Rugged individualism
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Rugged individualism is the phrase used often by Herbert Hoover during his time as president. It refers to the idea that each individual should be able to help themselves out, and that the government does not need to involve itself in people's economic lives nor in national economics in general. Hoover emphasized that rugged individualism was not laissez-faire, though many modern rugged individualists have ignored that. Hoover's idea of "rugged individualism" reflected his idea of how the federal government should not interfere with the American people during the Great Depression. Providing large-scale humanitarian efforts, Hoover feared, would injure "the initiative and enterprise of the American people." Rugged individualism may have come from a libertarian annoyance at the unprecedented government involvement with the economy during World War I.
When the Great Depression started, Hoover tried to use rugged individualism to end it, insisting that the problem would fix itself and that the government didn't need to interfere. Unfortunately, it did diddely-squat, and the economy continued to suffer.