Life Did Get Better For Many Americans In the 1930’S – To What Extent Was This Due To Roosevelt’S New Deal?
Life Did Get Better for Many Americans in the 1930's - to What Extent Was This Due to Roosevelt's New Deal?
The New deal was put into place in 1933; it was a government scheme to create jobs, by spending money on work schemes such as building roads and dams, and also to help the unemployed and poor. The scheme was based on the idea that once people were earning wages, they would begin to buy goods, businesses would begin to revive, they would then employ workers, theses workers in turn would earn money and therefore spending it in the economy, and so on. Thus meaning that the downward spiral caused by the depression would be changed into an upwards spiral, boosting the lives of U.S. citizens.
The New Deal helped many American's; the Federal Emergency Relief Act (FERA) provided $500 million in benefits to the poor and the unemployed. Another scheme, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) helped the economy revive in two ways, it employed young men and some women between the ages of 18 - 25. The money they earned helped to revive the economy when they re-invested in it, as well as this, the work they did helped the agricultural market, since it included things such as planting trees to stop soil erosion.
Another way in which the New Deal helped the Agricultural economy was through the agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) of 1933, it meant that crops were destroyed and animals slaughtered, in order to make prices rise, therefore enabling farmers to sell at a profit again, thus improving the conditions of farmers lives.
A further technique by which the New Deal helped farmers and people living in farming valleys was via the Tennessee Valley authority. The scheme was intended to provide cheap electricity, stop floods and make the soil fertile. The scheme worked, by 1943, 80% of valley farms transferred from kerosene lamps to electricity.
The Second part of the new Deal, which began in 1935 greatly worked to improve the lives of ordinary U.S. citizens. It included the Social Security Act (SSA), this began the first national system for helping old citizens through a pension scheme, it also provided ...
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A further technique by which the New Deal helped farmers and people living in farming valleys was via the Tennessee Valley authority. The scheme was intended to provide cheap electricity, stop floods and make the soil fertile. The scheme worked, by 1943, 80% of valley farms transferred from kerosene lamps to electricity.
The Second part of the new Deal, which began in 1935 greatly worked to improve the lives of ordinary U.S. citizens. It included the Social Security Act (SSA), this began the first national system for helping old citizens through a pension scheme, it also provided benefit for the unemployed, and this improved the lives of ordinary citizens.
Other policies of the New Deal which improved the lives of many American's during the 1930's were the Work's Progress Administration (WPA) which provided employment, by schemes such as building schools, hospitals and roads, as well as finding assignments for writers artists and photographers. This improved lives by providing jobs, and therefore money to citizens, as well as good schools and hospitals to increase their living standards. Also the Wagner act of 1935 improved lives for workers living in the 1930's, it gave every worker the right to join a union, in order to enhance their working standards. The act also set up the National Labour Relations Board to punish employers who did not recognise worker's rights.
Still, despite this there were many limitations to the New deal, which refrained the lives of many American's from getting better. Despite authorities such as the CCC, TVA and WPA helping in getting American's back to work unemployment still remained high and women and black workers were not given as fair a chance as white male workers. This was mainly due to the fact that the majority of black workers were neither skilled nor unionised, so the policies of the New Deal did not affect them very much, though the black workers it did affect, it mainly did so in a negative way. For example when crops were destroyed through the AAA the compensation given only reached the people at the top - the land owners, the workers - mainly blacks lost their jobs in exchange, since the less crops there were the less work their was to be done. 20, 000 blacks lost their jobs due to taking land out of production. Also black people, and women were still paid less than men, even if they did the same job as men. They were only used because they received a lower pay.
Another example of the limitations of the New Deal was that despite the Emergency Banking ACT (EBA), which helped to re-open banks, trust in banks was not yet fully restored, and investment still only reached 75% of former levels.
The greatest limitation of the New Deal was the opposition to it's policies, it received opposition from campaigners for State's Rights, which objected to schemes like the TVA that forced them to co-operate in the Federal Government's plan to build dams across seven states, it believed that the right of states to make their own laws was being taken over by the state government. Opposition such as this slowed down the policies of the New Deal from coming into place.
Other objection came from the Supreme Court, it decided that many of Roosevelt's deals were unconstitutional - this meant they were illegal. When Roosevelt threatened to retire judges even the general public turned against him, they thought he was interfering too much, so the idea was abandoned. Fortunately for the New Deal some judges retired anyway, and new younger judges supported Roosevelt. This delayed many policies, but it was overcome eventually.
One major group, which made a strong barrier against policies of the New Deal, was rich business men such as Al Smith and John Davis and wealthy organisations such as the American Liberty League, they did not like the interference of the New Deal, they opposed it for giving support to workers, and also for choosing to help the poor although he was rich himself. Although Roosevelt challenged big business it remained very powerful and was able to undermine the policies of the New Deal.
The consequences of opposition groups were that after the problem with the Supreme Court in 1936 Roosevelt became more cautious, and in 1937 since prosperity seemed to be returning Roosevelt cut the New Deal budget, this was exactly what Conservatives wanted. Many workers employed by the New Deals own organisations were laid off, this cut in spending triggered cuts throughout the economy, and the downward spiral in the economy began once again. This recession meant that Roosevelt was badly affected, in the1937 congressional elections the Republicans did well, this meant that it became much harder for Roosevelt to push his reforms through congress. Still, Roosevelt was still popular with ordinary elections, he was re-elected with a big majority in 1940, but now America's attention became focused on the outbreak of war in Europe.
The war helped to improve people's lives and the economy through providing jobs to a large majority of American's, men to fight in the war and women to work in factories making ammunition, this helped greatly to reduce unemployment and revive the economy
For those people whose lives did change in the majority of the 1930's it was due to the New Deal, although the new Deal did not help everybody. Still it was not the only factor contributing to the improved living standards, the war played an important role in improving the economy and the lives of US citizens towards the late 1930's, and in the early 1940's.
