were okay that they were never going to be famous or rich and werent willing to throw anyone under the bus to become rich or famous and kids were okay to be 5 feet away from their parents and cars were fast.
This is an excellent idea for deflating dumbassed debaters. Thank you - I'll be implementing it shortly.
I'm not sure the U.S. began it's fall in the 60s. It seems like the 90s were the last good decade at this point. People were generally happier, had some disposable income, & and the spotlights were on much lighter topics (Lewinsky) compared to the latest video ISIS that resembles Saw 28 or whatever. No, I'm not saying Bill was a good President either. Then the aughts came, & let's face, 9/11 affected our collective psyche for a good portion of that decade. While there were probably more jobs, the economy wasn't all that great as a whole besides a few pockets of economic success(Wall St., Silicon Valley, etc.) The administration in charge became more of a joke almost every day & that's why people were ready for something different. However, what we've had from 08-present has probably been the biggest waste imho since America's birth. I see no significant, positive differences in the last 7 years, but rather skyrocketing deficits, broken promises, and a recovery that no one ever seems to find.
Overall, our Presidents haven't been that good in recent times, to put it mildly, and I'd put our current one as the worst.
Korea and Qatar today are more racist than 1950s America.
Anonymous
That is zero-sum bullshit.
The fact that Europe and Asia had economic problems was a net drain on the world economy. This would have a negative impact on the US economy even in those times with greater protectionism than today. Those were markets lost because the people were poor (i.e. not producing economic value); those were people who could not produce and supply American companies, and the lack of competition pushed the prices up.
Economic growth in one place encourages, does not suppress, economic growth elsewhere. The idea that we compete with other nations for ranking is a good thing, as it encourages economic growth, but it is actually meaningless. It is just a human habit, of wanting to feel rich relative to others rather than in more rational absolute terms.
I was a teenager in the UK at the start of the 50's.It was a wonderful world.
There were rules,of course,the church was strong and so was the family.There was no PC or sadistic police,Feminism didn't rule the country and females were placed on a pedestal which is how men liked it.Mum ruled the roost but in a nice way,everybody played sports and people were far fitter.TV was only an occasional entertainment
and nobody preached at you.We all had a sense of identity,we were all treated fairly.
Green and pleasant were the words used for England.
The left on the one hand praises the 1960's as being full of left-wing activism (which it was) yet on the other hand hates the 1950's and for that matter the 1960's because of some mythical racism. In other words they are basically saying that economic growth and prosperity is bad if it is benefiting white people.
In a way the left likes all the problems that to be fair they have been recognising have taken place particularly since the 1970's. The main problems since the 1970's have been stagnating wages for regular workers largely because of immigration from the third world and the movement of productive industries to third-world countries although automation has also made some jobs redundant. The expansion of college has been a big consequence of his changing labour market. One of the reasons college has to cost something is that indebted workers are slaves.
The left nonetheless likes many of these problems because it allows people to make careers out of pretending to solve these problems. This is where charities and race lobbies and radical feminists come from. Immigration has allowed the 'left' to make political capital and the big capitalists and feminists have colluded to get all women in to the workplace so working conditions are reduced as much as possible.
The left doesn't believe racism is good for the economy, they believe that capitalism=racism. http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/you-cant-have-capitalism-_b_5809628.html
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