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Let's not forget that Keynesian stimulus programs failed in the 30's her and in japan in the 90's. Spending newly printed money is welfare, not real job creation, which can only originate in the private sector.

I was raised with the derision toward the poor and unemployed the Mr. Kennedy speaks of! To this day, my mother, who was born in 1931, hates poor people and blames them for their situation. Thank you for giving me context for her ugly lack of empathy.

I don't have the statistics at hand, but not "almost all families have two wage earners." Lots of families are single persons or single parent. So you cannot across the board reduce the income effect of any given unemplyment rate.

I have to wonder if the speaker's figures are really accurate, as too often we refer to the middle class as "everybody".

"Only 9% of married women worked?" Including poor and non-white women, who historically almost always worked outside the home and/or for income (i.e., taking in laundry).

"Today, typically households have 2 incomes." Yes, but not poor black families, which are by and large headed by single women with low wage jobs!

We are at or over 9% if we take into account those unemployed people not counted by the federal government. Real unemployment is _certainly_ over 10% and probably over 13% now.

This is not a fringe view. Paul Krugman, Joseph Stiglitz, Lester Thurow all take this view.

As for what unemployment might reach, it is not at all inconceivable that unemployment could hit 20%.

Moreover, the figures before the late 40s are estimates. The government did not collect statistics on unemployment until after the Depression made clear the need for such data.

David Kennedy makes an assumption about the relation between official unemployment and effective household unemployment (that is, the number of homes with _noone_ working). The relation today is far more complicated today than simply assuming that most homes have two employed adults.

For example, the number of single parent households is much higher today. Living costs, taking into account inflation, are vastly higher (which is one reason why so many two-parent homes see both parents working).

Kennedy needs to speak to some economists who _aren't_ at the Hoover Institution.

As for Keynes, he was so dismayed by the trend at Versailles that he left the treaty conference.

Unemployment doesn't count people graduating from college who are having trouble finding jobs, remember that. So the % is always a bit higher .

Did the 9% unemployment rate include the so-called discouraged workers who our current official unemployment stats don't?

Hoover was a Quaker who sought cooperation between government, business and labor. Cooperation is a key word for the Friends.

So Obama is Herbert Hoover redux?

OK, Hoover may be underrated, but I still hope Obama is nearer FDR than Hoover.