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'''''A Program for Monetary Reform''''' iswas a July 1939 first draft proposal to repair and rebuildreturn the American economiceconomy systemto full employment following the [[Great Depression]]. whichIt beganwas withwritten thein sudden,1939 devastatingby collapsea group of USacademic [[stock market]] prices on October 29, 1929, known as [[Black Tuesday]]economists and aftercirculated apparent recovery inwithin the mid-1930sacademic was followed by the [[Recession of 1937-1938]]community.
==Background==
A Program for Monetary Reform (1939) was never published. A copy of the paper were apparently preserved in a college library.{{citation needed|date=November 2012}} Copies of the paper, stamped on the bottom of the first and last pages, “LIBRARY - COLORADO STATE COLLEGE OF A. & M. A. - FORT COLLINS COLORADO” were circulated at the 5th Annual [[American Monetary Institute]] Monetary Reform Conference (2009) and the images were scanned for display on the internet.[http://home.comcast.net/~zthustra/pdf/a_program_for_monetary_reform.pdf]
Widely distributed among academic economists, the draft proposal for A Program for Monetary Reform (1939) was never published and did not lead to legislation. Some copies of the program found their way into university and college libraries or private collections.{{citation needed|date=November 2012}}
Ronnie J. Phillips, then a Professor of Economics at [[Colorado State University]], referenced the draft proposal in his book, ''The Chicago Plan & New Deal Banking Reform'' (1995). Phillips is currently a Senior Fellow at the [[Indiana State University#Colleges and school|NetWorks Financial Institute]] at Indiana State University. <ref>Ronnie J. Phillips website [http://www.ronniejphillips.com/RJPHomepage/Ronnie_J._Phillips.html]</ref>
Copies of the draft proposal stamped on the bottom of the first and last page, “LIBRARY - COLORADO STATE COLLEGE OF A. & M. A. - FORT COLLINS COLORADO” surfaced at the 5th Annual [[American Monetary Institute]] Monetary Reform Conference (2009) and one was acquired for the Kettle Pond Institute by cofounder Pete Young. With the help of <!-- Betsy -->Jane Clary, Professor of Economics at the [[College of Charleston]]<!-- http://sb.cofc.edu/academicdepartments/economics/faculty/clary-jane.php -->, the images were scanned for display on the institute's web site.<ref>
http://www.economicstability.org/history/a-program-for-monetary-reform-the-1939-document</ref>
==Authors==
''A Program for Monetary Reform'' was coauthoredattributed byon its cover page to six USAmerican economists: [[Paul H. Douglas]], [[Irving Fisher]], [[Frank D. Graham]], [[Earl J. Hamilton]], Wilford I. King, and Charles R. Whittlesey.
===Paul H. Douglas===
{{Main|Paul H. Douglas}}
<!-- Paul Howard Douglas -->
Paul H. Douglas (1892–1976)<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.newschool.edu/nssr/het/profiles/douglas.htm |title=Paul H. Douglas, 1892-1976 |publisher=The New School}}</ref> was an American economist and politician. He earned a PhD in economics from [[Columbia University]] in 1921. Together with the mathematician [[Charles Cobb (economist)|Charles W. Cobb]], he developed the [[Cobb-Douglas]] [[production function]] (1928). He authored ''Real Wages in the United States, 1890-1996'' (1930), ''The Theory of Wages'' (1934) and ''Social Security in the United States'' (1936; 2nd ed. 1939). Douglas was a professor of economics at the [[University of Chicago]] when he coauthored ''A Program for Monetary Reform'' (1939).
He later went into politics and was elected to the [[United States Senate]] where he served from 1948 until 1966. Douglas had a reputation of being an unconventional liberal; he passionately supported [[civil rights]] but was equally concerned about fiscal discipline. He was best known for his support of [[environmental protection]], [[public housing]], and [[truth in lending]] laws. While serving in the Senate, Douglas authored the [[Consumer Credit Protection Act]] and ''Ethics in Government'' (1952). After leaving the Senate, he held a position at [[The New School]] for Social Research.
===Irving Fisher===
{{Main|Irving Fisher}}
Irving Fisher (1867–1947)<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.newschool.edu/nssr/het/profiles/fisher.htm |title=Irving Fisher, 1867-1947 |publisher=The New School}}</ref> was a celebrated American economist and [[Yale University]] professor of economics who is best known for his work on the [[quantity theory of money]]. Fisher was a true celebrity and one of the major influences on [[Milton Friedman]]'s [[monetarism]]. Friedman called Fisher "the greatest economist the United States has ever produced."<ref>{{Cite book|last=Friedman |first=Milton |title=Money Mischief: Episodes in Monetary History |publisher=Houghton Mifflin Harcourt |year=1994 |pages=37 |isbn=0-15-661930-X}}</ref> The [[Fisher equation]], the [[Fisher hypothesis]], the [[international Fisher effect]], and the [[Fisher separation theorem]] are all concepts named after him.
