The Great Depression

The Great Depression:

WHAT IS THE GREAT DEPRESSION?

In 1929 - 1939, The Great Depression was the deepest, longest lasting and most widespread depression economic downturn in history. It was a severe worldwide economic depression. The depression was originated in the United States, after the fall on stock market prices that began around 4th of September 1929, it became worldwide news when the stock market (also known as Black Tuesday) collapsed on Wall Street on the 29th of October 1929. It send the financial markets worldwide into a chaos with catastrophic effects.

It had overwhelming effects in countries both rich and poor. Personal income, tax revenue, profits and prices dropped, while international trade plunged by more than 50%. Unemployment in the United States rose to 25% and in some countries rose as high as 33%. Some countries started to recover by the mid - 1930s, however, in many countries the negative effect of The Great Depression lasted until the beginning of World War II. Cities all around the world were hit hard, especially the ones that were dependent on heavy industry.

Source A:


This image was from the 1930’s. It showss how the stock market crash caused a rise in unemployment numbers. The long line of people in this image shows how they were doing bad finically and were not able to afford food. The Great Depression was impacting the citizens and poverty was becoming a big issue.

http://history105.libraries.wsu.edu/fall2014/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2014/08/great-depression-food-line.jpg

The impact of the Wall Street Crash:

1) 12 million people out of work

2) 12,000 people being made unemployed every day

3) 20,000 companies had gone bankrupt

4) 1616 banks had gone bankrupt

5) 1 farmer in 20 evicted

6) 23,000 people committed suicide in one year – the highest ever

GERMANY DURING THE GREAT DEPRESSION

Gremany was particularly affected because it was bulit upon foreign capital, mostly loans from America and it was very dependent on foreign trade. Germans were not so much dependent on exports as they were on America loans. The well oiled Germans exports industrial machine quickly ground to a halt when the loans from America suddenly came due and when the world market for German exports dried up. No further loans were issued in the late 1929. In 1932, there were about 5 million German who were unemployed and many of them blamed the Weimar Republic for it.

Source B:


Unemployed queing at an employment office in Hanover in 1930.

http://gcsehistory.org.uk/modernworld/germany/images/unemployment.jpg 

The Versailles treaty was considered by most Germans to be a punishing and degrading document because it forced them to surrender resource-rich areas and pay massive amounts of compensation. These punitive reparations caused consternation and resentment, although the actual economic damage resulting from the Treaty of Versailles is difficult to determine. While the official reparations were considerable, Germany ended up paying only a fraction of them. However, the reparations did damage Germany's economy by discouraging market loans, which forced the Weimar government to finance its deficit by printing more money, causing rampant hyperinflation. In addition, the rapid disintegration of Germany in 1919, due to the return of a disillusioned army, the rapid change from possible victory in 1918 to defeat in 1919, and the political chaos may have caused a psychological imprint on Germans that could lead to extreme nationalism, shown by Hitler. 

http://gcsehistory.org.uk/modernworld/germany/depression.htm

THE IMPACT ON GERMANY

Germany became a democratic republic known as the Weimar Republic at the end of World War l. The government were not able to deal with the economic disaster left by the war. In 1923, France occupied the heartland of German industry (Ruhr Valley) because Germany was not able to pay war reparations demanded by the Treaty of Versailles. American banks immediately withdrew the loans they had made to Germany. Businesses closed, unemployment rose and inflation was rampant, German money had so little value.

Done by: Nurina Syarah