The Great Depression: America, 1929–1941
The Great Depression: America, 1929–1941 () is a 1984 history of the Great Depression by acclaimed historian Robert S. McElvaine. In this interpretive history, McElvaine discusses the causes and the results of the worst depression in American history, covering the time from 1929 to 1941. He examines the causes of this cataclysmic event, its impact upon the American people, and the political, governmental, and cultural responses to it. He comes down firmly in favor of the "demand-side" argument that maldistribution of income in the 1920s having left the bulk of potential consumers with too small a share of national income to buy all that mass production was putting on the market was the principal cause of the collapse. Building on his innovative use of letters written by "ordinary" Americans during the Depression that were collected in his first book, "Down and Out in the Great Depression", McElvaine takes readers into the experience of Depression victims to an extent never before achieved.
Stimulus (economics)
Milton Friedman argued that the Great Depression was caused by the fact that the Federal Reserve did not counteract the sudden reduction of money stock and velocity. Ben Bernanke argued, instead, that the problem was lack of credit, not lack of money, and hence, during the financial crisis, the Federal Reserve led by Bernanke provided additional credit, not additional liquidity (money), to stimulate the economy back on trail. Jeff Hummel has analyzed the different implications of these two conflicting explanations. President of the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, Jeffrey Lacker, with Renee Haltom, has criticized Bernanke's solution because "it encourages excessive risk-taking and contributes to financial instability."