write a conclusion paragraph that gives a clear summary of the argument and aligns with the thesis given this essay: The Great Depression, an era of economic turmoil and widespread hardship, stands as one of the darkest chapters in American history. In the late 1920s, there was a huge surge in consumer spending and a speculative favor in the stock market, fueling a false image of permanent prosperity. Then, a catastrophic financial crisis struck the US in the 1930s, sending millions of people into desperation, unemployment, and poverty. It was a moment when the country faced unheard-of difficulties and prosperity seemed unattainable. The Great Depression, which was full of terrible times, permanently altered the economic and social landscape of the United States. Spending habits of the people, the stock market, and the unbalanced workforce were all factors of this horrible period of time known as the Great Depression.
During the 1920s, the spending habits of the people played a significant role in leading to the Great Depression. During this time, a lot of Americans developed a consumerist mindset that increased their debt levels and contributed to an unstable economic bubble. According to “The Perils of Prosperity” written by William E. Leutchtenburg, “...consumers bought goods on installment at a rate faster than their income was expanding…” (Document 6). To explain, people buying all of their things on installment credit while not having the actual money to pay it back illustrates how reckless people were with their spending during this time. People's financial resources were overextended due to this unrestrained consumerism, which inevitably created the conditions for an economic collapse. Additionally, in “If Hoover Fails”, Elmer Davis states, “In past times…(w)hen people had bought all they could afford they stopped buying… We, it seems, have abolished the business cycle; when people have bought all they could afford they go on buying…” (Document 10). Similarly to the previous example, people were impulsive and did not have any second thought about any of their spending, as they believed the money would come back to them someway. However, it did the complete opposite and was sort of like a snowball effect, the debt kept on piling up until they had literally nothing left, ultimately leading to the Great Depression.
Another main cause of this major economic hardship was the stock market. This can be seen when John T. Raskob, a well known investor and former executive at General Motors, encouraged everyone to invest a good amount of their money into the stock market instead of putting it into savings and promising that they would become rich (Document 2). This perfectly sums up what everyone was beliveving in and doing during the 1930s. People were speculating that the stock market was going to stay up and increase their income immensly, however it ended up doing the exact opposite. If one small thing went wrong, all of their money would be lost, which is exactly what happened to countless people and led to the Great Depression. Furthermore, according to the New York Times on October 29, 1929, “Sixteen Leading [Companies] Down $2,893,520,108” (Document 3). With a good majority of America having their lots of their money invested in stock, seeing this headline instantly created panic and created an urgency of selling and withdrawing from the market. This made the economic situation even worse, leading to the terrible time period. Overall, the stock market caused a series of events that eventually led to the Great Depression
Lastly, the unbalanced workforce significantly contributed to the onset of the Great Depression as well. The overproduction of goods in industries like manufacturing as well as the countless deficient incomes serves as proof for this. According to the table from “The Big Change” written by Frederick Lewis Allen, 60% of American families made less than or equal to $2000, while $2000 was the requirement to meet basic needs of living (Document 9). Over half of America was either in poverty or right on the borderline of it due to them not making enough money. This was because of the inumerable amount of workers that were fired in response to business trying to save money. Not only was this a clear imbalance of the workforce, it was a thing that created a life full of struggle for many Americans. Another example can be seen in the Saint Paul Daily News in April 1930, which shows a man, depicted as being the farm industry, tripping over a bag, described as being overproduction, and spilling a bag full of coins, labeled as prices (Document 11). This cartoon implies that there was a massive supply of commodities in the agricultural sector compared to the demand, which caused prices to drop and put farmers in a difficult financial situation. The overproduction of agricultural goods demonstrates the workforce's unequal situation, as supply could not keep up with demand, causing companies to lose loads of money and have to lay off lots of employees. As a result, increasing the inequality of the workforce accelerated the economy's decline and contributed to the Great Depression.