The Great Depression of 1929-33 was the most severe economic crisis of modern times. Millions of people lost their jobs, and many farmers and businesses were bankrupted. Industrialized nations and those supplying primary products (food and raw materials) were all affected in one way or another. In Germany the United States industrial output fell by about 50 per cent, and between 25 and 33 per cent of the industrial labour force was unemployed.
The Depression had profound political implications in western democracies. In countries such as Germany and Japan, reaction to the Depression brought about the rise to power of militarist governments who adopted the regressive foreign policies that led to the Second World War. In countries such as the United States and Britain, government intervention ultimately resulted in the creation of welfare systems and the managed economies of the period following the Second World War.
In the United States Roosevelt became President in 1933 and promised a "New Deal" under which the government would intervene to reduce unemployment by work-creation schemes such as street cleaning and the painting of post offices. Both agriculture and industry were supported by policies (which turned out to be mistaken) to restrict output and increase prices. The most durable legacy of the New Deal was the great public works projects such as the Hoover Dam and the introduction by the Tennessee Valley Authority of flood control, electric power, fertilizer, and even education to a depressed agricultural region in the south.
The New Deal was not, in the main, an early example of economic management, and it did not lead to rapid recovery. Income per capita was no higher in 1939 than in 1929, although the government’s welfare and public works policies did benefit many of the most needy people. The big growth in the US economy was, in fact, due to rearmament.
