The Work Life of Ben Hamper

This insert above is a prime example of the hardships of finding jobs during this time. So many people were looking for jobs and the demand for them was a lot higher than the supply of them. Once people found jobs, the working conditions were terrible. A new idea came about called "speeding up" where once the workers reached a pace, then, they would speed them up more and working at outrageous speeds. If one could not keep up with the speed and the job, they would get the boot and be replaced by someone else looking for a job.

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

There was a great boom in consumer goods. Ordinary people were encouraged through advertising and could now afford to buy goods like cars, refrigerators, radios, and among other luxuries that became necessities. These new inventions made home life easier for women and more enjoyable for men. Also, there was this “mass production” method to produce many consumer goods. Assembly lines like, Henry Ford’s factory. Production costs fell quickly, wages rose slowly, and prices remained constant. For example, in 1908 the average cost of the car was $850, but by 1925 that cost had dropped to $290. Many people invested their money into businesses. Some, bought stocks sold on the stock market, when companies did well, so did

During the recession period manufacturing, finance and real estate industries had experienced the most and lost many workers. Even the workers, who were able to keep their jobs often found themselves doing substantially more work for the same or lower pay. Often high-tech video cameras and

“Much of the Roaring '20s was a continual cycle of debt for the American farmer, stemming from falling farm prices and the need to purchase expensive machinery.” (“The Farming Problem”). Tractors had just graced the U.S. markets which boosted the production of goods greatly. Most would think this was good, but it was more of a problem, the farmers would overproduce goods without enough people to buy them all which made the goods almost worthless. The farmers had to borrow money to pay for their tractors, assuming they would be able to pay back the debt with the money that the tractor made, but when they found they could not it set them up having no money and a debt with no way to pay it back. “When the stock market crashed in 1929 sending prices in an even more downward cycle, many American farmers wondered if their hardscrabble lives would ever improve.” (“The Farming Problem”). The stock market crashing made the stocks the farmers though they would be able to get some money from virtually worthless.

The United States during the 1920’s were some of the best and fun years there were. Everybody always went to parties, invested in stocks, made money, and spent it as quickly as they got it. In 1929, the stock market crashed which ultimately turned the roaring twenties into the Great Depression. The effects of the Great Depression was a rocket high in the number of unemployment. People went from riches to rags, and started losing trust in banks which destroyed the economy and pushed the business cycle into a new phase worse than anybody had ever seen or experienced. The “business cycle” was a template for how most economists and politicians explained the economy and gave it reasoning.

Flint town is a small town in Michigan. Flint was a prosperous town when it had many General Motor workers. The General Motor factories made most of the people who lived in Flint middle-class citizens (Canepari, et al). They made about making about $80,000 a year. After General Motors shut down all of their factories in Flint, most of the people lost their jobs. This put Flint into major poverty and increased their crime rate (Canepari, et al).

Companies lost so much money that some were forced to lay off workers and even shut down. Over spending and installment buying along with the stock market crash led to many people not only losing their savings but also their

Issues like downsizing and overseas relocation had always seemed distant to me until my co-workers at one factory told me that the unit I was working in would be shut down within six months and moved to Mexico, where people would work for 60 cents an hour”, in this statement he gives the readers reasons for factory work being a hard way to live. Lastly, this statement he made, “The things that factory work has taught me how lucky I am to get an education, how to work hard, how easy it is to lose that work once you have it are by no means earth-shattering” the author is giving examples of the different lessons that leads to my main claim about his purposes for writing his article.

It shows how the Chrysler plant was to lay off thousands of people and because of this the Mega Burger restaurant of Mr. Diamantouros also went into recession and had to layoff 15 of his employees. This is considered bad times, but say the demand for cars increased Chrysler would have to hire more people opening job opportunities, this would also lead to Mr. Diamantouros business to increase as he would receive more customers from the plant. Also the cars that the plant manufactures will be delivered to dealers who sell them to us. This is considered good times. It all just depends on a businesses relationship with another business this then influences our economy in a good way or a bad

From the years 1929-1933, the United States was in an economic turmoil under the presidency of Herbert Hoover. During the 1920s, consumerism began to rise and people bought many things on credit with money they did not actually have. Once millions of shares were pulled from the stock market in 1929, there was a drastic decrease of money within the economy. Consumer spending dropped as well as investment rates. Businesses could not afford to have too many employees working when the company was barely making

He showed signs of greatness at times, learning his job and performing at incredibly fast rates, but this would eventually die out. Like most others in the factory, Hamper was focused on exploiting the system. Taking days off and getting paid for them was something Hamper loved. After the reprieve from the recession, Flint was hit hard and Hamper was laid off. Instead of being transferred Hamper soon learned that he could collect more money being unemployed then from a regular paycheck. In Hamper’s eyes this freedom called for celebration. During the 2nd layoff Hamper whiled away nights at the Rusty Nail, a local bar that became Mecca for shoprats. The only problem with being unemployed is that the days are also free. Hamper decided to return to the hobby of writing. Hamper was so accustomed to constant work at the shop that, he constantly had to do something while he was unemployed. Doing nothing was almost as bad as constantly working. Spending time at the bar and drinking was a common pastime not only for him but for the majority of workers. Hamper began writing and it was the best decision he could have

This shows how the great depression impacted many americans lives. After the lousy fight that ensued all that Braddock received a broken hand, and was decommissioned. This made life for the Braddock family even tougher as Braddock needed to work. With a broken hand this made moving large heavy bags difficult at the docks. Soon Braddock could barely support his family and his children were sent away.

With the economy falling in shambles and companies defaulting on loans, nearly all private and corporate investment ceased. Companies couldn’t afford to expand, and in fact, many had to consolidate in order to cover the margins on their loans. This meant postponing hiring and laying workers off, which caused unemployment to skyrocket. With people now willing to work for less money, wages lessened too. At the same time prices rose in an attempt by companies to make some amount of profit off the goods.

As Barry Eichengreen says, “The 24% unemployment reached at the depths of the Great Depression was no picnic.” The Great Depression was a time in American history where there was an economic dip, not only in the economy but in people’s lives as well. Most people were depressed, lonely, poor, and starving. People would walk, or drive, for miles to find work, like George and Lennie from John Steinbeck's "Of Mice and Men". George and Lennie lived in Weed, California for years until they had gotten into trouble with the authority.