What is the worst thing that could happen to a county other than war? There are many things that might happen to a certain country that might destroy it and have negative impact on the people who live in that country. Its heartbreaking witnessing the faces of pitiful young kids, and people who were at the front of the closed banks that had their money. Unfortunately, these incidents were just small things that had happened during that time. People who lived in that era explained that what happened to them in details. People couldnt find food to eat and others would stay for long hours just to get bread to feed their family. This was a common thing for people who lived in all the states, it was one of the worst economic problems that Unite States faced at the time. Everything started after the stock market crashed on october 1920, which led people to panic. There were many things that led to the stock market crashed, there was decrease in purchasing properties or even anything. Reduction in Purchasing Across the Board With the stock market crash and the fears of further economic problems, individuals from all classes stopped purchasing items. This then led to a reduction in the number of items produced and a reduction in the workforce. Also the United States economic policy with world countries changed. Drought Conditions, While not a direct cause of the Great Depression, the drought that occurred in the Mississippi Valley in 1930 was of such proportions that many could not even pay their taxes or other debts and had to sell their farms for no profit to themselves. The New Deal that Franklin Roosevelt passed many things were not going to be accomplished with that law, but still it did have minor effect on somethings.
For history events there will always significant that stands out and make the event memorable. The Great Depression started when the stock market crashed on Black Tuesday, October 29, 1929. Before that incident and with all the problems that happened the stock market was going well and people were not having any kind of issues. People were investing a lot of money and buying stocks. The profit was made basically in a simple way. People bought the stocks from credit and then when they earn the money they would pay it back in full and that would be easy way to make money. People from all kind of classes were damaged by what happened when the stock market crashed. What happened changed the financial market of the US and it was called to be major damage to the country and that was huge factor that caused the Great Depression. Unemployment had risen from 3 percent to 25 percent of the nation’s workforce. Wages for those who still had jobs fell 42 percent.
In the 1920,s people had changed their mind on buying products, before they would buy stuff using credit and pay the whole amount after what happen, now they begin to pay in installments. Not only the people in the city were affected but many farmers lost their farms, At the same time of the years of overcultivation and a drought created the Dust Bowl in the Midwest. It ended agriculture in a previously fertile region. Thousands of these farmers and other unemployed workers ended up living as homeless, because there was not much to do. Furthermore, these people lost everything they have and that's the most terrible thing could happen to us as human being, because these poor people have to start from the nothing and try to build what they lost which seems to be impassable at the time.
There is no better way to understand history than to read personal experiences from the past. To better understand the hardships faced during the Great Depression, is to see what some people had to deal with during that time. In the Pennsylvania coal fields, three or four families crowded together in one room shacks and lived on wild weeds. In Arkansas, families were found inhabiting caves. In Oakland, California, whole families lived in sewer pipes. Vagrancy shot up as many families were evicted from their homes for nonpayment of rent. All these cities were damaged by what happened in the country and that is small damage if we consider the big picture and see what these people had to deal with and suffer from all the terrible things that they faced. The wealthy tended to save money that might have been put back into the economy if it were spread among the middle and lower classes.
People in middle class had already stretched their debt by purchasing automobiles and household appliances on installment plans. At the time, installment plans seemed to be good solution for some people but later on it started to make hug mess for people. There were fundamental structural weaknesses or key factors for the United States economic system at the time. Banks operated without guarantees to their customers, and that created hug panic for people when it was time for the stocks to crash. Also the banks lent money to their customers without any consideration if these people can pay the money back or if they are financially stable. Just like I mentioned earlier, agricultural prices had already been low during 1920’s leaving farmers unable to make any profit or even recover from all that.
During this hard time for most Americans, president Hoover was inaugurated. Unfortunately, he ran for president for bad time and it was changing for him to start everything and put America back on track. Also his approach on the government intervention mad little impact on the economy. The economy shrank with each year during Hoover's presidency. The middle class was completely damaged and it became one of the most nation's poorest people in europe. The Great Depression was known as the deepest and longest lasting economic downturn in the history of the Western industrialized world. At that time these news sent the wall street into panic and wiped out millions of investors that were there for long period of time. Over the next few years, consumer spending and investment dropped, casing steep declines in industrial output in the whole country. Companies couldn’t keep up with all that so they had no choice but to lay of most of their workers.
By 19933, when the Great Depression reached its bottom rock, 13 to 15 million Americans were unemployed and nearly half of the country’s banks and companies had failed. Many banks had closed their doors by 1933 and that made major panics for the people and the government. Hoover’s administration was in the face of this dire situation, his administration tried supporting failing banks and other institution with the government loans. The idea behind these loans was that, banks in turn would loan to businesses, which would be able to hire back some of the employees that lost their jobs. Farmers seeked for ideas also, but the only thing they could do at the time was to get loans from the banks and use that money to buy more lands. Across the whole country, people were desperate to just find a way out of this bad dream that most Americans had to deal with.
Farmers and people who worked outside urban areas were late on payments and some couldn’t even pay the mortgages. In the cities the situation was way worse, because a lot of people were out of work, and that what caused these people to go crazy. These middle class workers were really in need of their jobs because how could they pay the rent and their loans. All these problems that the people faced and the banks involved. The banks seemed to make really poor investments and decisions to help the people and their workers. People didn't have insurance for the money that they had put in the bank and when the bank closed many people lost their cavings once the bank didn't have money. People started giving up on the whole entire banking systems because there was no hope for them to get their savings back. One of the major causes that the Great Depression was dealing with was that the banks failed to help the economy to get back to its feet and unfortunately, it did the opposite instead of helping the United States’s economy it made more damage to it.
