Friday, December 10, 2010
Table of Contents
I have linked to each part of my final project so that it can be read in any order desired.
I-Search Essay: Depression and Recession
Some Short Notes About the Depression and Recession
How My Original Compositions Reflect My Research
The Road to Recovery
Cooperation
Annotated Bibliography
For further information about the Civilian Conservation Corps, I have also included the full interview I conducted here.
I-Search Essay: Depression and Recession
Ever since the Recession started, everyone has compared it to the Great Depression. Journalists always introduce it as “the worst economic downturn since the Depression.” I began to wonder how alike the Great Depression and Great Recession really were. In my research, I hope to discover some of the similarities and differences between the Depression and the Recession. I will explore: what caused the Depression and the Recession, what the government did to try to fix the economy, what ultimately ended the Depression, and what possibilities we should consider in order to end the Recession.
Before I began my research, I thought that the stock market crash caused the Depression, and nothing else. But the stock market crash was just part of the problem, and more the culmination of many different factors. We can consider the crash as acting like a firework explosion after the fuse is lit. In October 1929, the world became transfixed by the bright display of the plummeting stocks. The economic situation got much worse after the crash. I found out that the Great Depression and the Recession shared similarities in that they both occurred because of a combination of bank failures and stock market crashes, as well as rampant debt (Ferguson 36). People believed that they could buy whatever they wanted, even if they had no way to pay for it. They just had to get a loan from a bank. The banks gave loans to anyone, even people who had bad credit and no knowledge on how to manage money. The people who got the loan did not consider how they would pay back the bank, and so these people spiraled down ever deeper into debt. In the article, “The End of Prosperity?” author Niall Ferguson tells us that recently, the biggest increase in debt came from people investing in real estate. “The result was a bubble; at its peak, average U.S. house prices were rising at 20% a year. Then—as bubbles always do—it burst” (Ferguson 36).
The government usually uses two main strategies to combat economic slumps. Sometimes politicians will use a strategy that involves financial stimulus. This includes giving tax cuts and financial stimulus packages to taxpayers, and bailing out financial institutions by propping them up with emergency funds so they do not go bankrupt. The other strategy involves public works projects. These projects operate by employing people to do a variety of jobs for the government, such as roadwork, construction work, and conservation work. Both strategies cost a lot of money. And spending money always causes problems in the government. In the case of spending money to combat an economic slump, government response gets slowed down by a lack of cooperation. One camp always thinks that we will spend too much money, and the other camp always thinks we will spend too little. I saw that today we have a different philosophy of the government’s budgeting than we did in the time of the Great Depression. Today the government rarely keeps a well balanced budget, but in the 1930s, politicians thought of a balanced budget as an extremely important thing in the government. As a result, the politicians reined in government spending. But reining in spending meant programs to help people got cut, which made the situation worse. In 1938 the government changed its approach and President Roosevelt got Congress to pass a five billion dollar relief program (“American President: Franklin Delano Roosevelt”). That is a lot of money to spend today, and it was an enormous amount to spend back then. Congress became upset when the relief program didn’t help much. According to today’s economists, the problem lay in that President Roosevelt still did not spend enough money for his plan to work. The theory of putting money in American’s pockets was sound; it was only the execution that needed work (“American President: Franklin Delano Roosevelt”). In today’s recession, lawmakers have certainly thrown a lot of money at the problem. In 2008, the government gave banks and other financial institutions hundreds of billions of dollars in bailout money in an effort to prevent them from falling apart (Boone 20).
I noticed one significant difference between the responses in the Great Depression and the Recession. This difference has to do with the public works projects I mentioned earlier. President Obama has implemented stimulus funds which include public works (Clemmitt 155), but he has not used public works to the degree that President Roosevelt did. Public works projects were one of the biggest strategies President Roosevelt used in the Depression. He had many different types of these programs, such as the Works Progress Administration (WPA), and the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). I have a personal connection to the CCC in particular. My great-grandfather John James Lovas Jr. was a member of the CCC. I interviewed my grandmother about her father’s time there (You can read the full interview here).
She said that he joined the CCC “because there were no other jobs” (Ramos). The times were so bad that even a healthy young man was unable to find any job, never mind one that paid well. The CCC used a military model, provided food, lodging, and a small salary, and gave the young men tools for good work habits.
