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Did France Cause the Great Depression?

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  • Douglas A. Irwin

Abstract

The gold standard was a key factor behind the Great Depression, but why did it produce such an intense worldwide deflation and associated economic contraction? While the tightening of U.S. monetary policy in 1928 is often blamed for having initiated the downturn, France increased its share of world gold reserves from 7 percent to 27 percent between 1927 and 1932 and effectively sterilized most of this accumulation. This "gold hoarding" created an artificial shortage of reserves and put other countries under enormous deflationary pressure. Counterfactual simulations indicate that world prices would have increased slightly between 1929 and 1933, instead of declining calamitously, if the historical relationship between world gold reserves and world prices had continued. The results indicate that France was somewhat more to blame than the United States for the worldwide deflation of 1929-33. The deflation could have been avoided if central banks had simply maintained their 1928 cover ratios.

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  • Douglas A. Irwin, 2010. "Did France Cause the Great Depression?," NBER Working Papers 16350, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    • Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:16350
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    2. Richhild Moessner & William A. Allen, 2011. "Las crisis bancarias y el sistema monetario internacional en la Gran Depresión y en la actualidad," Revista de Economía Institucional, Universidad Externado de Colombia - Facultad de Economía, vol. 13(25), pages 43-87, July-Dece.
    3. Kevin H. O'Rourke & Alan M. Taylor, 2013. "Cross of Euros," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 27(3), pages 167-192, Summer.
    4. Jordà, Òscar & Schularick, Moritz & Taylor, Alan M., 2015. "Betting the house," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(S1), pages 2-18.
    5. Adam, Marc C. & Jansson, Walter, 2019. "Credit constraints and the propagation of the Great Depression in Germany," Discussion Papers 2019/12, Free University Berlin, School of Business & Economics.
    6. Patrice Baubeau & Eric Monnet & Angelo Riva & Stefano Ungaro, 2021. "Flight‐to‐safety and the credit crunch: a new history of the banking crises in France during the Great Depression," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 74(1), pages 223-250, February.
    7. David le Bris, 2018. "What is a market crash?," Economic History Review, Economic History Society, vol. 71(2), pages 480-505, May.
    8. Fratianni, Michele & Giri, Federico, 2017. "The tale of two great crises," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 5-31.
    9. Crafts, Nicholas, 2013. "Long-Term Growth in Europe: What Difference does the Crisis Make?," National Institute Economic Review, National Institute of Economic and Social Research, vol. 224, pages 14-28, May.
    10. Robert Shelburne, 2012. "Restoring Stability to Europe," ECE Discussion Papers Series 2012_3, UNECE.
    11. Nicholas Crafts, 2014. "What Does the 1930s' Experience Tell Us about the Future of the Eurozone?," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(4), pages 713-727, July.
    12. Nicholas Crafts & Peter Fearon, 2010. "Lessons from the 1930s Great Depression," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 26(3), pages 285-317, Autumn.
    13. Selgin, George & Lastrapes, William D. & White, Lawrence H., 2012. "Has the Fed been a failure?," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 569-596.
    14. Roger Vicquéry, 2022. "The Rise and Fall of Global Currencies over Two Centuries," Working papers 882, Banque de France.
    15. Bordo, Michael D., 2012. "Could the United States have had a better central bank? An historical counterfactual speculation," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 34(3), pages 597-607.
    16. Nicholas Crafts, 2016. "Reducing High Public Debt Ratios: Lessons from UK Experience," Fiscal Studies, Institute for Fiscal Studies, vol. 37, pages 201-223, June.
    17. Raphaël Hekimian & David Le Bris, 2016. "US Crashes of 2008 and 1929 How did the French market react? An empirical study," Working Papers hal-04141589, HAL.
    18. Raphael Hekimian & David Le Bris, 2016. "US Crashes of 2008 and 1929 How did the French market react? An empirical study," EconomiX Working Papers 2016-21, University of Paris Nanterre, EconomiX.
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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • E31 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Prices, Business Fluctuations, and Cycles - - - Price Level; Inflation; Deflation
    • E42 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Money and Interest Rates - - - Monetary Sytsems; Standards; Regimes; Government and the Monetary System
    • E5 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Monetary Policy, Central Banking, and the Supply of Money and Credit
    • N14 - Economic History - - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics; Industrial Structure; Growth; Fluctuations - - - Europe: 1913-

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