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Depression every 70-80: Is this a cycle?

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rosstaylor posted on Thu, Jan 6 2011 4:48 PM

Has anyone noticed how something major occurs every 70-80 years in the US? The last Great Depression occurred roughly 70-80 years ago, and the Civil war occurred 70-80 years before that. In addition, 70-80 before that we had the american revolution. Has anyone noticed this? Does anyone think this is a cycle, more or less?

- Ross

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Kaz replied on Mon, Jan 10 2011 4:56 PM

agreed with Kaz here. Except if I recall correctly, the so-called "Long Depression" turned out to be pretty good. Prices were falling but there was economic growth. This was addressed by Tom Woods in one of his presentations(unfortunately, i forgot the title of it), and i think i've seen addresssed somewhere else as well. Does anyone know which presentation it was where Tom Woods talked about this?

I disagree with Woods on this, taking more of an Austrian approach than his Rothbardian approach.

He defends the period more because it starts precisely with the imposition of the gold standard by force, and Rothbardians see this as somehow good. He abandons the Rothbardian obsession with opposing all attempts to measure economic activity objectively, when those metrics can be twisted to support his position, as the Rothbardians tend to do...if we use his unprincipled change in standard, then Rothbard was wrong about the cause of the Great Depression, wherein he refuses to consider the price stability of the 1920s that proves there wasn't an inflationary boom before the bust.

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Yes, I have.

Why I'm back in Mises looking is with respect to the

Kondratiev Wave Cycle.
I don't put serious thought in Kondratiev theory but there is One important element to it.

In a substantial family 75 years is a close approximation of living aural [family] history.

Today there are few to no living people who were involved or even present to know of and pass on actual details of family [and the society around them]

150 is double that - a family member approaching 75 has a possibility of having actually met an ancestor who was alive in the Civil War

Think of the Civil War at approximately 150 years, and consider how many people today do not have or are not aware of any american ancestors in the middle of the nineteenth century.

 

Someone who is 75 today knew ancestors who were adults in the twenties, and may have met aging relatives who were alive in the civil war.

Someone who was an adult during the Revolution may have known why their families came over from seventeenth century England or Europe - The English Civil War or the European Thirty Years War.




 

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