>>>>>The current deficits are in direct response to the worst financial crisis of our lifetime. The first stimulus bill was passed with Bush as president and with bipartisan support. Most Keynesian economists think the government should be doing more, not less, to goose the economy. Snapping the purse strings shut is viewed by Keynesian economists as a direct cause of the duration of the Great Depression and Japan's decade long slump in the 1990s.
>>>>
>>>>FYP ;)
>>>
>>>I don't pretend to understand that.
>>
>>Fixed Your Post
>
>Disagree on the second "cause" of second bolding ;-)
>
>Japans current debt level just does not really speak for snapped purse strings shut.
>If debt climbing from about average early nineties to nearly 200% of GDP
>is not [fruitless] Keynesian enough, what is ?

I was mistaken about Japan --

http://mises.org/daily/1099

Between 1992 and 1995, Japan tried six spending programs totaling 65.5 trillion yen and cut income tax rates during 1994. In January 1998, Japan temporarily cut taxes again by 2 trillion yen. Then, in April of that year, the government unveiled a fiscal stimulus package worth more than 16.7 trillion yen, almost half of which was for public works. Again, in November 1998, another fiscal stimulus package worth 23.9 trillion yen was announced. A year later (November 1999), yet another fiscal stimulus package of 18 trillion yen was tried. Finally, in October 2000, Japan announced yet another fiscal stimulus package of 11 trillion yen. Overall during the 1990s, Japan tried 10 fiscal stimulus packages totaling more than 100 trillion yen, and each failed to cure the recession. What the spending programs have done, however, is put Japan's government in poor fiscal shape.