What FDR faced when he took the oath of office

"In 1933, the United States economy had shrunk by one-third in real terms since 1929. Industrial production had fallen by 40 percent. Unemployment had soared to 25 percent, from 3 percent in 1929."

FDR did not really understand or endorse Keynesian economics. "Yet despite New Deal programs and some aid to the states, total government spending — federal, state and local — as a share of the economy throughout the 1930s remained at just under 20 percent. (Today, total government spending is more than 35 percent, a larger buffer against weakness in the private sector.)" It took World War II for the Keynesian dictates to be put into practice: "By 1942, total government spending as a share of the economy rose to 52 percent, and peaked at nearly 70 percent in 1944, when unemployment fell to 1 percent."

From the New York Times, January 27, 2009