Economic problems were the main reason the governments of the Weimar era failed Discuss.

        The damage done to Germany’s economic state because of the reparations they were forced to pay, discouraged market loans, and Germany made a futile attempt to pay back these reparations and fix the economic crisis through Quantative easing.  This only served to create hyperinflation which drastically worsened Germany’s financial state. By august 1923 a US dollar was worth 1 million marks. Having already worsened the economic state Weimar called for a currency reset and replaced the old currency with a new one called the Rentenmark; this allowed them to begin paying reparations again.

        In October 1929 the Wall Street crash occurred, which led to a worldwide recession. This particularly effected the Weimar government because they were so dependent on loans from American banks. The crash led Germany being made to repay its loans to the United States. The Wall Street crash had a devastating effect to the already fragile economic state in the Weimar republic.  In the great depression following the Wall Street crash many people suffered. People could not afford to live in proper conditions and had little money for necessities such as food.

        Although the economic problems in Germany were a huge factor in the failure of the Weimar government it was not the only reason for the failure. There were many problems with the Weimar republic aside from the financial trouble Germany was in. the constitution of the government was weak in many ways. The voting system was that of proportional representation, therefore one party could never get a majority and opposing party’s were always in government together, this lead to arguments within the government.  Also in the constitution of the Weimar government it was stated that there was to be a president as head of state, which was elected every seven years and could take control of the country in an emergency situation. There was also to be a chancellor to act as head of the government. He needed support of the government and was appointed by the president. This had major problems, as the chancellor was always bound by majority vote and was always reliant upon others, and made the chancellor a weak figure.

          To conclude I believe that the economic problems Germany had during this period was the reason for the failing of the Weimar government. There was much unrest within the German community about the economic situation and many people wanted to see a new constitution to replace the Weimar government. There were big problems with the structure and constitution of the Weimar government that made the government a weak system, as well as the economic problems. Also many German people were already unhappy with the current political system as it wasn’t traditional of what had previously been set up in Germany and many saw it as a system that took away German prestige. Despite the problems within the government and constitution  I believe the main problems with the Weimar government were the economic problems that plagued Germany for many years, and could not be solved by the Weimar government.