Review de Robert Higgs del libro más recomendable a su juicio sobre el periodo de las décadas de los 20 (boom) y 30 (bust) del s. XX, escrito en 1934: Banking and the Business Cycle: A Study of the Great Depression in the United States (en .pdf gracias al Mises Institute) de varios autores. Habría que añadirlo a la lista con el de Benjamin Anderson (a la lista de lecturas pendientes también).

It is tempting to characterize its theoretical framework as Austrian, as indeed it is in many respects (Mises and Hayek are cited favorably, along with many other sound economists, many of them now forgotten), yet Phillips, McManus, and Nelson’s framework is broader and more eclectic than a strictly Austrian analysis would be. Moreover, besides being packed with excellent economic analysis in a great variety of applications, the book contains a wealth of quantitative evidence, which the authors handle with admirable caution and good sense. They present many tables and charts, but not a single equation. For modern mainstream economists, who can scarcely move a muscle without writing a raft of equations, this book stands as a brilliant reproach.

This remarkable book deserved a far, far better fate than to have faded into near oblivion. Indeed, if it, rather than Keynes’s General Theory, had been the point of departure for subsequent study of macroeconomic fluctuations, the world almost certainly would have been a much, much happier place.

Cita que incluye el post del libro, que sirve a la perfección para el día de hoy:

“[W]e must save our way out of depression, we must increase the real savings that make the creation of real capital possible, instead of spending our way to recovery by cumulating governmental deficits which concentrate attention on consumption as has now been done for five years.”

Véanse también otros dos posts:

Hayek coincide con Friedman sobre la Gran Depresión

Breve recopilación de artículos míos tratando la Gran Depresión