Saturday, May 12, 2012
"Black Thursday"
"Black Thursday" was the name given to the 24th of October 1929, a day when businesses all over the U.S.A collapsed, leaving thousands of people ruined. This disaster was caused by the "Wall Street Crash" which took place in New York in 1929. As people were running out of money and they could see that the prices for the shares were coming down, in September, they started to rush to sell their shares so not to lose too much money on them. The poblem was that no one wanted to buy shares because the prices of the shares were going down very quickly. People hoped that maybe the banks would buy thier shares and keep the high value of it, but they couldn't as they were also short of money.
The origins of the financial crisis
The origins of the financial crisis began in 1919. They were caused because the Americans had over-produced,
consequently there was too much supply and not enough demand. As they couldn’t sell
their products, they weren’t receiving money, so people such as farmers couldn’t
buy. This crisis ended in 1929.
1920's decade
1920’S decade featured economic and for many people, care free
living. This decade began with a roar and ended with a big crash, giving it the
name “the booming twenties and the financial crash”.
After the First World War the economy was stagnant in Europe and
America. Europe had a great dependency on America, as they provided Europe with
cheap credit. After the war all the countries had to pay the money back to
America, but Germany had to pay much more, for the reparations of the warThis war benefited the U.S.A, as it increased industrial
production and gave American firms new markets lost by the Europeans. As it
also benefited the government, they increased salaries; wealthy people taxes
were cut, so that way they had more money, being able to invest it... This was
known as the “Booming Twenties”
Soon after that, their luck came to an end. Nearly half of the
American population were forced to live below the poverty line. Duties on
products were a must, to try and protect them from U.S. imports. As the
companies in the U.S were doing really well people started to borrow money to buy
lots of shares. Europeans depended on U.S. loans. This was known as the “financial
crash”
The First World War
The First World War was a conflict that
lasted four years, between 1914 and 1918. This was an armed confrontation
between Germany, the Austro-Hungary Empire, Turkey and Bulgaria against France,
England, Russia, Belgium, Serbia, Japan, Italy, Rumania, the USA and some other
countries.
The break out was the murder of the archduke Francisco Fernando, the next to the Austro-Hungary throne, in Saravejo, on June 28th 1914, however before this, many tensions had been created between the European powers because of the fighting for those places rich in raw materials and the colonies. The sum of all these tensions ended in the WWI.
The Great War finished four years later, which may seem to be a short period of time, but it was actually quite much and the results were terrible. Fortunateley, things could be solved thanks to the fourteen points of Woodrow Wilson[1], the last of these points suggested the creation of an organization between the nations to provide alternative solutions to wars[2].
Thanks to these fourteen pints, today we have the sexual equality, there is less racism and there are no wars as the Great War or the Second World War.
The break out was the murder of the archduke Francisco Fernando, the next to the Austro-Hungary throne, in Saravejo, on June 28th 1914, however before this, many tensions had been created between the European powers because of the fighting for those places rich in raw materials and the colonies. The sum of all these tensions ended in the WWI.
The Great War finished four years later, which may seem to be a short period of time, but it was actually quite much and the results were terrible. Fortunateley, things could be solved thanks to the fourteen points of Woodrow Wilson[1], the last of these points suggested the creation of an organization between the nations to provide alternative solutions to wars[2].
Thanks to these fourteen pints, today we have the sexual equality, there is less racism and there are no wars as the Great War or the Second World War.
The postwar period
The period after this war, was really hard
as the deadly victims were around 9 million in total. It also had a big impact
on the economy, the most affected were France, Russia and Belgium, however the
USA was not affected at all, in fact it became the creditor of all of them.
The treaty of Versailles
·
When the treaty of Versailles was
signed[1],
it established Germany as the guilty for the WWI, and as so, it was obligated
to: reduce all the army (aerial, marine and normal); renounce to their colonial
territories (which were shared between the winning nations); leave Russia;
leave and restore Belgium and France; pay for all the losses it had caused; and
the king William II was forced to abdicate. With this, Germany became a
Republic and in January of 1919 the Weimar Republic was created[2].
[1] June 28th 1919. Between Germany and the winning countries in the
Mirror room of the Versailles Palace. There were present the British Prime
Minister Lloyd George, the Italian Minister Giorgio Sonnino, the French
politician George Clemenceau and the USA president Woodrow Wilson.
[2] Gustav Stresseman: prime minister of the Weimar republic.
Democracy in danger
In this period of time, as a consequence of
the active participation of women and the “low classes” during the war, the
universal suffrage had to be accepted. On the other hand, many new parties
appeared, the most of them were radical as the socialists, the communists and
the social democrats.
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