What Was The Great Depression In America

The Great Depression was a very influential era in American history, affecting many future generations. One of the most prevalent impacts it had on society was the extreme poverty that swept across the nation, affecting both people in cities and in the country. The main cause for this poverty was the mass loss of jobs among the middle class. Millions lost their jobs and consequently their homes. Families lived out of tents and cars in shanty towns or Hoovervilles. In these camps, many people didn’t have their basic human needs met, children and adults alike starved. They lived in clothes that were caked in dirt and tattered, too small for growing children and too cold for the frail elderly. Government relief programs attempted to help but offered little support to the now impoverished families of the millions that lost everything.

All the unemployment caused many to live in poverty. This poverty caused many to make makeshift houses. Some even made neighborhood. One of the worst cases of these were known as Hoovervilles. One of the most famous images of one of these hoovervilles was

The Great Depression was caused by the stock market crash in 1929. The Great Depression was very sad time for Americans, who faced many adversities which ultimately changed the way they lived. During this period of time unemployment rose to nearly 25% of the population, those who did not lost their job saw a dramatic decrease in their pay.

Before the depression happened many factories and farms alike, were producing mass amounts of cheap goods/produce, more than people could buy. This led to product prices falling, due

Economic laws suggested that the market worked in waves and the upward spiral could not continue. A wave of panic gripped investors. On October 23, 1929, investors dumped their stocks loosing more than four billion dollars in the market. The next day, known as Black Tuesday, the market lost another nine billion dollars. Without a money supply, no new jobs were created and many were lost. Corporations cut production, slashed wages, and reduced jobs. By 1932, more than one million people were homeless in America and by 1933 almost twenty-five percent of the work force was unemployed. Unable to pay rents or mortgages, eventually nearly six hundred thousand people lost their property. Many took to living in caves, sewer pipes, with relatives, or joined the sea of homeless people. Some sold apples on street corners - some dug through garbage bans - and others begged. Shanty towns, called Hoovervilles sprang up on abandoned land and in parks. Breadlines formed in cities. Many children had nothing to eat.

The event that debatably started the depression was the banking crisis. One day a man wanted to withdraw some money from his bank. When they told him that they lost all his money giving out loans, and investing in the stock market (Which had crashed), he spread the word. People panicked and tried to take their money out of the banks as soon as possible. This caused many banks to close. To solve this problem the Emergency Banking Relief Act was created. (Sources E, F, and G) What this did was close all banks for 4 days. (Sources E, F, and G) Within those 4 days there would be inspections on all of the banks. (Sources E, F, and G) Only the banks that passed the inspections and had enough money to give out loans could reopen. (Sources E, F, and G) Banks help the economy. They do this by giving out loans that people use to buy products. The businesses hire workers, and those people buy more products. This is what started the upward economic cycle that jobs create.

There were easily multiple causes for the start of the Great Depression in 1929. Many historians and economists put emphasis on organizational causes such as actions by the Federal Reserve. Often part of any business cycle are recessions due to the changes of supply and demand, but what turns this business cycle into a depression is always up for debate. In the case of the Great Depression, the stock market crash of 1929, bank failures, debt deflation, and American economic policies with Europe

There was a steel mill company created in the 1900 in Gary by a president of the United States name Elbert H. Gary it was named after him. The steel started getting popular because everyone nationwide was using it to build railroads and homes. There three things they used to make steel such as iron ore, limestone, and coals. There was variety of coals that was used but the only one they use was called coke they had to burn a fuel that turned into coke. In order for them to make it, they had to make the coke burn at an extremely high temperature so they can produce it to melt big quantity of limestone and iron ore.

According to Foner the Great Depression was “the greatest economic disaster in modern history.” (Foner, 632) After the stock market crash in 1929, the people of America wound up in a massive amount of debt. The crash began due to a day called Black Tuesday, a day were almost all investors sold their stocks and the prices dropped to eventually become worth nothing. Since there were so many who could not afford to pay for objects, the value went down drastically and employees were eventually laid off from their work with no way of being able to find another one.

history. The Great Depression started during 1929 and how it all started with the stock market crash of 1929. The Great Depression lasting almost a decade plunged America into sorrow and great dismay. (Source 3) Before the Great Depression happened America was booming in economic growth. Later this boom was named the Roaring Twenties. New inventions contributed to this economic growth. People would build new devices which created manufacturing jobs which increased the amount of money people had to spend after bills. For example, the Television and the radio were a huge deal. However, most middle and lower classes could not afford all the new inventions that were coming out. However, people did not want to be left out so a new idea was made. This new invention is credit, credit was a form of payment in which the bank gave you an certain amount of credit in which you could use the buy items if you could not pay in cash. However, later you would have to pay the bank back in small increments each month or pay banks back in

The Great Depression was one of the most significant events of the 20th century, and the greatest economic struggle the world has ever faced to date. Lasting 10 years between 1929 and 1939, it not only was an important event then, but also an important event today - as it affects the way we live even now. Not only was it significant in the way it changed the United States, and but it had a big impact on the rest of the the world as well. It changed the economy, the laws, the way people lived, and some changes remaining in effect today.

Then shortly after this in 1932 alone 30,000 companies lost their jobs. By 1933 over 12 million people were out of work which is one fourth of workforce. Average income dropped to $1,600 from $2,300 a few years from 1929.(Appleby 535-536) Since people were out of work they often waited in bread lines or soup kitchens to get free food which was handed out by charities. “Peggy Terry, a young girl from Oklahoma City during the Depression, later told an interviewer how each day after school, her mother sent her to the soup kitchen.” (Appleby 536).

Farmers were forced to leave their crops to rot, leaving more people to go hungry

On top of this people were losing their jobs very rapidly. The national unemployment rate was nearly twenty five percent. This forced many families out of their homes and onto the streets. “By 1930 homeless people had built shantytowns in most of the nation’s cities. In New York City, squatters camped out along the Hudson River railroad tracks, built makeshift homes in Central Park, or lived at the city dump.”2 Many citizens began to call these shantytowns “Hoovervilles.” Another common sight during the Great Depression was a long line at a local soup kitchen. Men and women would come from miles just to get a meal that they otherwise could not afford.

The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression) in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s.[1] It was the longest, most widespread, and deepest depression of the 20th century, and is used in the 21st century as an example of how far the world's economy can decline.[2] The depression originated in the United States,