Ellen Brown argues that the Civil War's inflation -- meaning the North's inflation -- was good for the American economy. As such, she is a defender of what is called military Keynesianism.
I provided evidence to the contrary. I cited Professor Roger Ransom of the University of California, Riverside, who has held positions in the department of economics (his Ph.D. is in economics) and the department of history. His 2010 article is posted on the Website of the Economic History Association, which is the main academic professional association of American and British specialists.
Ellen Brown dismisses Professor Ransom's conclusions as ill-informed.
14. The Civil War's paper money made survivors richer.I disagree with your conclusions, and I believe I have cited plenty of authorities for my position in that chapter. See, e.g., the section beginning on p 86 titled "Did Greenbacks Cause Price Inflation?"
So, let us examine her expert witnesses.
Page 86 begins with the expert testimony of Vernon L. Parrington. Parrington was a professor of English. He wrote a literary history of America in 1927, Main Currents in American Thought. He had no training in economics or economic history. But he had very strong opinions. In 1918, he wrote:
With every passing year my radicalism draws fresh nourishment from large knowledge of the evils of private capitalism. Hatred of that selfish system is become the chief passion of my life.
He summarized the opinions of Ellen Brown's favorite economist, Henry Carey. Who was Carey? A defender of Henry Clay's "American system" of government subsidies and high tariffs (sales taxes on imports). He was a self-taught economist whose main work was published in 1859, two years before the Civil War began.
Next, on page 88, we find her section, "Did Greenbacks Cause Price Inflation?" Here, she quotes Irwin Unger's 1964 book, The Greenback Era. That book is 46 years old.
Then she quotes Greenbacker non-economist Stephen Zarlenga, who quoted one sentence by James Randall. Randall was not an economic historian. In any case, the unidentified statement is 73 years old: 1937. What did he say? That Civil War inflation was not so bad as World War I's inflation. He said nothing about whether inflation made the survivors richer after 1860.
Zarlenga then quoted one sentence from John Kenneth Galbraith, the Left-wing Harvard economist and senior price control economist during World War II. The sentence made no statement regarding inflation and its supposed wealth-creating effects. He did not say that inflation made the survivors richer.
Then she quotes Thomas Edison, the inventor and non-economist. He said nothing about the Civil War in this quote.
Anyone else? No. You mean that's it? That's it.
She thinks this totally refutes Professor Ransom. After all, what does he know?
Once again, Ellen Brown demonstrates for all to see that she does not know what she is talking about.
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