To stick to the present situation would be something like a man who was observed in Times Square looking earnestly along the pavement. He was asked what he was looking for. He said "I lost my watch."

Larger deficits are necessary and proper means to mitigate unemployment as the far greater evil in terms of human welfare.

Deficits do not in themselves produce inflation, nor does a balanced budget assure a stable price level.

There is no real justification for a requirement that a budget of any sort should be balanced, except as a rallying point for those who seek to hamstring government.

The nominal budget is a poor indicator of the impact of government outlays and revenues.

Balancing a nominal budget will solve nothing, and attempting to achieve such a spurious balance will produce much mischief.

... often analysis seems to be based on the assumption that future economic output is almost entirely determined by inexorable economic forces independently of government policy so that devoting more resources to one use inevitably detracts from availability for another.