This history of theories and theorists of economic growth elucidates the economic theory, economic history, and public policy observations of the renowned scholar W. W. Rostow. Looking at the economic growth theories of the classic economists up to 1870, Rostow compares Hume and Adam Smith, Malthus and Ricardo, and J.S. Mill and Karl Marx. He then examines the period 1870-1939 and its economic theorists, including Schumpeter, Colin Clark, Kuznets, and Harrod, and surveys the three forms of growth analysis in the postwar era: formal models, statistical morphology, and development theories. This authoritative overview also includes an agenda of unresolved problems in growth analysis and a description of the five major tasks statesmen will confront over the next several generations.
The Federal Reserve system was designed, built and operated as an agency that forced its policies on American banks. The banks in turn had the power to push around the real economy. Now the Federal Reserve finds itself in a world where banks don’t matter as much. Markets set interest rates, markets determine liquidity and markets help or hinder the plans of businessmen. Markets are unpredictable, international and, worst of all, they have their own information systems that do not follow the rules of banking or bank supervision