The Cold War is a proxy war that is said to be the root cause of a triumph of capitalism over communism. This geo-political conflict between the United States and The Soviet Union lasted a total of about fort-five years and ended with major economic impacts in both countries. During the Cold War, the Americans took it upon themselves to try and boost the United State’s economy. During President Reagan’s term, he went through with numerous tax cuts and deregulation in order to stimulate the economic growth. Many people believed, “due to the advantageous economic position that the US held in the beginning of the war and continued to have throughout that the US was destined to victory from the outset” (The U.S. Victory in the Cold War). During …show more content…
As we mobilized troops in Vietnam, “After 1965 the Vietnam War buildup carried real defense purchases to a mobilization peak in 1968, up by more than one-third” (The Cold War Economy Higgs). Through evidence, it is seen that before the major wars during this time period, mobilization and military spending was relatively low and it was only when troops were required for war did the spending reach its peak. At these times, the American economy would have been on a down-turn and into a recession. This would mostly be due to the government’s focus on defense and the protection of the nation rather than focus on areas like interstate development. The Paris Peace Agreement, which drew back all United States troops from Vietnam, was the ultimate cause of the drop in military spending and a slight upward turn to the U.S. economy. Additionally, during the arms race with the Soviet Union, the Reagan administration showed that, “While defense spending doubled in the first Reagan administration, so also did the nation’s national debt…over US$700 billion.” Most of this was in large due to the defense spending during the 1980s. In addition, due to this rapid inflow of money into new defense mechanisms such as buying new weapons, many felt like the spending was not worth it. This is largely because previous presidents such as Carter and Nixon had also spent money on buying weapons and still had around the same number of weapons purchased as Reagan did (Mysteries of the Cold War-
Though Reagan and Bush found tax cuts effective for the economy, the budget deficit continues to rise. As President Ronald Reagan takes office in 1981, he proposed tax cuts and reduced non-defense expenditures to increase military spending to Congress. Reagan believed that tax cuts would create more job opportunities for people and increase tax revenue in the long run. Lee et al. (2012) found “The tax cuts adopted in 1997, unlike those of 1981, were accompanied by offsetting expenditure reductions, so there was not as much of a reduction in federal revenue… therefore federal revenues did not increase” (Public Budgeting Systems, p. 74).
The huge deficiencies of the 1980s maintained the second-longest time of nonstop peacetime extension since World War II, yet that flourishing was traded off by the shortfalls that future eras will need to pay for. Congress was somewhat to fault for the shortages, but since optional spending represents one and only fourth of the financial backing, Reagan's tax reductions and extensive military increments were the significant reason for the shortfalls. Reagan's tax reductions for the prosperous and spending cuts that fell vigorously on the poor expanded financial
Inflation remained high, and imports dramatically outnumbered exports. However, the economy stabilized in 1983 and continued to grow through the remainder of Reagan’s presidency. Unfortunately, Reagan’s plan cost the federal government trillions as increased military spending hugely outweighed tax revenue. The President had hoped to balance military expenses by cutting social programs, but ran into trouble as he was reluctant to cut such programs and Medicare and Social Security. Under Reagan, the national debt ballooned from one to three trillion dollars (although Republicans blamed Congress’s failure to pass a balanced budget, not Reaganomics, for the increased debt) and the deficit skyrocketed.
The Cold War was an icy rivalry that developed between the United States and the Soviet Union after World War II. This rivalry first developed because the two conflicting nations had different ideas of successful economies. The United States believed that capitalism, in which private owners control trade and industry was more efficient than Communism, in which the state or government control trade and industry. In addition, many of the events that occurred at The Yalta Conference played a significant role in the cause of this era of competition that lasted from 1947 to 1991. At Yalta, Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin agreed that Poland’s government would include members of the pre-war Polish government and that free elections would be held
American war and economics have a long history together from the over taxation during the revolutionary war to WWII’s munitions manufacturing and railroad boom, economics played a role in almost every American war, including the Civil War. The Civil War tore the nation apart, pitching brother against brother, North versus South over the critical issue of slavery. Despite excellent military strategy and battle ethics that the South possessed, it was ultimately the North’s economic superiority that won the war. This is observed in the fact that cotton is not king, Northern industry and capitalism faced off against Southern agriculture and socialism, and the power of railroads.
