Causes Of The Great Depression

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The Great Depression was caused by…. Hmm that’s a tricky statement because there wasn’t really one singular event that caused The Great Depression. The Great Depression was caused by a string of multiple small events and mistakes that built up over the course of several years. Although many argue that the main cause of The Great Depression was (Davidson pg. 506) “The Great Crash” of the stock market that started on October 24, 1929, known as “Black Thursday, and lasted almost four years.” Others argue it was a combination of the following events. The first event was in 1928 when (Williams) the booming industries such as steel production was faltering and loosing profits this led to layoffs and decreased hourly wages which in turn led to the …show more content…

The reason Herbert Hoover’s administration was unable to correct the problem was because they first relied on private charity organizations instead of putting forth federal or government help quick enough. (Davidson pg. 517) ” In 1930 President Hoover began combating the Depression by stimulating investment and rallied business leaders to maintain employment, wages and prices, he also pushed tax cuts to spur consumer spending. When the federal budget didn’t balance he reversed course.” Had he been more concerned with the economy and less concerned with the budget he may have lessened the effect of the depression. With banks failing and the situation getting worse in 1932 President Hoover’s administration created a federal bailout program called The Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC) to help pull the banks out of jeopardy. This helped but not nearly enough to stop the downhill spiral, he also created the Emergency Relief and Construction …show more content…

1932 Franklin Delano Roosevelt was voted into office by popular vote of 57%. Along with the new candidacy they also brought new promises such as (The Great Depression) “it was the government’s responsibility to guarantee everyman the right to a comfortable living.” The Roosevelt Administration planned to make good on that promise by getting congress to pass programs like “The New Deal.” In 1933-1935 these programs focused on relief, reform, and recovery through the passing of multiple acts and organizations such as The Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) which loaned millions to states, neighborhoods and charitable organizations, work relief programs began such as Civil Works Administration (CWA), Civilian Conservation Corps. (CCC) and Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) were all designed to make jobs available for people in hopes that they would be able to support themselves through hard work, and the National Recovery Act (NRA) was created to control competition, these are just a few of the acts and administrations involved in the reform effort that began to pull America out of the

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