The men worked in the National Parks. My great-grandfather got sent to the National Parks in Idaho and Wyoming. He spoke often to my grandmother about his time in Grand Teton Park. He fought forest fires and planted trees. The CCC really shaped his love of nature. One of the pictures my grandmother has from him shows the men attending Mass by Jackson Lake, with the Teton Mountains in the distance (Ramos). The CCC could not employ everyone, but it changed the lives of those it did employ, despite criticisms from some who said that public works projects did not do enough.
The Great Depression eventually ended because of World War Two. No one cared about spending too much money after the attack on Pearl Harbor. The war created the jobs and spending needed to jump start the economy (“American President: Franklin Delano Roosevelt”). Meanwhile, in the present day, we still struggle with the economy. According to the calculations of the National Bureau of Economic Research, the Recession officially ended in June 2009, and now we just have to recover from the recession (Business Cycle Dating Committee). But we have had a sluggish, weak recovery. We have spent so much money on wars in the Middle East, and yet we hesitate when it comes to spending money to fix the economy. We have not really tried public works projects because of fears the projects would cost too much money. Bailouts and financial stimulus packages have only passed legislation after a large amount of bickering and deal-making in the government. Apparently, we have no problem spending as much money as possible when we fear an attack from the outside, but when a bad economy attacks us from the inside, we suddenly cannot decide how much to spend and where to spend it. There is a distinct lack of cooperation between the parties in the government, so any action towards fixing the economy takes a long time to get accomplished. Until we learn to work with each other instead of against each other, nothing will get better.
In conclusion, I have found many similarities between the Great Depression and the Recession. The beginnings of both share amazing similarities, when people went deep into debt and invested unwisely, and financial institutions failed, causing stocks to crash. They both used some similar strategies. But there also remain some important differences between the two. Unlike the Depression, we have not used public works projects much at all, and instead we have relied mainly on bailouts. I also realized that we cannot recover in the same way that the US recovered from the Depression. War will not fix this. Cooperation within the government would prove most effective in fixing our problems, but politicians will not work together unless the public pushes them to do so. The Recession has tangled the economy thoroughly. Any plan we can come up with will take a long time to untangle it.
Before I began my research, I thought that the stock market crash caused the Depression, and nothing else. But the stock market crash was just part of the problem, and more the culmination of many different factors. We can consider the crash as acting like a firework explosion after the fuse is lit. In October 1929, the world became transfixed by the bright display of the plummeting stocks. The economic situation got much worse after the crash. I found out that the Great Depression and the Recession shared similarities in that they both occurred because of a combination of bank failures and stock market crashes, as well as rampant debt (Ferguson 36). People believed that they could buy whatever they wanted, even if they had no way to pay for it. They just had to get a loan from a bank. The banks gave loans to anyone, even people who had bad credit and no knowledge on how to manage money. The people who got the loan did not consider how they would pay back the bank, and so these people spiraled down ever deeper into debt. In the article, “The End of Prosperity?” author Niall Ferguson tells us that recently, the biggest increase in debt came from people investing in real estate. “The result was a bubble; at its peak, average U.S. house prices were rising at 20% a year. Then—as bubbles always do—it burst” (Ferguson 36).
The government usually uses two main strategies to combat economic slumps. Sometimes politicians will use a strategy that involves financial stimulus. This includes giving tax cuts and financial stimulus packages to taxpayers, and bailing out financial institutions by propping them up with emergency funds so they do not go bankrupt. The other strategy involves public works projects. These projects operate by employing people to do a variety of jobs for the government, such as roadwork, construction work, and conservation work. Both strategies cost a lot of money. And spending money always causes problems in the government. In the case of spending money to combat an economic slump, government response gets slowed down by a lack of cooperation. One camp always thinks that we will spend too much money, and the other camp always thinks we will spend too little. I saw that today we have a different philosophy of the government’s budgeting than we did in the time of the Great Depression. Today the government rarely keeps a well balanced budget, but in the 1930s, politicians thought of a balanced budget as an extremely important thing in the government. As a result, the politicians reined in government spending. But reining in spending meant programs to help people got cut, which made the situation worse. In 1938 the government changed its approach and President Roosevelt got Congress to pass a five billion dollar relief program (“American President: Franklin Delano Roosevelt”). That is a lot of money to spend today, and it was an enormous amount to spend back then. Congress became upset when the relief program didn’t help much. According to today’s economists, the problem lay in that President Roosevelt still did not spend enough money for his plan to work. The theory of putting money in American’s pockets was sound; it was only the execution that needed work (“American President: Franklin Delano Roosevelt”). In today’s recession, lawmakers have certainly thrown a lot of money at the problem. In 2008, the government gave banks and other financial institutions hundreds of billions of dollars in bailout money in an effort to prevent them from falling apart (Boone 20).