Ronald Reagan said, “ So far dentetes been a one-way street that the soviet union has pursued at their own times….” Ronald Reagan was certain that the Soviet Union was not as powerful as they have said they were. The Soviet Union government could not successfully meet meet up to the America’s free-market system. So the ideas were steadily flowing and started taking place, he commenced a fast, large increase in the mass and grade of America's military technology and overbearing amount of weapons and taunted and the soviets to get them to match it.
The production capability of the U.S. has been quite strained during the war time since the requirement of weapons and other machines are high. This caused an unbalanced productivity between daily consumer goods and military equipments. The government’s non-profit input decreased dollar’s value and finally lead to an inflation. The inflation began to rise from 1969 and kept increasing through out the war. American families’ life became
Sarah Paroya D period I hate MUSH The end of World War II should have marked a period of relief in America but instead, it lead America into a completely different type of war called the Cold War. The Cold War was an ongoing state of political and military tension between the United States and the Soviet Union. This constant state of tension and fear had been embedded deep in the American public.
On November 1st, 1955, a country divided into two, North and South Vietnam will soon have a war known to many countries around the world. The Vietnam War, or the Second Indochina War occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia. At the time, Vietnam had a dispute on what the country should be, Communistic or Republic, which had led war breaking out. North as the Viet Cong group while the Republic Of Vietnam group was South; eventually unexpected events started to unfold, leading towards the end of the war. To this very day, The Vietnam War has changed the ways how many civilians live their lives, especially my family.
The United States economy was in disarray, suffering after the 1979 energy crisis. Due to high unemployment and inflation, many Americans had lost faith in the government and the nation as a whole. When Reagan took office in 1981, the recession and this “national malaise” were already about a year old. However, many people faulted him for America’s poor condition. Immediately, he addressed the declining economy, introducing many new policies that came to be known as “Reaganomics.”
From Statistics provided by the Department of Commerce from the years of 1949 to 1959, a steady increase is seen in the GNP, which shows the nation’s overall wealth (Document G). These numbers suggest the economy booming soon after the war, meaning that even during the recession of 1953 people had money enough and steady jobs to support their lifestyles. This was done during Eisenhower’s Administration, and the statistics show that the tactics he chose to increase the GNP worked, as it went up almost $500 in 10 years. Though the GNP went up, the government also spent much more money than previously, even on things such as the Interstate and Highway System. This system was put in place as a defense mechanism in June 1956, and was widely recognized across the nation as a grand idea to pull the nation back together.
Ronald Reagan was an influential leader due to his actions in the Cold War, his stance on international peace, and his impact on the US economy. Between 1981 and 1989, Ronald Reagan was a major force in creating a peaceful end to the Cold War. The military spending policies of the Reagan-Bush years forced the Soviets to the brink of economic collapse (Jim Woods). This was beneficial to ending the Cold War because the Soviets could not afford to move resources, Nuclear Missiles, into firing positions.
The USSR’s GNP (Gross National Product) was significantly lower than the United States, but the USSR still spent over thirty billion more dollars on their military program. The Soviet Union had more of everything, besides money. The military was known as the “Red Army,” and they had more troops, tanks, artillery guns, and nuclear weapons than any other nation on the planet. In Document E, Time Magazine compares the USSR’s Nuclear Arsenal to that of the United States, and its more than double the size. The USSR went to extreme lengths to have the most powerful army in the world, yet it greatly damaged their economy years before it collapsed.
The tax cut and increased defense spending increased the federal deficit. Increased spending for welfare programs and unemployment compensation, both of which were induced by the plunge in real GDP in the early 1980s, contributed to the deficit as well. As deficits continued to rise, they began to dominate discussions of fiscal policy. The events of the 1980s do not suggest that either monetarist or new classical ideas should be abandoned, but those events certainly raised doubts about relying solely on these approaches. Reducing the deficit dominated much of fiscal policy discussion during the 1980s and 1990s.