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akuma587 on 11 July 2009
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Viper1 said:
No, WW2 was nothing more than a production and employment bubble itself. There were still dozens of facets of the depression still lingering during the war. It wasn't until AFTER the war that the depression truly ended.

Viper1 said:

Didn't I just get finished saying the war was its own bubble?  It was government propped up employment, it wasn't economic market based.  Sure, it looks good on paper but we still were not out of the woods yet.

 

This argument is just plain ludicrous and unsupported by the facts.  It is true that you saw normal contraction after WW2 ended, which should surprise no one since GDP was growing close to 12-15% annually, which is simply unsustainable even for an aggressively strong economy like China.  But after about two years things completely levelled out and any sign depression was long gone.  Government spending ended the Great Depression.  This especially rings true when you look at the unemployment numbers before and after WW2.

You keep talking about a bubble, but when did the bubble pop?  A bubble is not a buble unless there is a subsequent burst of that bubble.  The unemployment numbers certainly don't reflect a bubble.  Most economists agree that something in the 4.5-6% range is full employment for America.

 

And compare the unemployment numbers too:

For the 1940's and 1950's era.  Unemployment is the purple line.  Following WW2, unemployment never broke 7% until the 1970's.  Where is this employment bubble you are referring to?



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