Transcript The Dirty Thirties

The Dirty Thirties
A Decade of Despair
The Stock Market Crash
Tuesday October 29, 1929
Causes of the Crash
1. Buying on margin: buying stocks on
borrowed money with the hope that the stock
will rise significantly in a short time,
2. Speculation: The belief that a stock will rise;
stockholder can re-pay the loan after selling
his/her shares.
Causes of the
Depression
1. Protectionism
Protective Tariffs: Tariffs are duties collected on
goods coming into a country.
•A country can protect home industries from the
competition of foreign goods by discouraging imports
through protective tariffs.
•When the United States began protectionist policies this
.
caused other countries to lose
their export markets (e.g.
wheat from Canada).
2. Slowdown in World
Trade

Decrease in production
led to layoffs in
factories

Less spending on
consumer goods
•Further decrease in
production
•led to additional layoffs in
factories
Canada and the
Depression
 illustrated a major weakness in the
Canadian Economy; a dependence on the
export of primary resources
 Mainly wheat (40% of world demand)and
newsprint (65% of world demand)
 A slowdown in the world markets led to
lost jobs
 Many Canadians were forced onto
government assistance (Pogey)
Canada and the Depression
• 1 in 5 Canadians became dependent on
government relief (Pogey).
• 30% of the Labour Force was unemployed.
• The effects of unemployment were very severe
because employment insurance and welfare
payments did not yet exist.
Why didn’t more people collect public
relief?
•Pogey was lower than the lowest paying
jobs in order to discourage people from
wanting to be on it.
•Government made it difficult for the
unemployed to collect “pogey”:
•Men had to wait in line for hours and declare
their financial failure publicly
Unemployment
Loss of jobs and
incomes
Poverty
Poor are
evicted from
homes
Despair
Loss of hope,
dignity,
respect…suicide
rate jumps
Immigration
 In 1931, the government put a
complete stop to immigration.
 First 1/2 of the depression saw
the deportation of
10,000immigrants
Responses to the Depression
 PM King was not ready for the depression and believed
the economy would improve in time.
 When desperate Canadians began to ask him for help he
said it was the responsibility of the provinces and
municipalities to offer aid.
 Unfortunately, many municipalities were bankrupted by
the depression.
 PM King is a Liberal (Grit), when the Conservatives asked
why some provinces were not being helped, King replied
that he would not give a “a five-cent piece to a Tory
(Conservative) provincial government.
 In 1930, King lost the election to the Conservative R.B.
Bennett.
King v. Bennett
R.B. Bennett was brought into power when his opposition,
Mackenzie King, reported that he would not give "a five-cent
piece" to "any Tory Provincial Government".
In the election, of 1930, the conservatives got 137 seats in
parliament and the Liberal representation was 88 seats.
R.B Bennett
William Lyon Mackenzie King
Liberal, Prime Minister
Conservative,
Prime Minister
Many Canadians needed help…
• Government relief (Pogey)
•Not easy to get…had to prove your hardship
and swear they did not own anything of value
• Private and Religious Charities set up
soup kitchens and distributed clothing
• Despite the help, many chose suicide
over destitution
Bennett’s Response to the
Depression
 Increase Tariffs - no help
 Banned Communist Party
 Relief Camps
The Conservative government of Bennett set up work
camps to prevent the growing unrest among this
wandering mass of young unemployed workers.
The camps were located in remote areas such as
northern Ontario and B.C.'s interior. Inmates called these
camps "slave camps".
They lived on war surplus clothing, bunked in tar-paper
shacks, ate army rations and were forced to work six and
a half days a week for twenty cents a day
Relief Camp
Relief Camp
LETTERS TO BENNETT
Dear Sir: I am writing you as a last resource to see if I
cannot, through your aid, obtain a position and at last,
after a period of more than two years, support myself.
The fact is this day I am faced with starvation and I see
no possibility for counteracting it or even averting it
temporarily.
I have applied for every position that I heard about but
there were always so many girls who applied that it
was impossible to get work... First I ate three very light
meals a day; then two and then one. During the past
two weeks I have eaten only toast and a drunk a cup of
tea every other day.
Day after day I pass a delicatessen and the food in the
window look oh, so good! So tempting and I'm so
hungry!...The stamp which carries this letter to you
will represent the last three cents I have in the world,
yet before I will stoop to dishonour my family, my
character or my God, I will drown myself.
Government Responses
To The Depression
• Government would have to take a more
active role in caring for the poor.
• Unemployment insurance, sick benefits,
child benefits, and welfare were proposed
during the Depression and implemented
some time later.
• Laissez faire* treatment of the economy
was dead. (*Leave it alone)
• Governments began to manage the
economy through tax policy, monetary
policy, and fiscal policy.
Protesters ride trains
on their way to Ottawa
On to Ottawa Trek
 1935 - 1000 camp workers from BC plan
to go to Ottawa to protest the conditions
in the camps.
 They grew in numbers along the way, riding
railcars toward Ottawa.
 When they arrived in Regina only the
leaders were allowed to go on to
Ottawa.
 Bennett declared the leaders “radicals
and troublemakers” and did not hear them.
 Meanwhile in Regina, the RCMP cleared
the rest of the trekkers; one man was
killed and 130 arrested.
But they didn’t all make
it to Ottawa
Communists?
The Dust Bowl
 Drought on the prairies between
1928-1936
 Combined with the collapse of the
world wheat market the result was
disaster
 Wind caused constant dust storms
No chance…