I noticed one significant difference between the responses in the Great Depression and the Recession. This difference has to do with the public works projects I mentioned earlier. President Obama has implemented stimulus funds which include public works (Clemmitt 155), but he has not used public works to the degree that President Roosevelt did. Public works projects were one of the biggest strategies President Roosevelt used in the Depression. He had many different types of these programs, such as the Works Progress Administration (WPA), and the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). I have a personal connection to the CCC in particular. My great-grandfather John James Lovas Jr. was a member of the CCC. I interviewed my grandmother about her father’s time there (You can read the full interview here).
 |
| John James Lovas Jr. |
In conclusion, I have found many similarities between the Great Depression and the Recession. The beginnings of both share amazing similarities, when people went deep into debt and invested unwisely, and financial institutions failed, causing stocks to crash. They both used some similar strategies. But there also remain some important differences between the two. Unlike the Depression, we have not used public works projects much at all, and instead we have relied mainly on bailouts. I also realized that we cannot recover in the same way that the US recovered from the Depression. War will not fix this. Cooperation within the government would prove most effective in fixing our problems, but politicians will not work together unless the public pushes them to do so. The Recession has tangled the economy thoroughly. Any plan we can come up with will take a long time to untangle it.
Some Short Notes About the Depression and the Recession
- The Great Depression and the Recession both started after a combination of bank failures, stock market crashes, and rampant debt (Ferguson 36).
- Both times, the government used financial stimulus to help the economy.
- President Roosevelt got Congress to pass a five billion dollar relief program in 1938, which did not help much (“American President: Franklin Delano Roosevelt”).
- In 2008, banks and other types of financial institutions got hundreds of billions of dollars in bailout money from the government (Boone 20).
- Franklin D. Roosevelt used many different types of public-works projects (“American President: Franklin Delano Roosevelt”).
- Public-works projects have not truly been used as a strategy in the present day. The closest we have come are stimulus funds which include public works (Clemmitt 155).
- The Great Depression eventually ended because of World War II, which created jobs and increased spending (“American President: Franklin Delano Roosevelt”).
- According to the calculations of the National Bureau of Economic Research, the recession ended and recovery began in June 2009. However, the economy is still far from normal (Business Cycle Dating Committee).
How My Original Compositions Reflect My Research
The essay I wrote titled The Road to Recovery is written as a speech with a bit of memoir. Because I wrote it as a speech, I used more to be verbs than usual, since I noticed that most of the speeches I read during the course also used a lot of to be verbs. The speech I wrote compares the feelings of depression about the economy in the 1930s to the feelings of depression in the present day. I also use information from the National Bureau of Economic Research, as well as other sources. The premise of my speech is that even though the economy is bad, we need to get past our fears.
The other essay I wrote, titled Cooperation, is more like a manifesto. My premise in this essay is that the best way towards fixing the economy lies in getting the political parties to cooperate with each other instead of fighting. I use a relevant quote from President John F. Kennedy about cooperation. I mention that President Franklin Roosevelt was good at getting Congress to pass legislation. I acknowledge that cooperation will not be easy, but still say that cooperation is more effective than one political party trying to drown the other one out.
Both essays relate well to my research because both relate the past to the present. I incorporated my research into the essays. Both examine some of the effects of economic turmoil, and both offer ideas on how to proceed.
The Road to Recovery
When I was eight years old, I nearly drowned at a pool party. I thought that I could swim, and I did not realize that the water was so deep. I ended up at the hospital. I did not get badly injured, and only stayed at the hospital for part of a day, but for years after that accident I had great fear around deep water. The accident affected my behavior, even in situations where I knew that I had plenty of people around to keep me safe. Even today, years after the accident, although I do not fear swimming in pools anymore, I am still not comfortable in them. The fear remains. Recently, everyone had this same experience with the economy. We did not know what we were getting ourselves into, and we almost drowned because of this. Today, we remain bogged down in economic difficulties. Recovery refuses to come easily, and part of our troubles stem from psychological issues. We do not know what will happen next, and that frightens us.
