NPR: Hear: If FDR Had Done Nothing

Hear: If FDR Had Done Nothing

Freezing in Allston, Mass.

Grandwazoo/Planet Money Flickr group

Today on Planet Money:

With the incoming Obama administration planning a $700 billion economic stimulus, the question now is whether a wave of government spending will revive the economy.

For answers, we turn to the example of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. If you're like me, you first encountered FDR in history class as the hero of the Great Depression. Lately, though, some people have renewed debate over whether FDR and the New Deal saved America or made matters worse.

We'll start with historian Eric Rauchway, who considers a world in which FDR had done nothing.

Bonus: Rauchway's got a blog and a new book, The Great Depression and the New Deal: A Very Short Introduction.

Download the podcast; or subscribe. Intro music: Paramore's "I Caught Myself." Find us: Twitter/ Facebook/ Flickr.

Laura Conaway

4:48 PM ET | 01- 5-2009 | permalink

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