A 13-year-old boy Living in Dows, Iowa in a farm land,
“The happy days I had spent in my home, were real good days until one sad day the factory or mill in which my father had worked gave a notice that their factory would only operate three days a week. My father came home that day planning of what to do, because of the notice given him and the employees of the factory. As the days passed one after another my father was still at his plan thinking of where he could get a better position to support our family…
My little sister and I tried to help my father in a way which we thought best. My little sister thought of helping the lady next door by taking care of the lady's baby while the lady went shopping. Thus she earned fifty cents. I tried to help my father by having a paper route after school hours. Thus I received my salary of one dollar and fifty cents per week. My little sister and I gave our salary to my father in order to help him and keep our home that we loved since we were very young. But now the factory only operated two days a week and our salary of two dollars a week wouldn't help my father any in buying our clothing and food.”
This story is just there are no words to put into to explain what these kids had to go through in order for them to help their families, it's just heartbreaking story to see kids that are supposed to play, study and enjoy their lives but instead they work and worry if they have food on the table or clothes that they have to wear during winter.
The Depression had a powerful impact on family life not just the kids. It forced couples to delay marriage and drove the birthrate below the replacement level for the first time in American history. The divorce rate fell, for the simple reason that many couples could not afford to maintain separate households or pay legal fees. But rates of desertion soared. By 1940, 1.5 million married women were living apart from their husbands. More than 200,000 vagrant children wandered the country as a result of the breakup of their families. These facts made huge impact on the children that were living at this time, and to be honest no one would wish to be born at this time where the country is falling apart and no jobs at all. Families were destroyed because they would no longer be able to support the house financially. The the young kids would pay the price for the mess that happened. The Depression left an invisible scar on those who lived through it, including the women that lived during that time. Forced to take on even more important roles in their homes and families, women played often unrecognized roles in helping the country through the Great Depression.
The roles that the women played during Great Depression was important, because these women were helping the family to be together and stay strong. Furthermore, some of the women would even work at home to try to earn some money to help her husband to pay bills and loans that they had from the banks. In other words, the country could never have survived the crisis without women’s contributions to their society and their homes. Some of these women said that, “We didn’t go hungry, but we lived lean.” That expression sums up the experiences of many American families during the 1930s, they avoided cruel privation but still struggled to get by.
The typical woman in the 1930s had a husband who was still employed, although he had probably taken a pay cut to keep his job, if the man lost his job, the family often had enough resources to survive without going on relief or losing all its possessions.
The effect was not only in the United States, but what happened in the economic it changed the way America operated with the world. In the 1932, American industry was running low, the government was trying to help and do something that change things and turn them around. Hoover and his administration wanted to fix things by signing the Smoot Hawley Act. The purpose of this act was to raise tariffs from 38 to 49 percent. People knew that the act was bad idea to the economy and it make things harder than ever before. With the act a lot of things were getting expense and that made the foreign countries to back up with their instruments and plants that they wanted to do. After that foreign countries couldn’t buy products from United States unless they have permit to sell. The countries didn't have no choice but to raise tariffs on American export. The stuff that was left and no one could buy them not even the people in US couldn’t after the percentage went high no could afford to pay.
President Hoover and his administration made huge impact by singing the act and that was one of the fundamental factors that created the Great Depression. The president should have listened to the people that told him the act will bring the county back and it won't help the economy in any way. After that unemployment increased even more than ever before, because businesses had to close and layof people and that made more destruction to the country. The act and economic policy with the foreign countries was one more reason to push the whole country deeper in the depression.
Luck is one of the most important things in life, some people don't believe in luck others do so. During the Great Depression there was huge drought that hit some parts of the US.
The Dust Bowl occurred during the Great Depression. During it, dust blew everywhere uncontrollably throughout northern Texas, southwestern Oklahoma, and Kansas. A lot of these people moved to California away from the dust and hopes of a better life. Living during the Dust Bowl was harsh and people couldn’t even eat because the dust would cover their food. People suffered not only from the Great Depression, and also lived with tons of dirt, covering everyone and people who lived in these states couldn’t even do their jobs anymore and most of them were farmers. Almost everyone covered the bottoms of their windows and doors with cloths to keep out dirt, but dust still flew in. It was a very horrible life for those who lived the Dust Bowl.
People couldn’t believe what was going on, so many terrible things have happened during that time and most people want a fast way out of the mess that damaged most of the country financially. In 1932 Franklin D. Roosevelt won the presidential election and he proposed a famous quote, “ the only thing we have to fear is fear itself “ By saying this, FDR was telling the American people that their fear was making things worse, because these people let their fear control them and when that happens, they will make really poor decisions that would make things worst than they are now. FDR shut down the bank system for few days and made them reopen again and that plan succeed because people now started to trust and bring back some of the money they had to the bank. FDR was really successful figure at that time because he knew how to talk to people and make them understand. Also, he created Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, to protect the people who deposits money in the bank.
FDR wanted to make a huge change in US and he knew that wont be easy but he had to try do his best. New Deal program to the American people it was a package deal of relief, recovery, and reform. It was smart move from the president to do because this is what people wanted to see. The New Deal was projects from the government given to people to start their normal life back and have their jobs back again. Works Project Administration was one of the most import one because it give jobs to many people that really wanted to work and have degrees and skills. After that, there were early signs showing that the economy was getting better and people started to have faith. Many things have changed during the Great Depression, and during that time congress passed the Social Security Act, which was for the first time to provide Americans with unemployment, disability and pensions for old people.
Finally, to summarize the Great Depression was a period of suffering and going throwout difficult obstacles that change the future of Unite States for ever. Also there were many lesions that were learned from what the country had to face. Many things came to benefit the people and the country after all that suffering.