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mswartz · Joined: 07 May 2010 Posts: 43

Please read (from your textbook):
* "New President, New Deal" pp. 543-549
* "Shift In Focus" pp. 551-553
* "New Deal Impact" pp. 561-562

Post: "Was the New Deal an effective solution to the Great Depression?' Please post at least two times (once on Thursday night, at leat once over the weekend). Try to get a good, specific conversation going by checking in often on the forum and adding your thoughts...

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mswartz · Joined: 07 May 2010 Posts: 43

No, I don't think the New Deal was an effective solution to the Great Depression. Many good social outcomes came out of the New Deal, such as social security. However the "New deal programs failed to achieve a complete economic recovery largely because Roosevelt never spent enough money to generate rapid economic growth." (page 561) The economy did not pick up in result of the New Deal and the wealth in the U.S was still not distributed evenly. While many good outcomes came out the of the New Deal, the economy as a whole in the U.S stayed relatively the same.

zatkinsweltman · Joined: 09 May 2010 Posts: 27

I also don't think that the new deal was a solution to the great depression, and good quote by the way. also think that although there were some future benefits, that benefit us today, nothing seemed to help them get out of a depression. Basically the depression was that nobody had any money and were out of jobs. It seemed to me that roosevelt put a lot of money and energy that he got from taxes to make groups, some of which succeeded, some of which didn't, which would help give jobs and regulate how much people worked. It would pay back the poor and it seemed like everything would work. The problem was that the money they used was money that was taken back. There was no extra money so everyone just remained poor. I would have thought that these groups would have helped, but with the lack of money to spend, there was really no good way out until spending could happen and the war came.

shawks · Joined: 12 May 2010 Posts: 12

I actually think that the New Deal did help the Great Depression. Sometimes, it might have seemed to the Conservatives that "government intervention was the problem rather than the solution because it undermined individualism and created an expensive and overbearing government". I think that the government needed to be "overbearing" during the Depression because it was hard to unify a whole country without a strong leader to improve the whole overall economy. The New Deal did things like bring the Tennessee Valley Authority to construct dams and powerplants from cheap electricity throughout a large portion of the South. It also gave jobs to 4 million poor people to do helpful conservation projects such as planting trees. Another thing that it did was give bright but poor high school students the money necessary for colleges. The New Deal was good in a lot of ways.

Jaehyouk · Joined: 07 May 2010 Posts: 22

Although, New Deal tried to get out of the Great Depression, overal i don't think it contributed much to escape from it (At this point i only have read the first half so i don't know yet). Accoding to my book, Originally, focus of the New Deal was helping people, it wasn't for reviving economy. It also did bad job on helping people, because if one gets satisfied than some other guy become unstisfied. Roosebelt made many new policies, but i beileve Tennessee Valley Authority is only thing that actually helped the economy (I will write better one tomorrow).

BChangy · Joined: 07 May 2010 Posts: 33

I would have to disagree with the statment said prior to mine ( or may e I'm just interpreting everything wrong). The New Deal was to revive Americans after the Great Depression. It was Roosevelts intent to bring America at a comfortable place in the world financialy. He did not intend on changing the status of the classes or bring them on the same level (to create socialisim, as sum believe he wanted). Roosevelt seeked to help the entire nation, from the rural farmer to the "forgotten man" and the once wealthy business owner. The new deal was efficient in helping all however the attention demanded from each made it impossible to satisfy all.
I'm glad that Zack pointed out the several Groups made by Roosevelt to make the New Deal possible. It seemed as though there was/ could have been a strange circle of poverty floating around. If people are working then they are being taxed, the money that is comming from these taxes go to the groups funding and the group with that funding are used to help not just the workers but the unemployed and business men. It's a wiered cycle that adds on more people everytime. The o ly question is how far can those taxes spread to help the entire country suffering from the Depression?

malexander · Joined: 07 May 2010 Posts: 20

I agree with Briana that the New Deal and all it's counterparts was an effective solution to the Great Depression. Even though it didn't end the depression completely, it made a large amount of progress and made connections that had never been made before in America. It connected society and people to the government and the president, and saw this as " solutions to the nation's problems" (p. 562). It is also almost impossible to satisfy an entire country, especially when in a depression. With all the institutions put in place by Roosevelt many of the issues of the depression were addressed, and he tried to help all people by creating jobs for all men, women, and young adults. Roosevelt also had schools built and employed teachers, and also gave aid to attend high school and college to over 200, 000 students in 1936.

