" later paper, which I wrote with Princeton historian Harold James, supported my interpretation of the Depression in an international context. We looked at the experience of twenty-two countries during the Depression and found, basically, that two factors dictated the severity of the economic downturn in each country. The first was the length of time the country stuck with the gold standard. (Countries that abandoned gold earlier were able to allow their money supplies to grow and thereby escape deflation.) That finding was in keeping with Friedman and Schwartz’s emphasis on the money supply. The second factor was the severity of the country’s banking crisis, consistent with my view of the importance of credit as well as money. "

― Ben S. Bernanke , The Courage to Act: A Memoir of a Crisis and Its Aftermath