Romer Great Depression

The 1920’s had a huge case of income inequality, and there was a drastic difference in how people across the financial spectrum lived their lives. While some people could barely afford basic necessities like food, medicine, shelter etc, this small subsection of the population lived extravagantly. They could afford new cars, lavish balls and expensive restaurants, and could absentmindedly spend their money anywhere they desire. To add to this, the rise in per capita income for top 1% of the population in 1920-1929 was 75% (a stark contrast to the fact that the per capita income for the rest of the country only rose by 9%). Also, the top 1% make up 23.9% of the total income/cash flow in the country, which is an extremely unproportional percentage for it to come from such a small portion of the entire country. Since income inequality was so prevalent in this era, the supposed affluence of this era can't be fully supported or justified. It is clear that the vast majority was just wasting away on their savings, and that only a lucky few actually were able to afford all the diverse activities they were involved

The Roaring Twenties is known as an age of parties, jazz, and overspending. After World War I, the optimistic American people reacted by celebrating and overspending. They purchased new appliances such as cars, radios and refrigerators; they purchased luxury items like clothes and invested in stocks. Their new attitude towards the booming American economy was carefree, leading to a series of events. First the stock market crashed. Next, the banks failed. Then, companies laid off employees who were unable to make the payments on the items they purchased. Tariffs and droughts further complicated the situation. This decade became known as the Great Depression, because the economic setbacks impacted everyone and everything. But the question is “Why did Americans lose so much money in such a short period of time?” One answer is, the failing stock market. A second is unregulated banking systems which allowed for buying on margin. Third, the lifestyle following World War I was too materialistic. The Great Depression was caused by Americans failing to responsibly manage their money.

The majority of individuals trust that the stock exchange crash that happened on October 29, 1929 is the main source of the Great Depression. The stock market accident was not the sole reason for the Great Depression, but rather it acted to quicken the worldwide economic breakdown of which it was additionally a symptom. Numerous components prompted the Depression. One of which being bank failures, another the global downturn, and dry season conditions.

Many people believe the Stock Market crash and the Great Depression are one in the same. In the nineteen twenties the Dow Jones went from sixty to four hundred. People became instant millionaires. Trading became America’s favorite pastime and a quick way to get rich. There were Americans mortgaging their home and investing their life savings in stock such as ford. However, there were many fake companies that formed to deceive the inexperience investors. Many investors did not believe that a crash was possible; they all thought the market would always go up.

The stock market crash, called Black Tuesday. Unequal distribution of wealth was a key factor during the time period as well. The day know as “Black Tuesday” was the day the stock market crashed. This led to the fall of stock prices, in fear, people sold their stocks and gathered the money they could. The people who didn’t, lost all of their stocks. Those who bought them on credit, they were now in debt. Investors lost a collective amount equal to the amount spent in WWI, that’s billions of dollars gone, approximately thirty-two billion dollars (32,000,000,000). As bad as the crash was, unequal distribution of wealth did not help. The rich saw an income increase of 70%, and the poor saw an increase of 9%. More than 70% of families earned less than $2500/year. Many of these families couldn't afford household products, such as the flood of overproduced goods. Only one out of ten families owned an electric refrigerator. One thing many people overlook when on the subject of the Great Depression is the president's influence on the situation. The two presidents during this time were Herbet Hoover and Franklin D. Roosevelt. Hoover was in office during the collapse of the economy, he didn’t believe in national relief, he believed in self-prevalence and self-help. His beliefs didn’t get the confidence of the people, in 1933, a fourth of working American’s were out of a job, that’s more than fifteen million people unemployed. Many people disliked Hoover, so when they needed to make a home out of paper, glass, tin, or whatever they could find, they named the towns constructed from these items “Hoovervilles”. They were found mostly on the outside of cities. Hoover's idea of self-reliance didn’t get him reelected, he lost to Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933. Roosevelt brought forward a new strategy to take on the economic problems, it was called the New Deal. The New Deal was a series of actions him and his

The Great Depression was a devastating time for many Americans. From 1929 to 1932, the US experienced an economic downturn that was calamitous to the lives of many people. Millions upon millions of Americans lost everything when the stock market crashed on October 29, 1929. After exiting an era that left people living a life of luxury, the stock market crash came as a surprise. As a result of the stock market crash, many became unemployed and many families were being forced to close their businesses. Although there were many factors that contributed to the cause of the Great Depression, the three main causes were The Stock Market Crash of 1929, high unemployment, a decrease in consumer purchases due to being “stuffed with stuff” during the roaring twenties.

