What Caused The Great Depression

The Great Depression Essay The great depression started in 1929 and ended in 1939. The depression had a lot of effects on people. The people went from the roaring 20’s to a complete drop in the economy, the unemployment rate skyrocketed. The great depression was the longest lasting economic downturn in history. There was overproduction because most people did not have enough money to buy stuff, and that lead to unemployment. The depression was like dominos every thing affected each other. The great depression was caused by speculation and instalment. The first cause of the Great Depression is speculation. Speculation is to invest in stocks or property in hope to gain but with a great chance of losing all of the money that was invested. In the document Everybody ought to be rich, by John T.Raskob, he …show more content…
Speculation was a cause in the Great Depression. The second cause to the Great Depression was instalment. Instalment is also known as lay away which means buy now and pay at a more convenient time. In the document The Perils of Prosperity by William E. Leuchtenburg talks about how people are abusing instalment. “Three out of every four radios were purchased on the installment plan, 60% of all automobiles and furniture.”(Leuchtenburg). This quote is a valid example of how this was being abused. People bought unnecessary stuff then could not pay it back which caused the to go further in debt. In the source Fortune , it has a photograph of a speed boat and it is meant to be an ad. “ … how graceful, how modern, how versatile they are”. This quote is describing the boat to people so they will buy it and, if they can't afford it they could use installment. Instalment was a cause of the great depression because people used there money for unnecessary things instead of necessities. This caused a lot of people to lose there money. Instalment was another cause to the Great