Contents - America's Great Depression, by Murray N. Rothbard

America's Great Depression
By Murray N. Rothbard

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This 5th edition copyright © Auburn, AL: Mises Institute: 2005, 2000; 4th: 1983, 3rd: 1975, 2nd: 1972, 1st: 1963.

• Acknowledgments
• Introduction to the Fifth Edition
• Introduction to the Fourth Edition
• Introduction to the Third Edition
• Introduction to the Second Edition
• Introduction to the First Edition
• Part I: BUSINESS CYCLE THEORY
  1. Chapter 1 THE POSITIVE THEORY OF THE CYCLE (p3)
     • Business cycles and business fluctuations
     • The problem: the cluster of error
     • The explanation: boom and depression
     • Secondary features of depression: deflationary credit contraction
     • Government depression policy: laissez-faire
     • Preventing depressions
     • Problems in the Austrian theory of the trade cycle
  2. Chapter 2 KEYNESIAN CRITICISMS OF THE THEORY (p37)
     • The liquidity "trap"
     • Wage rates and unemployment
  3. Chapter 3 SOME ALTERNATIVE EXPLANATIONS OF DEPRESSION: A CRITIQUE (p55)
     • General overproduction
     • Underconsumption
     • The acceleration principle
     • Dearth of "investment opportunities"
     • Schumpeter's business cycle theory
     • Qualitative credit doctrines
     • Overoptimism and overpessimism
• Part II: THE INFLATIONARY BOOM: 1921–1929
  4. Chapter 4 THE INFLATIONARY FACTORS (p85)
     • The definition of the money supply
     • Inflation of the money supply, 1921-1929
     • Generating the inflation, i: reserve requirements
     • Generating the inflation, ii: total reserves
     • Treasury currency
     • Bills discounted
     • Bills bought-acceptances
     • U.S. government securities
  5. Chapter 5 THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE INFLATION (p137)
     • Foreign lending
     • Helping Britain
     • The crisis approaches
  6. Chapter 6 THEORY AND INFLATION: ECONOMISTS and THE LURE OF A STABLE PRICE LEVEL (p169)
• Part III: THE GREAT DEPRESSION: 1929-1933 (p185)
  7. Chapter 7 PRELUDE TO DEPRESSION: MR. HOOVER AND Laissez-Faire
     • The development of Hoover's interventionism: unemployment
     • The development of Hoover's interventionism: labor relations
  8. Chapter 8 THE DEPRESSION BEGINS: PRESIDENT HOOVER TAKES COMMAND (p209)
     • The White House conferences
     • Inflating credit
     • Public works
     • The New Deal Farm Program
  9. Chapter 9 1930 (p239)
     • More inflation
     • The Smoot–Hawley Tariff
     • Hoover in the second half of 1930
     • The public works agitation
     • The fiscal burdens of government
  10. Chapter 10 1931—"The Tragic Year" (p257)
      • The American monetary picture
      • The fiscal burden of government
      • Public works and wage rates
      • Maintaining wage rates
      • Immigration restrictions
      • Voluntary relief
      • Hoover in the last quarter of 1931
      • The spread of collectivist ideas in the business world
  11. Chapter 11 THE HOOVER NEW DEAL OF 1932 (p285)
      • The tax increase
      • Expenditures versus economy
      • Public works agitation
      • The RFC
      • Governmental relief
      • The inflation program
      • The inflation agitation
      • Mr. Hoover's war on the stock market
      • The home loan bank system
      • The bankruptcy law
      • The fight against immigration
  12. Chapter 12 THE CLOSE OF THE HOOVER TERM (p321)
      • The attack on property rights: the final currency failure
      • Wages, hours, and employment during the depression
      • Conclusion: the lessons of Mr. Hoover's record
• APPENDIX: GOVERNMENT AND THE NATIONAL PRODUCT, 1929-1932 (p339)
• Tables
  • Table 1: Total Money Supply of the United States, 1921-1929
  • Table 2: Total Dollars and Total Gold Reserves
  • Table 3: Member Bank Demand Deposits
  • Table 4: Demand and Time Deposits
  • Table 5: Time Deposits
  • Table 6: Member Bank Reserves and Deposits
  • Table 7: Changes in Reserves and Causal Factors . . . 1921-1929
  • Table 8: Per Month Changes in Reserves and Causal Factors . . . 1921-1929
  • Table 9: Factors Determining Bank Reserves July-October 1929
  • Table I: National Product
  • Table II: Income Originating in Government
  • Table III: Private Product
  • Table IV: Government Expenditures
  • Table V: Expenditures of Government Enterprises
  • Table VI: Expenditures of Government and Government Enterprises
  • Table VII: Receipts of Government and Government Enterprises
  • Table VIII: Government and the Private Product