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Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
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said once in my presence, “Mr. President, if we can ever get the income of the United States up to ninety billion dollars we've got nothing more to fear. We stuck down in the forties and fifties. That's why there's more out-go than income. But once we get the income up to ninety billion dollars we've got nothing more to fear, because then the taxation on that brings in enough to run the government and you get out of this dreadful budget situation. You can balance the budget then.”

Jones didn't think you could balance the budget in 1933, or '4, or '5. He knew that you had to get your income up. He was always harping that up. You should try to get the total income up and way you could. I don't think he broke it down into getting the per capita income up. I don't think he thought about that. An economist doesn't think about that, except when they think about purchasing power. Income in the places where it will be spent is, of course, more income. A dollar in circulation, if it goes to ten men, gets reported as ten dollars worth of income. So it goes without saying that the money must be spent. If it's just put away in the ground somewhere it doesn't do any good. Anyway, he was always harping on income. That's sound economics and its liberal economics.





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