Known also as Black Tuesday, October 29th left stockholders shattered with recorded losses reaching $40 billion dollars (Kelly, n.d.). Many banks and financial institutions began collapsing which led to irretrievable, uninsured deposits and savings. Fearing further loss, people began spending less which led to a decrease in production and an increase in unemployment. As companies began to fail, the government devised the Smoot-Hawley Tariff in order to protect American businesses. The Tariff placed high taxes on imports leading to a decline in international trade.
Even though the stock market began to regain some of its losses, by the end of 1930, it just was not enough and American truly entered what is called the Great Depression. Before Black Tuesday, the economy had been stagnant for months prior, and the effects of the market crash were compounded due to the use of margin, and the general lack of market regulations at that time. The use of margin means people had borrowed funds (Doc K). This led to a spiral of falling prices. With significantly reduced wealth, spending decline, banks failed and on top of this drought conditions contributed to a lack of good crops.
We have downfall and then we pick things back up and everything gets better. But , just when things get better, it happens to get worse again. Many believe erroneously that the stock market crash that occurred on Black Tuesday, October 29, 1929 is one and the same with the Great Depression. In fact, it was one of the major causes that led to the Great Depression. Two months after the original crash in October, stockholders had lost more than $40 billion dollars.
The Great Depression: Did America Need it? Dawood Nadeem CHA3U1 Aside from the Civil War, the Great Depression was the gravest crisis in American history. Just as in the Civil War, the United States appeared—at least at the start of the 1930s—to be falling apart. But for all the turbulence and the panic, the ultimate effects of the Great Depression were less reassuring than revolutionary. I feel that the great depression was needed to shape the new Republic.
When people realized this, they quickly got rid of their stocks. This caused the prices of stock to drop drastically, and continue to drop. This completely ruined the economy, and was a main cause for the stock market crashing, and the Great Depression. Through the United States’ tariff policies, the American way of spending money, and by the gambling of stocks, the Great Depression began. Each economic failure led to the next, and ended up destroying America’s economy.
It dropped the prices for homes and the value just plummeted at exponential rates. It all started back in the banks where our money is kept. They started to make too many subprime deals with zero down financed costs. They also ignored deteriorating credit standards. On top of this there was a lot of bad lending to people who had no chance of ever returning the loans to the bank.
The Great Depression was the most significant downturn the U.S. economy experienced in the history of the United States. One of the most significant factors that caused the Great Depression was the staggeringly unequal distribution of wealth among the rich and the middle class. In the late 1920s, the top .1% of all Americans had a combined income equal to the bottom 42% while today, the top 5% richest Americans have a combined income equal to the bottom 53%. While this unequal distribution of income is not quite equal to that of the 1920s and 30s, it is nearing a dangerous point. Another significant cause of the Great Depression was the extensive stock market speculation that occurred in the late 1920s.
Likewise, the United States’ trade is becoming unprofitable as American goods are struggling to compete against cheaper foreign made goods. The shocking similarities between the Great Depression and today’s market foreshadow a darker future for the international
The 1920′s could be described as economic boom gone bust. The early 1900′s began with an advancing industrial revolution and ended with the Stock Market Crash of 1929, which is one reason it is known as an era of contrast. The trigger that caused the great depression began with the boom in sales of stocks in a bull market. Credit was developed and debt was created. Stock prices hit rock bottom and wild selling left banks with little in reserves to stabilize.
Mike Hall Current World Affairs November 3, 2013 World Depression The Great Depression is seen as a defining moment in American History as it changed the country drastically. Many forget this economic downfall is not limited to the United States, but were felt globally and actually started elsewhere before having a domino effect that encompassed the United States. Most historians and economists believe that the causes of the Great Depression in the United States had many causes only one of which was the Stock Market Crash of 1929. (The Great Depression) The Stock Market Crash can be attributed to many things but the cause that set it all up to fail was the printing of monies by foreign countries during the First World War.