The Economic Policies of President Eisenhower

In November of 1952 General Dwight D. Eisenhower was elected to the office of

President of the United States. It was the first time a Republican was elected since

Herbert Hoover in 1928. The Eisenhower administration started at a rather awkward time, both politically and economically. First of all there was a war on. The Korean War had begun in June of 1950 and was still waging. As was usual for wartime the country was economically prosperous. However, the war had caused President Truman to abandon his former restraints on government spending. The amount of money being spent on defense skyrocketed to supply the troops in Korea with the supplies they needed.

This caused the federal deficit to increase dramatically (Pach and Richardson, 53).

Another legacy leftover from the Truman days was that of the Fair Deal domestic program. Although Truman found much opposition to his programs in Congress he managed to get several things done. Such as a public housing bill, an expansion of social security coverage, and increased minimum wages. The Republican party was not in favor of the majority of this legislation. Thus when Eisenhower was elected they immediately made plans for cutbacks in the spending on these programs. Unfortunately for them the newly elected president was not opposed to the programs Truman had began and improved upon. Over the course of his administration Eisenhower often did not hold the same opinions as some of the members of his party.

As the Chief Economic advisor to the President of the United States there are many different issues which I must consider. These issues are both large and small, foreign and domestic, and affect the upper, middle, and lower classes. At this point in time there are several important concerns which I have. The Korean War is ending and this is going to have a profound affect on the economy of the United States. During the war the country was prosperous but afterward there is always a high risk of increased inflation and an increase in unemployment. These conditions have the ability to cause a recession. Now that an armistice has been reached in Korea, a recession is beginning to occur (Pach and Richardson, 54).

I believe that the President’s chief concern should not be to make an immediate and fast acting restoration of the...

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... during the fifties. The country needed a strong military to compete with the Soviet Union, a strong government to legislate, and a strong economy to back it all up. The policies I helped to implement were the ones that met the needs of the times. After a war a nation needs stability and my policies and programs provided this stability which allowed the United States to adequately recover from World War II and the Korean War so that the country would be able to fight future battles.

Works Cited List

Albertson, Dean. Eisenhower As President. New York: Hill and Wang, 1963

Ambrose, Stephen E. Eisenhower. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1970

Bonker, Don. America’s Trade Crisis. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1988

Branyan, Robert L., Larsen, Lawrence H. The Eisenhower Administration 1953-1961.

New York: Random House, 1971

Melanson, Richard A., Mayers, David. Reevaluating Eisenhower American Foreign

Policy in the 1950s. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1987

Pach, Chester J. Jr., Richardson, Elmo. The Presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 1991