The great depression brought sadness and struggle among the middle class and the poor of America. Rich business owners controlled all the money, and the few who had money saved every cent. The early warning signs first came in the agricultural sector. Farmers continued to produce more and more food due to technological advances like the tractor. They had produced extra food to supply overseas demand during World War I.  As production grew farm prices dropped.  This became a problem in the 1920s after the World War demand ended. Food surplus, dropping demand, and falling prices led to failed farms because they could not pay off their debt.  Farmers were like the “canary in the coal mine” because they began to fail first in the 1920s as a warning sign of the bad economy to come.  Many farmers had conditions go from bad to worse in the 1930s and were forced to leave their mid-west farms due to 3 consecutive droughts that brought about “dust bowl” conditions.  The farmers migrated to cities and to farms in the south and west.

The rise in overproduction and Laissez Faire or “hands off” policies of the 1920s left the economy unregulated. Fraud and over speculation in the stock market brought a fake hope and an eventual bursting of the overinflated stock market bubble.  The Stock Market crashed in October of 1929.  Decline in foreign trade due to President Hoover’s attempt to protect American made goods through tariffs brought the final blow that took America into great depression.

the great depression