The+Great+Depression

The Great Depression
__**The Great Depression in the U.S.**__

Countries all over the world were affected by the downfall of the economy. One of the affected countries was one that we live in, the United States. Our country’s downfall was started by the breakdown of the stock market. The market crashed on October 29, 1929. We Americans remember this day as Black Tuesday. At the start of this tragic time period, it left many Americans unemployed, and in poverty.

The depression caused many political changes. One of the major ones was the [|New Deal.] This change federal relief programs to help the people in the agriculture business and in the support labor unions. It is unfortunate for the President, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, because he was serving his term during the start of the depression.



__**Unemployment in the Great Depression**__

During the [|Great Depression] it was not uncommon to see people in poverty, needing food, clothing and homes. 1933 was the worst point in the depression. One in four Americans could not find any jobs. Only in 1941 the ultimate [|unemployment] rate went under 10%. This huge tidal wave of unemployment began before any food stamp program came in action. There were only a couple of programs that helped the poor and the temporary needy. Most wives didn’t work, so if the father lost his job no money would be coming into the home. Multiple people say that the beginning of the depression started pm October 24, 1929, Black Thursday. This was the day the stock market crashed. But, the economists disagreed; they thought it was between recession and depression. A recession time is when economic activity was decreasing. A depression is a time when it dejected below a level. There were a couple recessions in the Great Depression; the main recession was when values of goods and services of the economy made dropped by 42%.


 * Dust Bowl **

The Dust Bowl happened in Arkansas all the way through to New Mexico. It was a horrible tragedy that took place during the Depression, in the 1930's. What had caused a horrible thing like that? Well the farmers from the west had been working hard for the past years making grain to sell for the north part of America and others countries. They had plowed way too much on the fields. As we already know that area in the first place doesn’t get a lot of rainfall, has light soil, and high winds. The west was having a drought at that time period. The soil that the west had no grassy root system to hold it in because the farmers had plowed over it and it didn’t have any way to protect itself from the winds also the drought had taken its toll. One day huge winds came and just took all the soil with it. The Dust Bowl had left a huge amount of people homeless and jobless for a long time. Some people went to go live with other family members. Others who were unlucky because they didn’t have any family members that had jobs, lived in old boxes and garbage cans. These people were call ‘’Hoovervilles’’ after the president who was trying to help them. In 1935, the government had formed a thing called [|Soil Conservation Service] to help farmers keep the topsoil healthy through these kinds of situations.