Great Depression Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ==== World War II and recovery ==== [[File:WomanFactory1940s.jpg|thumb|A female factory worker in 1942, [[Fort Worth, Texas]]. Women entered the workforce as men were drafted into the armed forces.]] The common view among economic historians is that the Great Depression ended with the advent of [[World War II]]. Many economists believe that government spending on the war caused or at least accelerated recovery from the Great Depression, though some consider that it did not play a very large role in the recovery, though it did help in reducing unemployment.<ref name="Britannica" /><ref name="Galbraith">Referring to the effect of World War II spending on the economy, economist [[John Kenneth Galbraith]] said, "One could not have had a better demonstration of the Keynesian ideas." {{cite video |url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/commandingheights/lo/story/ch_menu.html |title=Commanding Heights, see chapter 6 video or transcript |date=2002 |medium=TV documentary |publisher=[[Public Broadcasting Service|PBS]] |location=U.S. |people=[[Daniel Yergin]], William Cran (writers / producer)}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Romer |first=Christina D. |author-link=Christina Romer |year=1992 |title=What Ended the Great Depression? |journal=Journal of Economic History |volume=52 |issue=4 |pages=757β784 |doi=10.1017/S002205070001189X |quote=fiscal policy was of little consequence even as late as 1942, suggests an interesting twist on the usual view that World War II caused, or at least accelerated, the recovery from the Great Depression.}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |last=Higgs |first=Robert |date=March 1, 1992 |title=Wartime Prosperity? A Reassessment of the U.S. Economy in the 1940s |journal=The Journal of Economic History |volume=52 |issue=1 |pages=41β60 |doi=10.1017/S0022050700010251 |issn=1471-6372 |s2cid=154484756}}</ref> The rearmament policies leading up to World War II helped stimulate the economies of Europe in 1937β1939. By 1937, unemployment in Britain had fallen to 1.5 million. The [[mobilization]] of manpower following the outbreak of war in 1939 ended unemployment.<ref name="Great Depression and World War II">[https://www.americaslibrary.gov/jb/wwii/jb_wwii_subj.html "Great Depression and World War II"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220124140816/https://www.americaslibrary.gov/jb/wwii/jb_wwii_subj.html|date=January 24, 2022}}. Library of Congress.</ref> The American mobilization for [[World War II]] at the end of 1941 moved approximately ten million people out of the civilian labor force and into the war.<ref>Selective Service System. (May 27, 2003). ''[http://www.sss.gov/induct.htm Induction Statistics. In Inductions (by year) from World War I Through the End of the Draft (1973)] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090507211238/http://www.sss.gov/induct.htm |date=May 7, 2009 }}''. Retrieved September 8, 2013.</ref> This finally eliminated the last effects from the Great Depression and brought the U.S. unemployment rate down below 10%.<ref name="Depression & World War II">[https://www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi/jb/wwii "Depression & WWII"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090625204217/https://www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi/jb/wwii|date=June 25, 2009}}. Americaslibrary.gov.</ref> World War II had a dramatic effect on many parts of the American economy.<ref name="Bloomberg">{{cite news|url=http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2011-12-16/how-did-world-war-ii-end-the-great-depression-echoes|publisher=Bloomberg|title=How Did World War II End the Great Depression?: Echoes|author=Hyman, Louis|author-link=Louis Hyman|date=December 16, 2011|access-date=August 25, 2015|archive-date=May 3, 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160503051054/http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2011-12-16/how-did-world-war-ii-end-the-great-depression-echoes|url-status=dead}}</ref> Government-financed capital spending accounted for only 5% of the annual U.S. investment in industrial capital in 1940; by 1943, the government accounted for 67% of U.S. capital investment.<ref name="Bloomberg"/> The massive war spending doubled economic growth rates, either masking the effects of the Depression or essentially ending the Depression. Businessmen ignored the mounting [[National debt of the United States|national debt]] and heavy new taxes, redoubling their efforts for greater output to take advantage of generous government contracts.<ref>Richard J. Jensen, [https://rjensen.people.uic.edu/causes-cures.pdf "The causes and cures of unemployment in the Great Depression"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211102124644/https://rjensen.people.uic.edu/causes-cures.pdf|date=November 2, 2021}}. ''Journal of Interdisciplinary History'' 19.4 (1989): 553β583.</ref> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! 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