Broken Window Fallacy And War

[Burke]

The French economist Frederic Bastiat wrote a parable exposing what is known as the "Broken Window Fallacy."

You can read about it here.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&s...hp.sxk1Hz00ILI

Can you see that the idea that going to war to put people back to work, as a way to get out of recessions and depressions, is just a massively larger example of that same fallacy? Basically, all the money spent killing people and destroying things could have been spent more productively. And you would not have lost 400,000 countrymen, as we did in WWII.

[MichiGator2002]

Well, certainly I don't think it is anything to do intentionally, but it can just kind of work out that way.

[MichaelJoeWilliamson]

There is a similar fallacy about the devastation from a hurricane. There are those that say a hurricane can help the building industry due to the necessity to rebuild. I think they are right. However, those that say a disaster like this helps the overall economy are just wrong. The economy as a whole suffers whenever there is great destruction, either from a natural disaster or a war.