Wednesday, April 15, 2009
"The Great Depression" - Period 6
On Monday we read about the causes of The Great Depression. Today, we watched a documentary about this period of history. What similarities and/or differences did you find between then and now? Were there any lessons to be learned from how the government dealt with the economic problems that lead to The Great Depression? Do you think the government is correctly addressing the current economic recession?
10 comments:
I think that there are a lot of similarities between the crash then and our situation now. To me, the most striking of these similarities is the way in which an economic boom triggered an economic problem. Because of the rapidly expanding economy of the 1920's, people were frugal with their money, investing in risky ventures and not worrying about what would happen should those ventures fall through. In the purest sense, everyone was having a great time and no one wanted to think about any consequences. At the moment, I think that the government is handling the situation about as well as is possible - although there may be things that they could do better, to a large extent, the only way that we can come out of this crisis is for the economy to correct itself, regardless of government intervention.
I agree with a lot of the things Max has to say. It's no coincidence that there are so many similarities between our recession today and the Great Depression. A big cause of both these situations is that people were using credit to buy so many things with money they didn't have. I think that the government should use what they learned from the Great Depression to try and help the recession today. I think that the Obama administration should implement some New Deal type programs and public works projects to help the economy. However, like Max said, the only this will only help ease the pain and the only real way to completely fix the economy is for it to correct itself.
What struck me most in the film about the Great Depression was the element of togetherness that existed amongst Americans once everyone was in the same boat. Normally the classes are noticably separated and not everyone travels in the same circles, but when everyone is surviving day by day people start to stick together and look out for one another. This behavior is inspiring not only as an American, but as a human being in general.
I agree with Max and Kevin that the circumstances we face today do mirror those faced by Americans at the time of the Depression. It is scary to think about what happened then and what could happen now, but I have faith that our elected officials have learned from the past and will make informed decisions that will ultimately allow for our economy to right itself and flourish again in the near future.
There seems to be a lot of similarities between what happened then and what is happening now. Both situations seemed to have been caused by people wanting to get rich quickly and making bad decisions like giving loans to people who were most likely not able to repay them. It was interesting to learn that credit was invented during this time which may explain why they got themselves into the situations they were in. What is shocking today is that after all these decades bankers were still willing to give loans to people who couldn't pay them back. It seems like something this serious should never be able to happen again because the government established safeguards against it. I really don't know if they're doing the right thing or not, but hopefully people in office are smart enough to solve this problem and do it wihtout greed interfering.
I think that there are a ton of similarities between the great depression and the horrible recession we are going through now. I think that with the great depression people were just being irresponsible with their money and were strongly influence by media and advertising that the consumers went over board and it caused a crash. With the recession we are in now, i think a lot of it has to do with the ability to credit things and take loans became so much apart of our culture that it was taken for granted and there was just so much debt that the system crashed. In both situations banks went under, the stock market completely crashed and so many lost their jobs. As Brian said, once everyone was losing everything they had it kind of brought them together because they were all in desperate need but bringing the people together definitely came at a cost.
Watching the footage of the time of the Great Depression was both shocking and scary. It is scary to think that we may be headed in the same direction, and watching those people being so blissfully unaware of the economic crisis that they were about to endure just made it seem even more likely. I cannot say how I feel about the government addressing the current recession, because I don't really know a lot about it.
I agree with everyone. It is definitely scary to think that we might have to go through with something very similar to that, but think about how everyone would come together. Of course there are many downsides to having a depression, but one must keep an optimistic attitude. I completely agree with Max that the current administration is handling the economic crisis well, but I also agree that things could be done better and that the economic crisis should heal itself.
Max had a lot of great things to say which i agree with. I feel irresponsible spending and lending in a time of prosperity was due for a recession, the current recession. Very similar to the Great Depression, we have high rates of unemployment along with crashing markets and banks. I think a tariff would be a bad strategy, for then a global recession may follow. I feel the government will not be able to pull the economy out of this recession, for it must do it on its own over time. The New Deal and Works Programs of that time period do not yet seem to have a current equivalent either.
Yes I agree with Max as well. The 20's were a great economic time in history much like the late 90's and early 2000's were. People were not smart with their money and bought luxury items they couldn't afford and now they are paying the price. I don't think that we are heading into a situation as bad as the Great Depression, but times are going to be tough for the near future.
I agree with max also. Max mentioned how there were great economic booms that later lead to recessions, and then depressions in the economy. I also saw the similarity on how deficit spending, that is spending money you have yet to receive, aka credit, was a major cause of the depression back then and it is now. I think the government needs to come up with a big deal type legislation that will update/fix the infrastructure of the nation and will cause the economy to start back up. With this legislature, the nation needs to end America's dependence on foreign oil, and instead make America greener, by adding solar panels, and wind farms across the nation. I think President Obama is on the right track in addressing the current economic recession, but the government, which is currently in an extremely large debt, needs to get more money and spend it for jobs that will start up the economy.
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