Yes, Jim D. has pointed out how little "Keynesian" there was in New Deal policy. I agreed and would point out that the New Deal was really much closer to an "institutionalist" economic policy (managed marketing arrangements, regulatory controls particularly for finance, large infrastructure projects and limited, targeted public works). Really resembles more conventional 1950's Development Economics than Keynes. In fact I believe Alvin Hansen who "brought Keynes to the US" (at least his version) was quite an institutionalist before that.
I also pointed (and won't bore pen-l with a rehash) that quite a case has been built up to show that the Nazis too were largely establishmentarian (1930's style) in their macro policies until just before the war, despite massive self-propaganda that they were building a "new society" with "modern" methods. People simply didn't go to the archives to dig up the basic numbers (which the Nazis had never published).
I am always amazed at how little we really know about the big questions in economics. And how much depends on crucial and often unexpressed assumptions that do not get examined. In this case, a whole school of thought has risen and (somewhat) fallen with very little actual experience being examined (some would also say with little actual experience - full stop...since Keynesianism was almost never tried).
The situation is even worse with Sraffian/Marxian explanations. Until recently (Tonak/Shaikh, Dumenil/Levy) we hardly even have had illustrative numbers to toss around.
Paul
3. As part of his long but useful essay, Ralph writes: >Hence, material conditions dictated as one of a limited range of feasible courses militarization and the attempt to capture colonial markets and resources. With Hjalmar Schacht's guidance the Nazi regime was able to restore growth and sharply reduce unemployment through a program of public works and rearmament facilitated by running budget deficits in defiance of financial orthodoxy - similar to the New Deal of FDR, which was less far-reaching due to the limits of presidential power ...<
Paul & I discussed this before. I don't think the New Deal was Keynesian (in the sense of truly pumping up aggregate spending) until WW II. The Germans were able to break the balance-the-budget orthodoxy more.
