Economic History

« Previous Entries

Conservative Ideology Is A Debt Problem

Thursday, May 18th, 2023

For the first hundred years of American history, there was one cause of public debt: war.  The United States of America started in debt, and it paid its bills.  There wasn’t another spike in debt to Gross Domestic Product ratio until the American Civil War. At this point, you might ask what is the debt […]

Conservatism Is Expensive

Wednesday, May 3rd, 2023

Fox News just agreed to pay $787.5 million for lying about Dominion voting machines.  Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton offered to use $3.3 million of tax dollars to settle a whistleblower case.  Donald Trump paid nearly $300,000 to cover up his extramarital affairs. It must be nice to have millions of dollars to pay for […]

Keep the Vultures off Social Security and Medicare

Thursday, February 23rd, 2023

Maya Angelou said, “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.” Liberals showed you who they are by creating and defending Social Security and Medicare.  Conservatives showed you who they were by opposing and undermining Social Security and Medicare.  In 1935 Franklin Delano Roosevelt championed Social Security during the Great Depression.  […]

A More Perfect Union

Thursday, February 9th, 2023

It shouldn’t surprise you that some reporters, talk show hosts and columnists are lazy.  They find a meme and then plug in a detail.   The meme today is the phrase “Washington is broken.” This phrase allows the speaker to avoid taking responsibility for a judgment or prediction.  It opens the door to the related meme, […]

Eat Real Food

Friday, January 13th, 2023

One of the best parts of my job as a historian is reading.  Because I work at a small teaching university rather than a large research university, I take a broad approach to my continuing education.   This morning I read a fascinating genetic study about prehistoric dog domestication.  It showed that there are five […]

Roots Run Deep

Friday, January 6th, 2023

In October of 1929 the New York Stock market crashed and took down the global economy.  Conservative President Herbert Hoover chose to keep government help limited.  For the next three years the economy remained in free fall. This horrible experience taught voters that something had to change.  Millions of people realized that they had the […]

Public Service vs. Private Profit

Thursday, September 15th, 2022

Conservatives have been pretty clear about one aspect of their governing philosophy.  They say that they will run government like a business.  Liberals, however, see government as public services.  The results are dramatically different. Liberal policies shaped American politics after the Great Depression.  Franklin Delano Roosevelt provided a role model for creating government services.  The […]

Let’s go Joe!

Thursday, August 25th, 2022

Between January 20, 2001 and July 14, 2008 prices at the gas pump rose from $1.47 per gallon to $4.11 per gallon.  During that extended price rise, two Texas oil men sat in the Oval Office and made decisions.  Dramatically, gas prices fell to $1.61 by December 2008.   George W. Bush and Dick Cheney created […]

Let’s Go Joe!

Thursday, August 25th, 2022

Between January 20, 2001 and July 14, 2008 prices at the gas pump rose from $1.47 per gallon to $4.11 per gallon.  During that extended price rise, two Texas oil men sat in the Oval Office and made decisions.  Dramatically, gas prices fell to $1.61 by December 2008.   George W. Bush and Dick Cheney created […]

Break Big Oil’s Monopoly

Thursday, March 17th, 2022

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result. The first oil shock happened in 1973. Energy prices are set by “the market. The global energy market keeps failing us. We have known the market is failing us for 49 years.  We know what can fix it: conservation and competition.  Conservatives […]

« Previous Entries