Title: Did the New Deal Work? | Investing | US News
Headings: Did the New Deal Work?
Did the New Deal Work?
As talk of a "new New Deal" grows, the debate about the original lives on.
A split
Fears of confiscation
Relief projects
A new social contract

Content: Under Wright's interpretation, the Great Depression merely catapulted the Democrats to power and allowed them to enact the policies they wanted anyway. He argues that the New Deal comes across much better if viewed in the light of the culmination of the efforts of the progressive movement. " The basics of the New Deal really set the terms of the social contract—reduction in inequality, status of labor unions, heavy investment in human capital and higher education." Some elements of that legacy are not very controversial today. Rauchway points out that "very few people disapprove of most of the New Deal reforms," which include Social Security, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., and Fannie Mae. Ultimately, then, the ongoing debate over the New Deal may be less about its empirical effects in the 1930s and more about conflicting philosophies of the role of government. Rauchway sees the idea of the New Deal as one to be praised. " [ The idea was that] government should experiment very carefully around the margins with economic regulation, and you discard the things that don't work and keep the things that do." Others see the failures of the NIRA and the massive expenditures required for public-works projects as signs that government should try not to tinker around the margins. " All those things did was transfer funds from one group of decision makers—consumers—to another—federal officials," Powell argues.