Great Depression Facts – FDR Presidential Library & Museum
what was the great depression? the “great depression” was a severe global economic disintegration symbolized in the united states by the stock market crash on “black thursday” on october 24, 1929 . The causes of the Great Depression were many and varied, but the impact was visible across the country. By the time FDR became president on March 4, 1933, the banking system had collapsed, almost 25% of the workforce was unemployed, and prices and productivity had fallen to 1/3 of their 1929 levels. Reduced prices and reduced production resulted in lower earnings in wages, rents, dividends, and profits throughout the economy. Factories were closed, farms and houses were lost to foreclosure, mills and mines were abandoned, and people went hungry. the resulting lower incomes meant a greater inability for people to spend or save their way out of the crisis, thus perpetuating the economic slowdown in a seemingly endless cycle.
How high was unemployment during the great depression? At the height of the depression in 1933, 24.9% of the total labor force or 12,830,000 people were unemployed. Although farmers were not technically among the unemployed, drastic drops in the prices of agricultural products caused farmers to lose their land and homes to foreclosure.
Displacement of the American workforce and farming communities caused families to separate or migrate from their homes in search of work. “hoovervilles,” or slums built out of packing boxes, abandoned cars, and other debris, sprang up across the country. Residents of the Great Plains area, where the effects of the Depression were intensified by drought and dust storms, simply abandoned their farms and headed to California in hopes of finding the “Land of Milk and Honey.” . gangs of unemployed youths, whose families could no longer support them, traveled the rails as vagrants looking for work. Unemployed citizens of the United States were on the move, but there was nowhere to go that offered relief from the Great Depression.
what was fdr’s program to end the great depression? with the country sinking deeper and deeper into depression, the american public actively sought help from the federal government and was increasingly most dissatisfied with the economic policies of president herbert vacuum cleaner.
In his 1932 Democratic Party nomination acceptance speech, Franklin Delano Roosevelt promised “a new deal for the American people” if elected. Following his inauguration as President of the United States on March 4, 1933, he fdr put into effect his new deal: an active, diverse, and innovative program of economic recovery. Within the first hundred days of his new administration, FDR pushed through Congress a package of legislation designed to lift the nation out of the Depression. fdr declared a “bank holiday” to end bank runs and created new federal programs run by so-called “alpha agencies” eg the aaa (agricultural adjustment administration) stabilized farm prices and thus saved The farms. the ccc (civilian conservation corps) provided work for unemployed youth while improving the environment. The TVA (Tennessee Valley Authority) provided jobs and brought electricity to rural areas for the first time. FERA (Federal Emergency Relief Administration) and WPA (Works Progress Administration) provided jobs for thousands of unemployed Americans on construction and art projects across the country. The NRA (National Recovery Administration) sought to stabilize the prices of consumer goods through a series of codes. By stabilizing jobs and prices and by making the government an active partner with the American people, the new deal propelled the economy toward recovery.
what do the letters mean in all those “alphabet agencies”?
the new agreement “alphabet agencies”:
aaa , Agricultural Adjustment Administration, 1933
bclb , bituminous coal labor board, 1935
caa , civil aeronautics authority, 1938
ccc , Civilian Conservation Corps, 1933
ccc , commodity credit corporation, 1933
cwa , civil works administration, 1933
fca , Farm Credit Administration, 1933
fcc , federal communications commission, 1934
fcic , federal crop insurance corporation, 1938
fdic, federal deposit insurance corporation, 1933
fera , federal emergency relief agency, 1933
ffmc, federal farm mortgage corporation, 1934
fha , federal housing administration, 1934
fla, federal lending agency, 1939
fsa , Farm Security Administration, 1937
fsa , federal security agency, 1939
fwa , federal works agency, 1939
holc, homeowners loan corporation, 1933
mlb , maritime labor board, 1938
nbcc , national bituminous coal commission, 1935
nlb, national labor board, 1933
nlrb , national labor relations board, 1935
nrab, national railway adjustment board, 1934
nra, national recovery administration, 1933
nrb , National Resources Board, 1934
nrc , national resources committee, 1935
nrpb , National Resources Planning Board, 1939
nya , national youth administration, 1935
pwa , public works administration, 1933
ra , resettlement administration, 1935
rea , rural electrification administration, 1935
rfc , Reconstruction Finance Corporation, 1932
rrb , railway retirement board, 1935
scs , soil conservation service, 1935
sec, securities and exchange commission, 1934
ssb , social security board, 1935
tnec, temporary national economic committee, 1938
tva, tennessee valley authority, 1933
USEP, United States Employment Service, 1933
usha, united states housing authority, 1937
usmc, united states maritime commission, 1936
wpa, works progress administration, 1935
wpa, name change to works projects management, 1939
Did the New Deal put an end to the Great Depression? Roosevelt’s New Deal recovery programs were based on various, not always consistent, theories about the causes of depression. they targeted certain sectors of the economy: agriculture, aid, manufacturing, financial reforms, etc. Many of these programs contributed to the recovery, but since there was no sustained macroeconomic theory (John Maynard Keynes’s General Theory was not even published until 1936), full recovery did not occur during the 1930s.
