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Comment by raiyu | Hacker News Reader

The 1950s and 60s were great in America because Europe was decimated in WWII, heavy industry was alive and well, the population was growing, the government was helping GIs with housing loans and college, and imports and global trade had not yet taken hold.

Fast forward and globalization has moved production else where, population growth compared to Nordic countries is massive, there are a multitude of factors at play.

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We've had 40 years of failed supply side economics in the US. Let us now try the theory that demand drives the economy just as much or more than supply.

(This means favoring policies that increase pay across broad swaths of the population vs favoring policies that benefit businesses over workers)

I hear the bit about America having the world to themselves trade-wise a lot from Americans, but it's not really true.

Both Western Europe and capitalist Asia (Japan, Singapore, South Korea) also had near full employment with quality jobs during this period.

It was not a US-only phenomenon. It was global. The US was exporting more, but it was also importing more. As were many other countries.

>Both Western Europe and capitalist Asia (Japan, Singapore, South Korea) also had near full employment with quality jobs during this period.

That seems off to me right away, because the major investment in South Korea didn't come until later. Certainly not in the 50's. In the mid 60's South Korea was still going through shifts towards industrialization.

Also Singapore was not well in the 50s and 60s. It got full independence in 1965, and (from the speech of Lee Kuan Yew), erratic electricity, only half of the population access to sewage system. The economy picked up only afterwards.

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