1. Revision – The Depression

2. The Depression 1929-39 29 October 1929 - Wall Street Crash.
Prior to the Depression, Britain was thriving on 'old industries'. However these survived on exports. After the Crash, demand for Britain's relatively expensive exports dropped.
Keys areas of British industry that suffered were Coal, Textiles, Iron and steel and Shipbuilding.
Large areas of Britain, particularly the northern towns and cities, were deeply affected by the Depression. However the South-east was enjoying the rewards of 'new industries' such as car manufacture.
Unemployment became massive and an emergency National Government, made up of a coalition of the main political parties, came together to sort out the crisis.
The National Government set up a variety of measures to take Britain through the Depression, mainly involving cutting spending and many felt that not enough was done to help the millions of unemployed.

3. These four actions made things worse:
Raising income tax- poor struggled even more
Cutting unemployment pay by 10 per cent
Introducing the means test- an assessment of people's belongings and worth as well as income, in order to allow them to receive benefits or the 'dole' as it was nicknamed. Very intrusive and unpopular
Scrapping Free Trade- adding import duties (tax) to goods from abroad meant that to buy foreign products was more expensive. So, British people started to buy British products and helped the economy
These four actions helped to end the Depression:
Came off the Gold Standard [Gold standard: Where the total currency in a country is equal in value to the amount of gold that the country owns. ] - this allowed the government to increase the amount of money in circulation BUT it also made British products expensive so foreign countries didn’t buy as much.
Reduced interest rates - this reduced people's debt payments and made more money available to spend, but also encouraged them to take out loans to spend more.
The Special Areas Act (1934) - This act involved the government offering grants to companies that moved to 'Special Areas' (areas that were suffering the worst) to help raise employment. However, unemployment only came down slowly because the new estates could not replace the 'old industries'.
Local councils built 500,000 council houses, which pumped money into the economy.

4. Some local authorities applied the Means Test more harshly than others
The Means Test 1932 The Means Test was very unpopular for a number of reasons:
Means Test was more about saving money than helping unemployed families
People hated having a Public Assistance Committee inspector go through their belongings and force them to sell items
Relatives were often forced to go an live somewhere else in order to receive more ‘dole’ each week
It was humiliating for families to have to reveal private information such as earnings, savings and the value of personal items
Some local authorities applied the Means Test more harshly than others
PAC inspectors would abuse their role by forcing families to sell them personal items for cheap or withhold their dole money
If the inspectors thought there was enough money in the house they could stop the dole money even without proof
The Means Test put great strain on families, especially of one of the older children who had a job was forced to pay more towards family funds by the PAC officer, leaving them with hardly anything
The National Unemployed Workers Movement (NUWM) organised mass protest marches, some of which resulted in violence (Rochdale). This gave working class protesters a bad name and meant that the Jarrow Crusade was unsuccessful.
George Orwell the author wrote about the Means Test and effect on living standards in his novel ‘Road to Wigan Pier’ 1937.

5. Effects Poverty and Diet-
families had less to spend so their diets led to malnutrition and a rise in diseases such as rickets (lack of Calcium) and scurvy (lack of vitamin C).
Infant mortality rate (number of infants dying) went up
Thousands were living below the Poverty Line.
Seebohm Rowntree (son of the chocolate and sweet maker) found in some research that 30% of the population of York lived below the poverty line
There was a big divide between rich and poor and this was normally seen between the north (poor) and south (rich)
Life expectancy in the north was much lower than the south
Women-
they were the first to lose their jobs during the depression and many stopped working so they could be eligible for more money in the Means Test.
Because they stopped work, their National Insurance payments stopped and they were not able to get basic medical treatment.
Women’s life expectancy went down in unemployed areas
Housing-
Living conditions were overcrowded and this led to poor health (bronchitis, tuberculosis etc.)
Survey in 1935 found that 12% of the population lived two to a bed.
Psychological effects-
Mental health went up as a result of unemployment and poor living conditions
Some unemployed people were criticised for treating unemployment like a holiday for the first few weeks