The New York Times endorses… Nazinomics. No, really:
In the summer of 1933, just as they will do on Thursday, heads of government and their finance ministers met in London to talk about a global economic crisis. They accomplished little and went home to battle the crisis in their own ways.
More than any other country, Germany — Nazi Germany — then set out on a serious stimulus program. The government built up the military, expanded the autobahn, put up stadiums for the 1936 Berlin Olympics and built monuments to the Nazi Party across Munich and Berlin.
The economic benefits of this vast works program never flowed to most workers, because fascism doesn’t look kindly on collective bargaining. But Germany did escape the Great Depression faster than other countries. Corporate profits boomed, and unemployment sank (and not because of slave labor, which didn’t become widespread until later).
What author David Leonhardt leaves out is one little tiny uncomfortable fact: Hitler’s plans required wars of global conquest no later than 1942-43 (that he got a global war in 1939 was an accident; he thought the Allies wouldn’t fight). Because after eight or nine years of Obamanomics Nazinomics, Germany was going to be out of money. Totally out of money.
So I’m thinking that sometime around summer 2017, we really ought to invade Poland.
Mmmkay?
(Hat tip, Mean ol’ Meany.)
UPDATE: We have a new corollary to Godwin’s Law.
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