The Federal Reserve’s mistakes contributed to the “worst economic disaster in American history” (Bernanke 2002). Bernanke, like other economic historians, characterized the Great Depression as a disaster because of its length, depth, and consequences. The Depression lasted a decade, beginning in 1929 and ending during World War II.
The financial crisis has made Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's book Essays on the Great Depression a hot seller.. .. Bernanke, a former Princeton University economist, is considered the pre-eminent living scholar of the Great Depression. He is practicing today what he preached in his book: Flood the system with money to avoid a depression.
Downloadable! Ben S. Bernanke's Essays on the Great Depression make satisfying reading. Spanning microeconomic foundations and macroeconomic outcomes, the book pulls together articles containing some of the best and most conclusive research on the economic catastrophe of the 1930s. Bernanke's work, with co-authors Harold James, Ilian Mihov, James L. Powell, Martin Parkinson, and Kevin Carey.
The curriculum begins with an introductory essay, “The Great Depression: An Overview,” written by David C. Wheelock, a research economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis and an expert on the Great Depression. The essay is incorporated into many of the lessons, as students are asked to read and refer to various sections of the essay.
Yet, in contrast to Friedman’s analysis, Bernanke’s major article on the Great Depression, originally published in American Economic Review, is titled “Nonmonetary Effects of the Financial Crisis in the Propagation of the Great Depression” (1983, reprinted in Bernanke 2000a, emphasis mine). Banks were the economy’s premier.