Twenty Years of Wage and Price Controls

The Heritage Foundation sponsored a forum examining the effect of President Nixon’s wage and price controls on the economy and the country since they went into effect August 15, 1971. The wage and price control prohibited wage and price increases for a 90 day period in the United States, with the intention of creating stability in wages and prices. Participants in the forum argued over the results of the wage and price freeze, which Burton Pines said reduced America’s economic competitiveness and did not aid the economy. William Niskanen called the wage and price controls one of the grossest abuses of presidential power since World War II, despite the high public favor it enjoyed at its inception. He said the event marked another step in the erosion of public law in American economic life. close