Rus: I would definitely agree with that sentiment. I grew up in the SF/Bay Area, and my dad was an aerospace engineer with Ford Aerospace in Palo Alto working on defense projects (the IntelSat program). I mention the Bay Area because Silicon Valley’s dirty little secret was that defense dollars funded most of those “entrepreneurial” little start ups in the 1970s and early 1980s.
During the height of the Cold War, a good segment of both California’s (Southern and Northern) economies were dependent on defense spending. I would certainly opine that housing prices were driven by that reality, and given that Reagan spent the Russians into oblivion during the closing years of the Cold War, well, it would stand to reason that he bears a large amount of the responsibility.
It is something of a paradox in my mind, because I credit him for having the cojones to stare the Soviets down and ultimately put them out of business, but he did so at a very high price, both in terms of blood and treasure.
