A modern day argument for the New Deal and Government intervention

In order to pull America out of one of the worst financial crises in history, the Federal government expanded its powers and abandoned, its Laizzes Faire policy toward economics. But it seems that Americans have short memories and even shorter attention spans.

The New Deal, whether you are for more or less government intervention was an unarguable success that coupled with the War Effort put millions of Americans back to work and created the post-war boom. Government jobs well paying and infrastructure was improving and expanding at an unprecedented rate. It's because of the New Deal that we have many of our Highways. However, today it seems that the Government does almost nothing and development in America has come to almost a standstill. This is in part due to the fact that Americans once again deregulated the market. This was also a major reason for the 2008 financial crisis that affected so many Americans.

Perhaps one of the best examples of a regulation of the Market in place was the Glass-Steagall act. Passed by the FDR administration, in the Banking Act of 1933. What is the Glass Steagall Act (or GSA for short)? Basically, it was a piece of legislation that ensured that commercial banks and investment banks could not mix. This meant that a bank couldn't use consumer money to invest in something. This makes money for the bank but if the bank fails then the consumer cannot get their money back. After the crash of 1929 many private individuals lost their money as many banking firms invested consumer money into investments that tanked when the market failed when the banks too failed then the consumer's who themselves had not invested in anything lost money because the bank declared bankruptcy and couldn't pay the consumer back. The GSA was passed to make sure that this never happened again.

It represented good Federal regulation that protected citizens and kept big corporations at bay. However, American's have short memories and the prolonged post-war economic boom left many to believe regulation was not only useless but outdated. As a result, the GSA was slowly eroded by loopholes and legislation, until it was finally repealed in 1999. The war on regulation has had disastrous effects. The same GSA that was meant to protect American Citizens from financial ruin had the ability to save many from debt or massive financial losses in the 2008 recession if had only not been repealed. The ability for consumer and investment banks to combine allowed for the nefarious lending terms that lead to the housing bubble's collapse. Yet it seems like once again people are pushing for more and more deregulation. Our president promises to deregulate, "We will get rid of the redundancy and duplication that wastes your time and your money."

I can see where many of these people come from but instead of scrapping beneficial legislation that are outdated, simply update it so that it fits our modern standards of economics. We are surprised at the growth of staggering wealth inequality in this nation yet forget that we managed to bridge this gap when the government stepped into the economy and it has subsequently stepped back out. Updated government intervention is the answer to many of our economic problems today. We must step back in before the bear market and learn from the 2 devistating economic recisions, that we have already had and make sure our economy is safe and secure.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/president-donald-j-trump-delivering-deregulation/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1933_Banking_Act

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decline_of_the_GlassSteagall_Act

https://www.britannica.com/topic/deregulation