Great Depression
...o eat food, sometimes they sold there house. Other people’s houses were taken over by the government, and they could do nothing about it. If they tried fight back to keep there house they would be shot. The depression was a hard time for the whole world. It affected the whole world mentally and economically. The business cycle had long had its ups and downs. If this downswing turned out to be words than any previous one, the reason must be sought in the profound structural changes heaped on top of a normal cycle. Fulcrum of the world economy, the United States had not yet learned how to play that part, as its erratic financial policies and high protective tariffs indicated. Deeper changes were going on in the world. Policies of "autarchy" had developed after the war an were to be perpetuated during the Great Depression; that is, countries that were no longer prepared to trust the international order tried to insulate their economies by tariffs, import quotas, or a managed currency. During the 1920s, while sometimes readjusting the rate at which their currencies were exchanged for gold, most nations clung to the gold standard, which facilitated international trade by permitting currencies to be freely exchanged in terms of gold. But beginning in 1931, when Great Britain was driven off the gold standard, country after country left it in order to protect themselves against a flight of gold leading to deflation and unemployment. The flight from gold was followed by all kinds of nationalist economic policies - exchange controls, import quotas, tariffs. International trade was thus further impaired. (http://mars.acnet.wnec.edu/) The Great Depression was the worst economic slump ever in U.S. history, and one which spread to virtually all of the industrialized world. The depression began in late 1929 and lasted for about a decade. Many factors played a role in bringing about the depression; however, the main cause for the Great Depression was the combination of the greatly unequal distribution of wealth throughout the 1920's, and the extensive stock market speculation that took place during the latter part that same decade. The maldistribution of wealth in the 1920's existed on many levels. Money was distributed disparately between the rich and the middle-class, between industry and agriculture within the United States, and between the U.S. and Europe. This imbalance of wealth created an unstable economy. The excessive speculation in the late 1920's kept the stock market artificially high, but eventually lead to large market crashes. These market crashes, combined with the maldistribution of wealth, caused the American economy to capsize. (http://www.geocities.com/) In the United States, President Herbert Hoover held office when the Great Depression began. The economy continued to slump almost every month. Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected President in 1932. R...