A Journey Through Economic Time

I like the early parts of this book best. John Kenneth Galbraith has been an economist with first-hand experience in a lot of areas: Canadian Scotch farmers, the big stock market crash, wage and price controls, post-war economic assessment of strategic bombing, post-war aid, Keynesian stimulation of economic demand, the political views of businessmen, but people who read this book are most likely to notice how fond he is of economic programs which benefit the less fortunate at the expense of those who are most comfortable with things as they are. Though published in 1994, this book praises Social Security as a miraculously successful program passed in 1935, based initially on benefits "at distinctly modest, even primitive levels, old age pensions" (p. 93), though opponents might complain. "An Ohio Chamber of Commerce official of strong historical bent found that similar measures had brought the fall of Rome." (p. 94). Ohio??? The state and the United States are still evenly divided on which way to head politically when economic matters are paramount, but any benefit that does not increase to reflect increases in salary levels is likely to seem primitive in this century. I once studied antitrust laws for a few years, with excellent instruction from some of the top professors, but it is not surprising that this knowledge rarely brings me riches or even meaningful employment since conflicts of interest can be a bar to active involvement. As a legal topic, it is like trying to apply philosophy to promote freedom. As Galbraith puts it, "For liberals in this time the antitrust laws were a comprehensive economic therapy. Given any evident misuse of market power, more broadly any defective economic performance, the answer was clear: enforce the antitrust laws. This, then and later, became, on frequent occasion, the ready recourse of the devoid liberal mind." (p. 48). "These were not repealed; they were simply not enforced. This was, save by the lawyers involved, one of the less noticed developments of the Reagan years." (p. 49). Galbraith's memory of the Reagan years must have been fresh when he wrote of that triumph for the view that "The domestic threat was the federal government, and specifically its power of taxation as this might be used on behalf of those outside the favored community." (p. 211). The surprising thing about A JOURNEY THROUGH ECONOMIC TIME by John Kenneth Galbraith is how often he can identify policies which have changed drastically in the last century. (Surtax rates went up to 65 percent on incomes over $1,000,000 in 1918. (p. 26)). Some steps even thwarted the rich hoards of previously inflated currencies. "The obvious solution was to diminish the regular currency outstanding by requiring the exchange of the existing notes for a smaller but functionally effective number. This, with characteristic pragmatism, the French did in the early months after the war. It had the further practical effect of denying t

"On page 191 appaernetly he feels it was the "perverse genius" of Richard Nixon to make Americans distrust government through such actions as Watergate." Stacy Redding ..........actually i have heard several peaople atribute watergate to being a plot "to make Americans distrust government." ...And it was also one of the most influencual impacts of water gate... And if you put this scenerio into a propper historical context it dosnt cmopletely not make sense. "For example, Does JKG really beleive that Watergate was a plot by Nixon to get Joe Sixpack to distrust government" stacy reddingActually several authors have also held this view

After the first world war the old world order begin to collapse.The great powers were no longer real great powers and then a new world order begin to form.This book gives you a realistic point of view about the whole economic events after WW1 till the end of communism.Reading this book also teaches the close contact between economy and the future of earth by showing us the collapsing empires,ideas and utopias because of economy.