In the year 1929, after a century of Americans being filled with a great sense of being alive and chasing after the American dream with new opportunities in front of them, everything Americans had worked so hard to establish came crashing down. On one fateful day the stock market crashed, leaving Americans all over the nation scared, penny less, and uncertain feelings about what the future would hold for them. The days leading up to years following this crash became known as the Great Depression a time where Americans struggled to get by or even had to leave the only home they’ve ever had when it comes to the dust bowl. The Great Depression posed a great hold on American economy leaving people unemployed and immigrants

The United States had just gained victory from World War I and was thriving. The period known as the roaring 20s was a time of success and materialism. Consumers were buying more and more products and spending money on credit. People were frivolously spending money and buying stock in the stock market. Although things may have appeared to be a time of success and prosperity, a storm was brewing and there were underlying weaknesses in the economy.

The Great Depression of 1929 was a horrible time where American and its people had to suffer from poverty and hunger. The reasons for the Depression as stated on page 4, were “...a number of serious weaknesses in the economy.” examples such as people borrowing money they could not give back, wealthy making more money, and even the cost of WW1 cause problems. These all lead up to the U.S. stock market crash of 1929, were “thousands of investors were ruined and confidence in the economy was destroyed. ”(page 4)

In 1929 the Stock Market crashed was said to have “ushered in” the Great Depression. After Wall Street and the Stock Market crash of 1929, the banks began to fail. By 1933 over half of the banks in the United States had failed and went out of business. The economy came to a full stop as businesses could no longer access credit lines to purchase inventory, checks were no longer accepted as currency due to the multitude of failing financial institutions which led to an unemployment rate reported to be as much as 30 percent of the available workforce. (“First measured century: Timeline,” n.d.)

The Great Depression was a time of great economic tragedy during the 1930’s. October 24, 1929 was the day of the stock market crash, causing economical shortage everywhere, even globally, and this scared everyone, including the rich. This day was/ is known as “Black Thursday”, where over 2.9 million shares were traded. On “Black Tuesday”, five days later, more than 16 million more shares were traded in another wave of panic. Many investors then lost confidence in their banks and demanded deposits in cash which forced the banks to liquidate loans in order to supplement their on hand cash reserves. By 1933, around 15 million Americans were unemployed and nearly half of the country’s banks had failed. This stopped Americans from purchasing which then led to less production of goods and decreased the amount of needed human labor. In the end, millions of shares ended up worthless, and those investors who had bought stocks with borrowed money were wiped out completely.

In the 1920s, American economy had a great time. The vast majority of Americans in 1929 foresaw a continuation of the dizzying economic growth that had taken place in most of the decade. However, the prices of stock crested in early September of 1929. The price of stock fell gradually during most of September and early October. On “Black Tuesday” 29 October 1929, the stock market fell by forty points. After that, a historically great and long economic depression started and lasted until the start of the Second World War. The three causes of the Great Depression are installment buying, uneven distribution of wealth and the irrational behavior in the stock market.

“Everywhere was the atmosphere of a long debauch that had to end;The orchestras played too fast,The stakes were too high at the gambling tables,players were so empty,so tired,secretly hoping to vanish into sleep.(Cowley,)” The 1920s was known as the roaring twenties or as the jazz age. The 1920’s, with it’s new inventions and a booming economy, gave people optimism due to all the new jobs opening up .By the late 1920s, hardships and troublesome times known as the Great Depression. The stock market crash of 1929 resulted in hard times that were yet to come.

In 1929, the United States Stock Market crashed. However, this “most disastrous day” that sparked the Great Depression did not occur out of the blue. There were many contributing factors to the Great Depression of the 1930s, the most influential being stock speculation and installment buying of goods, maldistribution of income, and the overproduction of goods. These three topics led up to the Bull Market Boom and the Great Depression.

Following the crash, the economy weakened, production of industrial products had outrun consumer and investment demand for them, the most likely reason is that business concerns misjudged the prospective increase in demand and acquired larger inventories than they later found they needed. The rich began to sustain their spending