Best New Deal Program?

[Sumner 1868]

Which had the best effect?

[Okay, maybe Mike Johnson is a competent parliamentarian.]

I doubt anybody would vote for them, but you forgot the FDIC and SEC.

[Sumner 1868]

I doubt anybody would vote for them, but you forgot the FDIC and SEC.

Yes, your right.

[Sprouts Farmers Market ✘]

By far the TVA. I know I like to rag on the South, but it could've been even worse. Hard to imagine it without that.

[H. Ross Peron]

SS of course, though I have a soft spot for the WPA and New Deal-era art in general.

[TNF]

Social Security: Grossly underfunded then and now, exclusionary for all but a few then and still allows too many to fall through the cracks now. Has never provided anything close to a livable income for the elderly and is always on the chopping block because politicians don't seem to think that after a lifetime of exploitation the elderly worker deserves a break. Nevertheless a tremendous step forward that would never have happened had it not been for decades of organizing around the issue of retirement security. B+

Civilian Conservation Corps: Explicitly racist in terms of hiring, firing, and pay scales, which were poverty level wherever you were at in the country. Keeping wages as low as it did undermined union wage rates (thus bring wages down everywhere) and probably acted as a drag on the economy overall. It did however build a lot of nice things and put my great-grandfather to work during the Depression, so I'm going to have to at least give it a passing grade. C-

Tennessee Valley Authority: Literally brought electricity to the region that I grew up in, and with it man-made lakes that attracted industry and tourism that helped create the high(er)-wage, union-dense environment that I'm myself a product of. Plus it was the only significant attack on private enterprise engaged in by the New Deal, and should be imitated pretty much across the country. Power should not be in private hands. I voted for the TVA in the poll (again partially for personal reasons, as it employed my other great-grandfather after the war) for ideological reasons and because it's probably the only real program that came out of the New Deal that wasn't full of holes. A+

Public Works Administration: A more substantive CCC. I'll give it a C+.

Farm Credit Administration: Don't know.

National Recovery Administration: Proto-fascist garbage. F-

National Youth Administration: Another one of the better New Deal programs. B-

Works Progress Administration: See CCC/PWA. Arts programs give it enough of a boost to put it at B-.

Federal Energy Regulatory Administration: Don't know.

National Labor Relations Board: Literally designed to control the class struggle and weaken unions by hitching them to the state. Unfortunately subsequent generations of labor leaders have made the NLRB the be-all, end-all of labor relations in this country when organizing the rank-and-file and not giving away the right to strike in contract negotiations is the best way to maintain workers' power. F-

Agricultural Adjustment Administration: "Let's just burn crops while people are starving!" Let's not. F-

Public Works of Art Project: Don't know.

United States Housing Authority: Don't know.

[Grumpier Than Thou]

Social security and TVA did the most good.

[Antonio the Sixth]

The one that continues to keep tens of millions of Americans out of poverty, of course.

[Marokai Backbeat]

The one that continues to keep tens of millions of Americans out of poverty, of course.

[nolesfan2011]

The WPA, they gave people dignity with jobs and built things that still stand today

[ElectionsGuy]

TVA, the one that was definitely needed.