The Halftime Show Between the Wars: The Depression

The Depression In groups of four, please answer the following questions about the Depression: What was the GDP of the US prior to the Depression? At the low point of the Depression, what was the GDP of the US? What was the highest annual unemployment level during the Depression? What was the cause(s) of the Depression? When did it end?

State of the Union President Coolidge, Dec 4, 1928: “No Congress of the United States ever assembled, on surveying the state of the Union, has met with a more pleasing prospect than that which appears at the present time.”

Depression A bad, depressingly prolonged RECESSION in economic activity. The textbook definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters of declining OUTPUT. A slump is where output falls by at least 10%; a depression is an even deeper and more prolonged slump. Source: Economics A-Z Economist.com

Stock Market Crash

Market Crash The market crash in 1929 “blighted the fortunes of many hundreds of thousands of Americans.” The Great Crash, 1929 page 302; John Kenneth Galbraith Although the stock market crash was a momentous event that wiped out the fortunes of many Americans …

Market Crash The stock market crash was not the cause of the Great Depression.

Indicators Total bank failures for 1929 were lower than the same statistic for 1924, 1926 or 1927. As of Nov 13, 1929 suicides in Manhattan for the previous 4 weeks were less than they had been the same time period in 1928. Source: The Forgotten Man by Amity Shales, page 88.

Industrial Production July, 1932: steel operations were at 12% of capacity. Pig iron output was at the lowest level since 1896. Source:, The Great Crash, 1929 by John Kenneth Galbraith

Causes of the Great Depression Federal Reserve Policy Deflation Excess Capacity

Causes of the Great Depression Increasing Tariffs (Smoot Hawley June 1930) Increasing Taxes Bank Failures: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EOzMdEwYmDU http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfP8__wl-_4

Banks and the Money Supply Bank Failures Cause the Great Depression

The Depression All of these factors led to consumers spending less and less, governments collecting less and less in taxes, and fewer and fewer people being employed. The depression spread from the United States to the rest of the world.

World Impact What is the potential impact of the US going into a significant economic downturn? On Germany? On Europe? On the debate between isolationism and intervention?

Depression Now What if your families income declined significantly? What would change in your life? What expenses would you cut? Work with a partner to complete the exercise on spending that I am handing out. You have 10-15 minutes to determine what you would cut in your budget to reduce your monthly spending from $5400 to $3000.

“Migrant Mother” Photographed by Dorothea Lange. March,1936 In a pea pickers camp, Nipomo, California.

Images of the Depression Describe the picture on the previous slide Include not only what you see, but emotions the picture creates.

Images The photograph that has become known as "Migrant Mother" is one of a series of photographs that Dorothea Lange made of Florence Owens Thompson and her children in February or March of 1936 in Nipomo, California.

Images Continued In 1960, Lange gave this account of the experience: “I saw and approached the hungry and desperate mother, as if drawn by a magnet. I do not remember how I explained my presence or my camera to her, but I do remember she asked me no questions…I did not ask her name or her history. She told me her age, that she was thirty-two. She said that they had been living on frozen vegetables from the surrounding fields, and birds that the children killed. She had just sold the tires from her car to buy food. There she sat in that lean- to tent with her children huddled around her, and seemed to know that my pictures might help her, and so she helped me. There was a sort of equality about it.” (From: Popular Photography, Feb. 1960).

Images of the Depression

Poem about Unemployment by Florence Converse What’s the meaning of this queue, Trailing down the avenue, Full of eyes that will not meet, The other eyes that throng the street… To see a living line of men As long as round the block, and then As long again?...” Source :The Forgotten Man, Amity Shales, page 123

Hard Times Unemployment · By the early 1930’s, approximately 25% of the nation was unemployed. Families in Crisis · Marriage and birth rates dropped. · Fathers and some children left home to find work. Homelessness · Homeless families build shacks out of wooden crates and scrap metal. · These shacks were known as Hoovervilles

Brother, Can You Spare a Dime? (1932) They used to tell me I was building a dream And so I followed the mob. When there was earth to plow or guns to bear, I was always there, right on the job. They used to tell me I was building a dream With peace and glory ahead -- Why should I be standing in line, just waiting for bread? Once I built a railroad, I made it run, Made it race against time. Once I built a railroad, now it's done -- Brother, can you spare a dime? Once I built a tower, up to the sun, brick and rivet and lime. Once I built a tower, now it's done -- Brother, can you spare a dime? Once in khaki suits, gee, we looked swell Full of that Yankee Doodle-de-dum. Half a million boots went slogging through hell, And I was the kid with the drum. Say, don't you remember they called me Al, It was Al all the time. Why don't you remember, I'm your pal -- Say, buddy, can you spare a dime? Once in khaki suits, ah, gee, we looked swell Full of that Yankee Doodle-de-dum. Half a million boots went slogging through hell, And I was the kid with the drum. Say, don't you remember they called me Al, It was Al all the time. Why don't you remember, I'm your pal -- Buddy, can you spare a dime?

Depression’s Misery 1929: $103.6 B 1930: $91.2 B 1931: $76.5 B Gross Domestic Product Gross Domestic Product 1929: $103.6 B 1930: $91.2 B 1931: $76.5 B 1932: $58.7 B 1933: $56.4 B 1934: $66.0 B 1935: $73.3 B 1936: $83.8 B 1937: $91.9 B 1938: $86.1 B 1939: $92.2 B 1940: $101.4 B 1941: $126.7 B 1942: $161.9 B

The Job Market

Images of the Depression

Jobless Recovery 1929: 3.2% 1930: 8.9% 1931: 16.3% 1932: 24.1% US Unemployment Rate US Unemployment Rate 1929: 3.2% 1930: 8.9% 1931: 16.3% 1932: 24.1% 1933: 24.9% 1934: 21.7% 1935: 20.1% 1936: 16.9% 1937: 14.3% 1938: 19.0% 1939: 17.2%

Government’s Help 1929: $9.4 B 1930: $10.0 B 1931: $9.9 B 1932: $8.7 B Government Expenditures Government Expenditures 1929: $9.4 B 1930: $10.0 B 1931: $9.9 B 1932: $8.7 B 1933: $8.7 B 1934: $10.5 B 1935: $10.9 B 1936: $13.1 B 1937: $12.8 B 1938: $13.8 B 1939: $14.8 B 1940: $15.0 B 1941: $26.5 B 1942: $62.7 B

The Great Depression The Great Depression Statistics

Images of the Depression

Images of the Depression

How Did The Depression End World War II-Employment for men and women World War II-Need for goods and services FDIC-Insurance on banks New Deal-Roosevelt policies to help people Increasing Money Supply