>>The Economics of Depression are called "Keynesian" - the set of tools, observations and policy proposals that are shown to work when in such a crisis. They ar

>>The Economics of Depression are called "Keynesian" - the set of tools, observations and policy proposals that are shown to work when in such a crisis. They are again fashionable with young stars in economics creating new Keynesian-expired models. All of the criticism of this "Depression economics" is usually valid during normal times, but this is an extraordinary event. There is an entire (respected) school of economics that disagrees that Keynesian economics works. I'm not here to argue which side is right, since I am not an economist, but to simply state the Keynesian economics are the "Economics of Depression" and then dismiss the Austrians as a "joke" is ridiculous. >>The talking heads and politicians never like stimulus - its use implies a different mode of the economy, its much easier to just continue talking as before. Debt isn't an issue, because stimulus from defence spending right before WWII was done with much bigger debt-to-GDP, inhereted from WWI in most countries that did it. From what I have seen, this is pretty much the opposite of true. The Democratic Party in the US has been extremely pro-stimulus basically since Obama's election (your point about state level cuts negating its efficacy may be true, but that doesn't mean there isn't a large group of politicians that are pro-stimulus). Most of the talking heads I have seem pretty pro stimulus, and they definitely are anti-austerity.