Technically, we may not be experiencing a depression, but we are depressed. According to the IBD/TIPP Economic Optimism Index,consumer gloom in July reached its highest level since the recession was at its worst, amid fears that the expansion remains too weak to create many jobs (Stoddard 1). Every day brings another round of news about the current financial climate, and the normally optimistic American spirit keeps sinking lower into a pit of pessimism. Unless we figure out a way to get out of that pit, the economy will never completely recover.
In this economy, I keep seeing a case of history repeating itself. Optimism and rapid economic growth dominated the 1920s. So much so that this time period gained the nickname of “The Roaring Twenties.” The economy seemed like it would just keep going up and up forever. But then in 1929 it all came crashing down into a depression. In recent years, we experienced this same rapid expansion and contraction. Whenever the economy contracts so suddenly, we experience a rise in depressed behavior. “During the Great Depression in the United States, suicide rates hit a 99-year high (of 17 per 100,000 people)” (Elmhirst 26). When the recession began, suicides went up again. In the time between 2007 and 2008, calls to the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline increased by 36 per cent (Elmhirst 27). It is almost scary how close the parallels are between the present and the Great Depression. Unless we want our economy to remain awful for a decade, similar to the Great Depression, we need to get our act together.
From what I have observed, a vicious cycle surrounds our economy: people either fearing for their jobs or unemployed decide to save more and spend less money. Because less people spend money, companies do not want to hire, and may lay off employees. These former employees then spend less money than they used to. So the economic carousel goes around and around again.
I am not saying that consumers should start spending willy-nilly and that businesses should go out and hire as many people as possible. That course of action would not help, and in fact might make the economic situation even worse. But just because we are in a shaky economy does not mean that we should stay out of the pool for fear of drowning. If we can keep calm, then we need not worry about the future. According to the Business Cycle Dating Committee from the National Bureau of Economic Research, the recession ended and recovery began in June 2009. The Committee based this statement on the fact that several economic activity indicators have gone up, including the real Gross Domestic Product (real GDP) and real Gross Domestic Income (GDI) (Business Cycle Dating Committee).
This information does not mean we have returned to normal. We still have a long way to go, and unemployment remains high. The economy will not heal overnight, not after the traumatic experience we have just endured. But we cannot heal if we do not at least test the water and wade in. We will not forget what happened to us, just as I will not forget nearly drowning. But the committee’s report at least gives us hope that we are making forward movement. We must work together, work past our fears, work onward and upward toward new hope and prosperity. Only then will we break this vicious cycle. Finally, let me leave you with this quote from President Franklin Roosevelt, who knew well that in a difficult economy, “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself---nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance” (Roosevelt 508).
Technically, we may not be experiencing a depression, but we are depressed. According to the IBD/TIPP Economic Optimism Index,consumer gloom in July reached its highest level since the recession was at its worst, amid fears that the expansion remains too weak to create many jobs (Stoddard 1). Every day brings another round of news about the current financial climate, and the normally optimistic American spirit keeps sinking lower into a pit of pessimism. Unless we figure out a way to get out of that pit, the economy will never completely recover.
 |
| Photo by Dorothea Lange from the Library of Congress |
In this economy, I keep seeing a case of history repeating itself. Optimism and rapid economic growth dominated the 1920s. So much so that this time period gained the nickname of “The Roaring Twenties.” The economy seemed like it would just keep going up and up forever. But then in 1929 it all came crashing down into a depression. In recent years, we experienced this same rapid expansion and contraction. Whenever the economy contracts so suddenly, we experience a rise in depressed behavior. “During the Great Depression in the United States, suicide rates hit a 99-year high (of 17 per 100,000 people)” (Elmhirst 26). When the recession began, suicides went up again. In the time between 2007 and 2008, calls to the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline increased by 36 per cent (Elmhirst 27). It is almost scary how close the parallels are between the present and the Great Depression. Unless we want our economy to remain awful for a decade, similar to the Great Depression, we need to get our act together.
