The Pros And Cons Of The New Deal

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The Stock Market crashed on October 24, 1929. Stock prices plunged, wiping out $10 billion in value, leading to a devastating worldwide depression. This resulted from declining demand; languishing agriculture, mining and textile industries that failed to sustain profits; under-consumption grew; and international economic conditions, stemming from WWI, which contributed to the Depression. During the Great Depression, unemployment rates climbed to 25%. Between 1929 and 1933, the GNP was cut in half, corporate profits fell from $10 billion to $1 billion and 100,000 businesses closed. By January 1930, 4 million workers were unemployed; by November, the number jumped to 6 million. By 1933, 13 million workers – about a quarter of the labor force – were jobless, millions more only part-time workers. No safety net, no welfare system, no unemployment compensation, and no social …show more content…

The New Dealers certainly brought about dramatic changes, but they were not radicals who were deeply opposed to capitalism or the vitality of the market economy. Rather, as this book argues, they were reformers who were deeply interested in fixing the problems of capitalism. To be sure, the many different programs of the New Deal were at times contradictory, and at points the New Dealers themselves were forced to craft improvisatory solutions. The New Deal, however, possessed a coherent internal logic. It was, on the one hand, a full-throated attempt to respond to the economic crisis of the Great Depression, and on the other, a political project of the Democratic Party, led by FDR. To understand the nature and consequences of the New Deal’s response to the Great Depression, it is essential to understand the nature and consequences of the Great Depression itself.” (Pg. 2 –

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