"Excessive acreages of unused buildings, commercial and residential were created. The need for such construction, given the space demands of modern business bureaucracy, was believed to be without limit. In later consequence, the solvency of numerous banks, including that of some of the nation's largest and most prestigious institutions, was either fatally impaired or placed in doubt. The lending of both those that failed or were endangered and others was subject, by fear and example to curtailment. The construction industry was severely constrained and its workers left unemployed. A general recession ensued. Any early warning as to what was happening would have been exceptionally ill received, seen as yet another invasion of the benign rule of laissez faire and a specific interference with the market. However in keeping with the exceptions to this rule, there would be eventual salvation in a government bailout of the banks. Insurance of bank deposits — a far from slight contribution to contentment — was permissible, as well as assurance that were a bank large enough, it would not be allowed to fail. A preventive role by government was not allowed; eventual government rescue was highly acceptable."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Academics from the United StatesAcademics from CanadaEconomists from CanadaUnited States Ambassadors to IndiaEconomists from the United States
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Ch. 5
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Kenneth_Galbraith
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
John Kenneth Galbraith
1908 – 2006
kanadisch-amerikanischer Ökonom
238 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by John Kenneth Galbraith →
Related Quotes
"It is my guiding confession that I believe the greatest error in economics is in seeing the economy as a stable, immu…"
"Modesty is a vastly overrated virtue."
"Nothing so effectively economizes effort and intelligence, as distinct from anxiety, as the knowledge that nothing ca…"
"When you see reference to a new paradigm you should always, under all circumstances, take cover. Because ever since t…"
"In the really hard cases you're choosing between the disastrous and the catastrophic, and it's hard to tell someone w…"
"Total physical and mental inertia are highly agreeable, much more so than we allow ourselves to imagine. A beach not …"
"Clearly the most unfortunate people are those who must do the same thing over and over again, every minute, or perhap…"
"Economic life, as always, is a matrix in which result becomes cause and cause becomes result."
"In the usual (though certainly not in every) public decision on economic policy, the choice is between courses that a…"
"You roll back the stones, and you find slithering things. That is the world of Richard Nixon."