Professor Obama: :"FDR was fiscal conservative"

History à la carte Contrary to myth ...

“ [...] No one grew the size of government, taxation and spending in peacetime the way Roosevelt did, Powell said. “FDR tripled taxes and spending more than doubled from 1933 to 1940,” Powell said. “That was the biggest increase in peacetime spending in American history. Before that, the biggest increases in spending came during wars.” Further, the New Deal did not bring the economy back and prolonged recovery, Powell said, as unemployment was still at 17 percent by 1940, before war spending began to pull the country out of the depression. “There were a number of New Deal policies that make it harder and more expensive to hire people,” Powell continued. “Compulsory unionism made it more costly to hire people. The more expensive something is the less you get of it. The more you subsidize something, the more you have of it.” Despite the $500 billion spent under FDR through various programs, the unemployment rate in the United States did not significantly decrease until after the U.S. officially entered World War II in 1941, according to Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) records from 1929 through 1944.  [Obama: FDR Was 'Fiscally Conservative'] ”