The economy seems to be on everyone’s mind these days. No matter where you are or where you go. . . ‘Today the stock market dropped, loans are being denied, houses are being foreclosed, businesses are going out of business’, For months it seemed like we were going to fall right back into the 1929’s and the Great Depression. But would we really be ready for it, has the outlook on the American lifestyle changed to greatly that if we could fall back into a depression? I believe if the United States were to go through another Great Depression it would be even more detrimental to our country due to Americans high standards of living, and ways of life.
“In October 1929 the stock market crashed, leaving nearly 40% of the paper values of common stock” (Billitteri). The sudden down fall left life to be unattainable, leaving everyone to fend for themselves, basic survival of the fittest. Now in 2008, with all the technology and advancements we find ourselves heading in the same direction. The same direction that President Theodore Roosevelt overcame when he introduced with his ‘New Deal’ idea; which was setting up and establishing new social and economical reforms that resembled those of some European countries. Could the United States handle a repeat of the Great Depression, have we become so materialistic that we wouldn’t even notice it until it was too late? The crash of the stock market in 1929 was detrimental to living in the United States, but could a repeat be even worse today due to need of materialistic items?
In 2007 the “average American made over fifty thousand dollars a year, in contrast to a mere fifteen hundred dollars in 1933” (/income_wealth/002484.html), just four years after the Great Depression started. That’s nearly a three hundred thirty three percent raise in seventy four years. In the early 1900’s Americans had their priorities mainly focused on family and work. Today, Americans have become so consumed in designer clothes, new technology, the latest gizmos and who looks the best that we would have to take that many more steps backwards to come back from another recession. Back in “1933 one of every four American’s was unemployed” (Reynolds), since the economy has started to fall in the twentieth century the unemployment rate has been on a roller coaster of its own; the worst of which hitting Michigan with “unemployment rate of nearly 8.5% as of July 2008”(Reynolds). With more people becoming unemployed due to the current economical status, more people are going to be hitting foreclosures due to our nature of buying unnecessary items.
To help prevent a repeat of 1929 congress recently passed a “$700 billion dollar bailout bill that will immediately put out $250 billion dollars to the banking systems” (Billitteri). The bank systems that seem to be the back bone of the economy falling right now. Another aspect that the government is doing to try to prevent the worst from happening is taking over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are “government-sponsored enterprises” (Reynolds) which are basically the largest financial agencies in America. In taking over these two agencies the federal government is hoping to put a hundred billion dollars into each firm to help prevent them from going bankrupt which would cause a huge loss in banking, loans, and much more.
Americans need to learn from the past in order to prevent a national financial breakdown like those of our past. I feel that if The United States were to undergo another Great Depression or anything similar it would impact our societies even greater due to the status we have put on materialistic items. It’s hard not to compare the past to what were going through today. With the lose of jobs, closing of major businesses, foreclosures, and everything else that is affecting almost every American in some aspect, how can you not see the connections or the problems were throwing ourselves into? If Americans of every nature don’t learn from the past soon it might be too late to prevent another depression.
Work-cited
Billitteri, J. Thomas. “Financial Bailout.” CQ Researcher Online.
http://library.cqpress.com/cqresearcher/document.php?id 24, October 2008
Reynolds, Maura, “U.S. unemployment rate hits 6.1%, highest level in five years” Los Angeles Time. 6, September 2008
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