The Great Depression

Hello, this is my blog post on The Great Depression.

Research Task: Why was Germany hit the hardest during the depression? Explain what Germany had to agree to by signing the Treaty of Versailles? How was NZ affected by the depression?

The great depression was an economic crisis that happened during 1929-1941 after the stock market crash that happened in October of 1929, this led to sending Wall Street into a wild panic, over several years during the GP, consumer spending and investment dropped, then leading for industrial output and employment to decline. This led to 25% of people to lose their job and stay unemployed, during these times the population of the world was around 2 million people, that means 500000 people were unemployed and couldn’t support themselves or their families.

Germany was hit the hardest during the great depression because Germany had to pay a lot of money due to starting the war and all the property destroyed etc. Although Germany had to pay $23b to the opposite side (The Allies.) The money went to constructing and reconstructing machinery and manufacturing plants to help rebuild the world from the war. This was very severe for Germany because of the government not being able to support their citizens, making times in Germany even harder during the great depression. 6 million Germans were unemployed, the number of Germans who had full-time jobs fell from 20 million to 11.5 million. Leaving families in distress and in poverty.

When Germany was signing the Treaty of Versailles they were also signing away territory to Belgium, Czechoslovakia and Poland. They also had to return Alsace and Lorraine to France and cede all of their overseas colonies in China, the Pacific and Africa to the Allied nations. The Allies goal was to weaken Germany because they were too dangerous to keep them with the power they had. They did this so that they wouldn't be a future threat to them. This postponed any scuffles with the Axis and Allies and may have prevented the third world war from starting, it also could’ve done nothing but actually ruin Germany during the GP.

The Great Depression hit New Zealand really hard, dropping exports by 45% for 2 years and New Zealand’s income by 40%, during this time George William Forbes term as prime minister (1930-1935) coincided with the harsh economic and social climate of the 1930s Great Depression. Unemployment was up by 12%, and people who were able to keep their jobs had their wages cut by about 20%. People being outraged by losing their jobs and having their wages cut led to Protests breaking out, people were protesting against urban and professional businesses. The most prominent manifestation of this protest was a conservative movement named the New Zealand Legion. This didn’t help with the great depression, because a lot of the businesses were also struggling to keep their sales up, even having to put prices down so that they could afford their products.