TY  - JOUR
AU  - Ohanian,Lee E.
TI  - What - or Who - Started the Great Depression?
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 15258
PY  - 2009
Y2  - August 2009
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w15258
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w15258.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Lee E. Ohanian
8283 Bunche Hall
UCLA, Department of Economics
Box 951477
Los Angeles, CA  90095
Tel: 310/825-0979
Fax: 310/825-9528
E-Mail: ohanian@econ.ucla.edu
AB  - Herbert Hoover. I develop a theory of labor market failure for the Depression based on Hoover's industrial labor program that provided industry with protection from unions in return for keeping nominal wages fixed. I find that the theory accounts for much of the depth of the Depression and for the asymmetry of the depression across sectors. The theory also can reconcile why deflation/low nominal spending apparently had such large real effects during the 1930s, but not during other periods of significant deflation.
ER  -