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Data Sources for “Stuck on Stupid”
We have assembled a lot of economic and political data for the years of the Great Depression from 1929 to 1939 and we want you to know where we got it.
Here’s the “ticker” that we run at the top of each year. Following the ticker we’ll break the data down and give links to the source of each item of data
1932 Will It Never End?
spend
def
tax
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click data for charts
President: Hoover (R); Senate: Watson (R-IN); House: Garner (D-TX).
Gross Domestic Product in the United States
from 1902 to present
data download
The Office of Management and Budget publishes Gross Domestic Product Data from 1930 to present.
Economic History Series maintains Gross Domestic Product Data from 1790 to present.
GDP: Economic History Series: What Was the GDP Then?
The United States Bureau of Economic Analysis maintains Gross Domestic Product Data from 1929 to present
GDP: Bureau of Economic Analysis: National Economic Accounts
GDP Data and Deflator - 1929 to present: Current Dollar and "Real" GDP (xls)
GDP Change - 1929 to present: Percent Change from Preceding Period (xls)
Money Supply in the United States
from 1867 to 1970
data download
M2 Money Supply:
The US Census Bureau maintains a time series, X-415: Money Stock,
from 1867 to 1970.
Bicentennial Edition: Historical Statistics of the United States, Colonial Times to 1970, Part 2
X. Financial Markets and Institutions: Series X-415; p.992 (pdf)
Dow Jones Industrials Data
data download
Dow Jones Industrials: Yahoo Finance Daily Prices
Prices shown are the opening price for the first business day of the year and the closing price for the last business day of the year.
Federal Spending in the United States
from 1900 to 2003
spend
def
data download
Federal Spending:
The US Census Bureau has this table of federal spending from 1900 to 2003.
Table No. HS--47. Federal Government -- Receipts and Outlays: 1900 to 2003 (xls)
It seems to be an orphaned table. The current Census Bureau page on federal spending only goes back to 1960.
Top Income Tax Rate in the United States
from 1913 to 1970
tax
data download
Top Marginal Rate in Federal Income Tax:
Historical federal income tax rates since 1913 are given in Statistical Abstracts of the United States:
From the Colonial Era to 1970.
Chapter Y: Government, p.1095
Consumer Price Index in the United States
from 1800 to 1970
data download
Consumer Price Index:
The US Census Bureau maintains a time series, E-135: Consumer Price Indexes (all items) from 1800 to 1970.
Bicentennial Edition: Historical Statistics of the United States, Colonial Times to 1970, Part 1
E. Prices and Price Indexes: Series E-135; p.211 (pdf)
Unemployment Rate in the United States
from 1900 to 1998
less
data download
Federal Unemployment Rate:
This early unemployment data comes from a website that claims to get its information
from Out of Work, Unemployment and Government in Twentieth-Century America
by Richard K. Vedder and Lowell E. Gallaway [Holmes & Meier, 1993]
Historical Statistics and Analysis on Unemployment, Poverty, Urbanization, etc., in the United States
Party Strength in United States Congress
from 1789 to present
senate
house
United States Senate Election Results from Wikipedia:
U.S. Senate Elections
United States House of Representatives Election Results from Wikipedia:
U.S. House Elections
Why Stuck on Stupid?
Seventy years ago the leaders of both US political parties turned away from the policies that had created an economic powerhouse we call the Roaring Twenties. For ten long years Americans suffered through wrenching economic dislocations: deflation, inflation, a four-year economic contraction, endless unemployment, mindless political experiments, and ruthless attacks on businessmen for political gain as their leaders stayed Stuck on Stupid.
Today, after a twenty-five year economic boom, Americans are once more faced with a political elite that wants to monkey with success. It wants to raise tax rates. It wants to restrict trade. It wants to increase government power.
It‘s time to look back and remind ourselves how it came to be, starting in 1929, that America got itself Stuck on Stupid. Otherwise it could happen again.
1929-1939: “A Decade that will live — in stupidity.”
Education
“We have met with families in which for weeks together, not an article of sustenance but potatoes had been used; yet for every child the hard-earned sum was provided to send them to school.”
E. G. West, Education and the State
Mutual Aid
In 1911... at least nine million of the 12 million covered by national insurance were already members of voluntary sick pay schemes. A similar proportion were also eligible for medical care.
Green, Reinventing Civil Society
Democratic Capitalism
Three dynamic and converging systems functioning as one: a democratic polity, an economy based on markets
and incentives, and a moral-cultural system which is plural and, in the largest sense, liberal.
Michael Novak, The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism
Government Expenditure
The Union publishes an exact return of the amount of its taxes; I can get copies of the budgets of the four and twenty component states; but who can tell me what the citizens spend in the administration of county and township?
Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America