After the 1937 recession, Roosevelt adopted Keynes’s notion of expanding deficit spending to stimulate aggregate demand. in 1938, the treasury department designed programs for public housing, slum clearance, railroad construction, and other massive public works. but these were removed from the chessboard by massive government spending stimulated by the second world war. even after 1938, private investment spending (housing, non-residential construction, plant and equipment) still lagged behind. it was war-related export demands and expanding government spending that brought the economy back to full-employment production capacity in 1941.
More on the Great Depression: The beginning of America’s “Great Depression” is often cited as the dramatic stock market crash on “Black Thursday” October 24, 1929, when 16 million shares of stock were quickly sold by panicked investors who had lost faith in the American economy. But some sectors of the American economy, such as agriculture, had been struggling during the 1920s.
At the height of the 1933 depression, 24.9% of the nation’s total labor force, 12,830,000 people, was unemployed. the wage income of workers who were lucky enough to have kept their jobs fell by 42.5% between 1929 and 1933.
It was the worst economic disaster in US history. agricultural prices fell so drastically that many farmers lost their homes and land. many went hungry.
Faced with this disaster, families were separated or migrated from their homes in search of work. “hoovervilles,” slums built out of packing boxes, abandoned cars, and other discarded debris, sprang up across the country. gangs of young men, whose families could no longer support them, traveled the rails in boxcars like so many vagrants, hoping to find work. Victims of drought and dust storms in the Great Plains, the “Okies” abandoned their farms and headed for California, the new land of “milk and honey.” America’s unemployed were on the move, but there was really nowhere to go. the industry was hit hard by the depression. closed factories; mills and mines were abandoned; fortunes were lost. both businesses and workers were in deep trouble.
Unable to help themselves, the American people looked to the federal government. Dissatisfied with President Herbert Hoover’s economic programs, the people elected Franklin D. Roosevelt as its president in 1932 after a campaign that promised activism and “bold and persistent experimentation.” early in his administration he brought together the best minds in the country to advise him. this group of men was known as the “brain pool.”
within one hundred days the president, his advisers and the us. Congress passed a package of legislation designed to help lift the troubled nation out of depression.
Roosevelt’s program was called the “new deal.” the words “new deal” meant a new relationship between the American people and their government. this new relationship included the creation of several new federal agencies, called “alpha agencies”. The AAA (Agricultural Adjustment Administration) was designed to increase farm prices; the ccc (civilian conservation corps) to employ unemployed youth and improve the environment; the tva (tennessee valley authority) to bring electricity to those who have never had it before; The FERA (Federal Emergency Relief Administration), which later became the WPA (Works Progress Administration), employed thousands of unemployed in everything from construction to the arts; The NRA (National Recovery Administration) drew up regulations and codes to help revitalize the industry and legalized the right of workers to unionize; The FSA (Farm Security Administration), which was created later, provided resettlement for the rural poor and better conditions for migrant workers.
Then came the creation of the social security system, unemployment insurance, and more agencies and programs designed to help Americans in times of economic hardship.
Under President Roosevelt, the federal government took on many new responsibilities for the welfare of the people. the new deal marked a new relationship between the people and the federal government that had never before existed to such an extent.
although the new agreement was criticized by many, both inside and outside the government, and the us. uu. They seriously questioned it. supreme court, received the overwhelming support of the people. franklin d. Roosevelt was the only president in United States history to be elected for four terms.
despite all the efforts of the president and the courage of the american people, the depression lasted until 1941, when the united states’ participation in world war ii resulted in the drafting of young men for military service and the creation of millions of jobs in defense and war industries.
The Great Depression strained the fabric of American life in a way that it rarely has before or since. it made Americans doubt his abilities and his values. it made them desperate. But they stood the test and, as a nation, emerged stronger than ever, ready to take on the new challenges of a world at war.