The stock market crash of 1929 and the subsequent depression cost Fisher much of his personal wealth and academic reputation. He famously predicted, a few days before the crash, "Stock prices have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau." Irving Fisher stated on October 21 that the market was "only shaking out of the lunatic fringe" and went on to explain why he felt the prices still had not caught up with their real value and should go much higher. On Wednesday, October 23, he announced in a banker’s meeting “security values in most instances were not inflated.” For months after the October 29 crash, he continued to assure investors that a recovery was just around the corner. Fisher was so discredited by his 1929 pronouncements and by the failure of a firm he had started that few people took notice of his debt-deflation analysis of the depression.
Fisher believed that deflation was the principal cause of the disastrous cascading insolvencies then plaguing the American economy. He said that deflation had increased the real value of debts fixed in dollar terms. Fisher was also convinced that unemployment was linked to the unstable buying power of the dollar. Fisher's influence as a coauthor is apparent in ''A Program for Monetary Reform'' (1939). Today, his views on debt-deflation as the cause of periodic recessions, depressions and unemployment are getting new attention.
===Frank D. Graham===
{{Main|Frank D. Graham (economist)}}
<!-- Frank Dunstone Graham -->
Frank D. Graham (1890–1949)<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.newschool.edu/nssr/het/profiles/fgraham.htm |title=Frank D. Graham, 1890-1949 |publisher=The New School}}</ref> was an American economist and [[Princeton University]] professor of economics whose early papers influenced theories on international trade and [[General equilibrium theory|general equilibrium]]. He coauthored ''A Program for Monetary Reform'' (1930) opposing the [[gold standard]]. Graham supported a [[market basket]] standard for currency which he believed would lead to [[full employment]]. His theories are brought together in ''Social Goals and Economic Institutions'' (1948).
===Earl J. Hamilton===
{{Main|Earl J. Hamilton}}
<!-- Earl Jefferson Hamilton -->
Earl J. Hamilton (1899–1989)<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/economists/hamilton/ |title=Earl J. Hamilton Papers on the Economic History of Spain 1351-1830 |publisher=Duke University}}</ref> was an American economist and economic historian. He authored ''American Treasure and the Price Revolution in Spain, 1501-1650'' (1934) and ''Money, prices and wages in Valencia, Aragon and Navarre, 1351-1500'' (1936). He was a professor of economics at [[Duke University]] (1927–1944) when he coauthored ''A Program for Monetary Reform'' (1939). He was later a professor of economics at [[Northwestern University]] (1944–1947) and the [[University of Chicago]] (1947–1967), and was Distinguished Professor of Economic History at the [[State University of New York at Binghamton]] (1966–1969). He authored ''War and Prices in Spain, 1651-1800'' (1947), served as editor of the ''[[Journal of Political Economy]]'' (7 years) and was the president of the [[Economic History Association]] (1951 to 1952).
===Willford I. King===
{{Main|Willford I. King}}
<!-- Willford Isbell King -->
Willford I. King (1880–1962)<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://nwda-db.wsulibs.wsu.edu/findaid/ark:/80444/xv64995 |title=Guide to the Wilford I. King Papers, 1912-1962 |publisher=The Northwest Digital Archives (NWDA)}}</ref> was a noted American statistician and economist. As a boy, he attended a [[one-room school]] in rural Nebraska. He attended and graduated from the [[University of Nebraska]] (1905) before receiving his PhD in Philosophy from the [[University of Wisconsin-Madison]] (1913). King moved to [[Washington, D.C.]] and became a statistician with the [[United States Public Health Service]] (1917–1920) and then an economist with the [[National Bureau of Economic Research]] (1920–1927).
He left public service to become a professor of economics at [[New York University]] (1927–1945). It was at this time that King coauthored ''A Program for Monetary Reform'' (1939). He opposed the [[New Deal]], instead advocating a sliding scale of wages based on production, currency expansion, and the reduction of taxes and regulations. He founded the [[Committee on Economic Accord]] (1933) and, after he retired, became chairman of the [[Committee for Constitutional Government]], which sought to "uphold Constitutional principles and our system of free enterprise."
===Charles R. Whittlesey===
{{Main|Charles R. Whittlesey}}
<!--Charles Raymond Whittlesey-->
Charles R. Whittlesey (1900–1979) was an American economist and [[Princeton University]] professor of economics.
==Historical Significance==
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