[apsec112]

"World War 2 more than anything else forced the government to cut spending and pay off debt"

Yer what? US debt-to-GDP ratio in WWII was at an all-time record high, because they were busy paying for the whole war thing. War is extremely expensive. See this graph: http://www.preemptivekarma.com/archives/National-Debt-GDP.gi...

[jswinghammer]

After the war the US was forced to cut spending and pay back debt. The spending they had to cut were the New Deal programs that were holding back the economy from recovering.