lstrickman · Joined: 06 May 2010 Posts: 20

Although I don't think that the new deal addressed every problem that the US was dealing with during the depression, I think it was an effective solution for the depression. It set the stage for the economy to improve further, and for the US to become more powerful in WWII. It also succeeded at providing immediate relief to people who were homeless and hungry. As people have said, Roosevelt did not deal with any issues of distribution of wealth or inequalities within the population. However, he did seem to include everyone in his relief programs, so I think he did as much as he could have. I think that his support for the "forgotten man", and his efforts to provide jobs and money to women and minorities were pretty remarkable, considering the mind frame of some people during that time.
That being said, I noticed in the reading that some of the programs he created ended up having conflicts. The government intervened so much that they ended up working badly together. An example of this would be the NRA and the AAA-- as it says in the text, "farmers complained that NRA-generated price increases at up any AAA benefits they received." Although it wasn't mentioned that much, I feel like these programs must have contradicted each other a lot.

Maddy.King · Joined: 07 May 2010 Posts: 23

i think the new deal was successful in some ways, and unsuccessful in others. From the new deal the WPA was created, which "employed over 2.1 million people a year" (552). The WPA helped to give many people their jobs back. Also, the Social Security Act of 1935 was created.
An area were the New Deal was unsuccessful was the rich. The New Deal "included relief for the poor and unemployed" (544), but left out the people who had money saved, or were not struggling as much as others, but still struggling.

Jessica.Santos · Joined: 07 May 2010 Posts: 21

Like most everyone who posted, i agree that the new deal was not effective. Someone mentioned that the text said that the purpose of the new deal was to help citizens, not the economy. So i feel like it did help in a sense that it created social security, but there was no boost or positive burst that it gave the economy. And to touch Maddy's point, i think that the idea was biased towards those who were not well off, instead of the people as a whole.

Eleanore Carson · Joined: 11 May 2010 Posts: 14

i feel that the new deal was not an effective solution to the Great Depression. i do feel though that it was an effective glue. each part of it kept the country together until the time when we joined the war. In the war we got to spend all the money that they wanted with out thought, or without as much precautions as in a time of peace. the money being spend jump started the economy. that relates directly to the quote that the first person to post included in their writing. There were many thing that came from it that still help us today, but non of it helped get out of the depression. Also, most of those things that were radical and new are now taken for granted like social security. But, the deal was necessary to keep the country together.

BChangy · Joined: 07 May 2010 Posts: 33

I think we need a clear idea of the New Deals purpose. Many people have said that it was to help the citizens but in what way? It seems as though some people are focusing on the ethical issues of the time and asking what about that, the new deal didn't cover that issue so then it wasn't sucessful.
I see the new deal as a sort of deal with Americans: the government will help everyone out finnancially and everyone has to contiune supporting the country as they always have ( through taxes And other sorts). The new deal was in everyone best intrest. Helping the everyday America would help them pay for thier dues to America Upkeep

BChangy · Joined: 07 May 2010 Posts: 33

We can disagree on this definition

Through a set of groups and acts aproved and created by Roosevelt the New Deal was created with the intent to push Americans to have no excuse but to thrive as a nation economically.

dokim · Joined: 07 May 2010 Posts: 23

During the US depression, the Roosevelt tried to save the US by using new deal policy. Some people say that new deal is not effective to solve the problem; however i disagree. I agree that new deal was an effective policy in order to solve the depression.
First, new deal solve the financial problem. Roosevelt closed the banks for moment which is called bank holiday and he supported and invested a lot of money for banks. Also, he convinced to citizens that it's is more safe to save the money in the bank. By his speech, the people started to invest their money into bank, so he could prevent the bankrupt of banks.
Second, he supported the farmers. He thought that the basic of the economy was agriculture. He passed the Agricultural Adjustment Act and it encouraged farmers to reduce production by paying them not to plant. As a result, recovery in ther ag5ricultural sector had clearly started.
Not only Roosevelt solved agriculture and financial systems, but he also encourage the relationship between labor-management and he provide for the economic welfare of the elderly.

hkwon · Joined: 07 May 2010 Posts: 24

The New deal is the major breakthrough led by Roosevelt in the fight against the great depression. Firstly, the Emergency Banking Act which only allows the believable banks to open assured citizens of the safety of their money. People who put their money under the matrix started saving money into banks so that most of commercial banks revived. Second, the Agricultural Adjustment Act which gives farmers incentives not to overproduce crops strengthened the purchase power. The great number of farmers got back to work. Third, the National Industrial Recovery Act established minimum wages and maximum hours of work as well as employed a lot of the jobless. This act actually guaranteed the right of workers. Based on the three acts made by the new deal, the economy in the United States of America incredibly recovered from the great depression.

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