 Pre-Keynesian Monetary Theories of the Great Depression: Whatever Happened to Hawtrey and Cassel? (with Ronald W. Batchelder)David Glasner () Chapter Chapter 14 in Studies in the History of Monetary Theory, 2021, pp 367-401 from Palgrave Macmillan Abstract: Abstract The first monetary theory of the Great Depression is often credited to Milton Friedman. Advanced to counter the idea that the Great Depression resulted from inherent capitalistic instabilities, Friedman’s theory attributed the Depression to policy mistakes by an inept Federal Reserve Board. More recent work on the Depression suggests that the cause lay in the attempt to restore an international gold standard after World War I and did not originate, as Friedman believed, in the United States. This chapter documents that current views about the Depression were anticipated by Ralph Hawtrey and Gustav Cassel, who both warned that restoring the gold standard would cause catastrophic deflation unless monetary demand for gold was limited by international cooperation. We also suggest possible reasons why the Hawtrey-Cassel explanation was overlooked and forgotten. Keywords: Gold standard; Great Depression; Deflation; Hawtrey; R. G.; Cassel; G.; Friedman; M.; Bank failures; Federal Reserve; Bank of France (search for similar items in EconPapers) There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it. Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:pshchp:978-3-030-83426-5_14 Ordering information: This item can be ordered from DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-83426-5_14 Access Statistics for this chapter More chapters in Palgrave Studies in the History of Economic Thought from Palgrave Macmillan |
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