Dynamist Blog

If You Think Today's Economy Is Unusually Tumultuous, You Haven't Read Enough American History

Andrew Olmsted calls my attention to this Robert Samuelson column on the myth of the good old days:

It's not simply that you can't turn back the clock. The larger difficulty is that the "good old days" never were. The supposedly placid past, once probed and explored, usually turns out to have been as jarring as the disruptive present. Something is always assaulting our sense of security and stability. We Americans say we like change, but we want it without troubling side effects. This is a mirage. Anyone who doubts that should read John Steele Gordon's superb, just-published book "An Empire of Wealth."

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