The Council's Cure

Northern Democrats called Dwight Eisenhower a doddering old conservative when, during the 1958 campaign, he declared that liberal Democrats were headlong "spenders." But last week, with the election and Democratic victory well in the bag, Washington was doing a double take at a liberal spending program that proved that Ike had been guilty of understatement.

Under examination was a manifesto issued by the liberal-dominated Democratic National Advisory Council (among the members: Adlai Stevenson, Harry Truman, New York's Governor Averell Harriman and ex-Senator Herbert Lehman). The council urged greatly expanded federal programs in social security, health, education, agriculture, public works and welfare, area redevelopment and urban renewal, did not attempt to put a price tag on the proposals. Virginia's economy-minded Senator Harry Flood Byrd--no member of the council--did. His estimate: $5 billion or $6 billion a year.

The Democratic Advisory Council could not have cared less, because it was operating on a theory--one often espoused by the British Labor Party and advocated in the U.S. by Leon Keyserling, chairman of President Truman's Council of Economic Advisers. Criticizing Republicans for allowing "persistent inflation," the Democratic Advisory Council manifesto said:

"The main key to effective inflation control is sustained full employment and full production, combined with truly competitive pricing." How should full employment and production be achieved? "Government expenditures, keyed to our vital needs and resource capabilities, are in themselves a key factor in maximum economic growth . . . It is elementary that a growing nation needs larger public as well as larger private expenditures, just as it costs more to support a family of five than it does a family of three."

In plainer language, the council's cure for inflation is to create more inflation--through Government spending.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.