Economists and historians view the events of the 1920s, the stock market boom and crash, the Great Depression and the New Deal, as being largely independent. This work presents an integrated, empirically-consistent view of this important period arguing that all of these events can be traced back to a paradigm technology shock, namely the electrification of U.S. industry from 1910 to 1926. The author goes from electrification through the stock market boom to the tariffs of the late 20s to the stock market crash and depression followed by the National Industrial Recovery Act in 1933.

This book presents an alternative view of the Stock Market Boom and Crash of 1929 as having resulted from government intervention, specifically from a case of flawed government policy in the form of the Republican party's 1928 election promise of an upward tariff revision―the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Bill. As such, the stock market in particular and the market mechanism in general were not to blame, government was. Where the market was to blame, however, was in its reaction to the massive technology shock that was electric power-based extremely-high-throughput, continuous-flow mass production techniques (EHTCFPT) pioneered at the Ford Motor Company's Highland Park plant in Detroit, Michigan. Specifically, aggregate income and expenditure failed to rise commensurately with vastly increased productive capacity, resulting in under income.

The day of October 24, 1929, will be forever remembered as "Black Thursday." On this day, stock prices plummeted. By the following Tuesday, Wall Street had suffered the worst stock market crash in history, changing the lives of millions of Americans. Fortunes and life savings were wiped out. People's confidence in business was shattered. After the crash, weaknesses that were already present in the U. S. economy raced out of control. Unemployment soared. Factories and stores closed. Poverty and despair settled over millions of Americans. The stock market crash of 1929 marked the end of a decade of prosperity as the nation found itself swept into the Great Depression. In The Stock Market Crash of 1929: Dawn of the Great Depression, author Mary Gow captures this important period in U. S. history through firsthand accounts and quotes. Also examined are subsequent economic crises, up to the present day. Book jacket.

An exploration of the causes and effects of the stock market crash of 1929.

Bachelor Thesis from the year 2009 in the subject Economics - History, grade: 1.3, Berlin School of Economics and Law, language: English, abstract: Within macroeconomics, economists agree that there were a number of contributing factors that led to the Great Depression. However, most of the discussion is about what was responsible for the depth and the length of this economic event. In the four years starting in the summer of 1929 until 1933,financial markets and institutions, labor markets as well as international currency and goods markets had stopped functioning and it seemed that economic and monetary policy remained helpless in that period. To analyze the Great Depression, Friedman and Schwartz supply one of the most critical but popular explanations. They focus on the monetary policy of the Federal Reserve System (hereinafter Fed) of the United States(hereinafter U.S.) since the Fed allowed a severe contraction in money supply in the period of 1929 – 1933, even though the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 delegated monetary actions by the Fed to avoid such monetary contraction. Friedman and Schwartz claim that the severeness of monetary contraction resulted from the Fed’s passive response to the banking panics in the 1930s when the public increased sharply its demand for currency. However, they admit that the Fed conducted a successful policy during most of the 1920s until a “shift in power within the system and the lack of understanding and experience of those individuals to whom the power shifted” occurred. Herein, they point to the death of Benjamin Strong the Governor of the New York Federal Reserve Bank who had the sagacity and leadership to take measures that would have avoided the Great Depression. Thus, they maintain that monetary contraction in the period of 1929 – 1933 induced the Great Depression due to a misguided policy by the Fed that was eventually in authority for the downturn in economic activity.

In the aftermath of the stock market crash of 1929, Yale University Economics Professor Irving Fisher remained steadfast in his view that the boom in prices had been warranted, pointing to the myriad innovations of the 1920s, including the introduction of the electric unit drive and utility-supplied power. Dismissed by most, this view has since given way to Alan Greenspan’s view of irrational exuberance. This book presents a series of contemporary and period writings which rehabilitate the fundamentals view, showing why Irving Fisher was right. Whereas Fisher was unable to provide a convincing narrative for the crash, these writings point to the Hoover Administration’s tariff initiative, the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Bill, as the key element which contributed to both the boom and the crash.

Explores the 1929 Stock Market Crash and how that event has sculpted societies, the sciences, and politics.