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A parcel of eminent economists, called into consultation by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund to diagnose the national ailment known as recession, came up with a prescription that, though slightly condensed, covered the better part of two pages in the New York Times. The prominence of these doctors makes it presumptuous for one who has not “majored” in economics to examine the ingredients of their curative concoction. Yet the fact is that all of us are economists by necessity, since all of us are engaged in making a living, which is what economics is all about. Any literate housewife, endowed with a modicum of common sense, should be able to evaluate the specifics in the prescription, provided these are extracted from the verbiage in which they are clothed.

First among these specifics is a tax reduction. How will this help the body economic? Well, it is a known fact that the amount of beans the home economist can obtain at the supermarket is in direct proportion to the takehome pay the breadwinner delivers to her. Beans have to be grown, which is the business of the farmer; prepared for consumption, which is the business of the processor; packed in tin cans, which are fabricated from ore dug out of the ground by miners; transported by railroads, after they have been put up in cases made of wood or corrugated cardboard; made easily obtainable by retailers. What she pays for the beans hires a lot of people who, in turn, spend their share of the price on things they want and thus keep other people in wages. A reduction in taxes is certainly a cure for whatever ails the national economy, and the larger the reduction the better will it thrive. The eminent economists should be commended for this common-sense recommendation.

FC

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Frank Chodorov

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A parcel of eminent economists, called into consultation by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund to diagnose the national ailment known as recession, came up with a prescription that, though slightly condensed, covered the better part of two pages in the New York Times. The prominence of these doctors makes it presumptuous for one who has not “majored” in economics to examine the ingredients of their curative concoction. Yet the fact is that all of us are economists by necessity, since all of us are engaged in making a living, which is what economics is all about. Any literate housewife, endowed with a modicum of common sense, should be able to evaluate the specifics in the prescription, provided these are extracted from the verbiage in which they are clothed.

First among these specifics is a tax reduction. How will this help the body economic? Well, it is a known fact that the amount of beans the home economist can obtain at the supermarket is in direct proportion to the takehome pay the breadwinner delivers to her. Beans have to be grown, which is the business of the farmer; prepared for consumption, which is the business of the processor; packed in tin cans, which are fabricated from ore dug out of the ground by miners; transported by railroads, after they have been put up in cases made of wood or corrugated cardboard; made easily obtainable by retailers. What she pays for the beans hires a lot of people who, in turn, spend their share of the price on things they want and thus keep other people in wages. A reduction in taxes is certainly a cure for whatever ails the national economy, and the larger the reduction the better will it thrive. The eminent economists should be commended for this common-sense recommendation.