From what I have observed, a vicious cycle surrounds our economy: people either fearing for their jobs or unemployed decide to save more and spend less money. Because less people spend money, companies do not want to hire, and may lay off employees. These former employees then spend less money than they used to. So the economic carousel goes around and around again.
I am not saying that consumers should start spending willy-nilly and that businesses should go out and hire as many people as possible. That course of action would not help, and in fact might make the economic situation even worse. But just because we are in a shaky economy does not mean that we should stay out of the pool for fear of drowning. If we can keep calm, then we need not worry about the future. According to the Business Cycle Dating Committee from the National Bureau of Economic Research, the recession ended and recovery began in June 2009. The Committee based this statement on the fact that several economic activity indicators have gone up, including the real Gross Domestic Product (real GDP) and real Gross Domestic Income (GDI) (Business Cycle Dating Committee).
This information does not mean we have returned to normal. We still have a long way to go, and unemployment remains high. The economy will not heal overnight, not after the traumatic experience we have just endured. But we cannot heal if we do not at least test the water and wade in. We will not forget what happened to us, just as I will not forget nearly drowning. But the committee’s report at least gives us hope that we are making forward movement. We must work together, work past our fears, work onward and upward toward new hope and prosperity. Only then will we break this vicious cycle. Finally, let me leave you with this quote from President Franklin Roosevelt, who knew well that in a difficult economy, “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself---nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance” (Roosevelt 508).
Cooperation
“Divided, there is little we can do--- for we dare not meet a powerful challenge at odds and split asunder” (Kennedy 740).
Cooperation is the key to fixing the economy. I am sure that everyone here has experienced cooperation. How many times did our mothers tell us to play nicely and cooperate with our friends and siblings? As children, we never dreamed of a world where we were not expected to cooperate. But the time has come to acknowledge that in the adult world, we do not see much cooperation. We especially do not see much of it in the government. We have not yet bounced back from the Recession because of that lack of cooperation. But if we show politicians our desire for cooperation in the government, then together we can erase all traces of the Recession.
We do not normally link together the words cooperation and Congress. How many times have we heard politicians running for office promise to reach across the aisle, and cooperate with the other party as well as their own? Unfortunately, while they have cooperated at times, politicians usually revert back to form. They vote along their party’s lines, and they go out of their way to make life for the opposite party difficult. It does not matter whether the politicians identify themselves as Democratic or Republican. Each party acts the same way. With every refusal to meet the other party, with every determination to vote the opposite way of other party, and with every decision to not listen to what the other party has to say, politicians have pushed cooperation further and further down. I have no doubt that the members of Congress want to fix the economy. They will not stop talking about the economy. But they insist on going about fixing it in the wrong way. Without cooperation, members of Congress take an all or nothing approach to governing the country. Without cooperation, real reforming legislation never gets passed. In the Great Depression, this same problem would have occurred if President Roosevelt had not stepped up to keep Congress in line. Congress would have bickered as usual while the country spiraled deeper into its depression. But Roosevelt managed to make Congress work together, and pass many laws and reforms to help ease the Depression (“American President: Franklin Delano Roosevelt”). In the end these laws might not have completely fixed the economy, but they certainly helped to keep it from getting worse. World War II was a great triumph for the cause of cooperation. World War II not only ended the Great Depression because it created jobs, but also because it caused the people of the country to finally cooperate with each other.
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| Photo from the Library of Congress |
We should consider cooperation especially important right now because Republicans regained control of the House of Representatives in the last election. Before that, the Democrats had the majority of both the House and Senate, and even when they had the majority they had a hard time agreeing on bills. When the Democrats controlled the House and the Senate, they had a tendency to leave the Republicans out of discussions. Now one of two things will happen in the coming Congressional session. Either the congressmen will learn to work together to fix the economy, or they will accomplish nothing because no one will agree on a course of action. The former option is highly preferable to the latter option. If we want the government to understand that we want more cooperation, then we need to take the initiative and tell the government. We need to send letters and e-mails to our representatives, to our senators, and to the president, telling all of them that they need to work in cooperation with each other. If we all speak with one loud voice, then they cannot avoid hearing our message. This method may seem a little old fashioned, but what other way could we use that would convey to the politicians the enormity of the situation? How else will we show them just how many people are fed up with the childish bickering?
Annotated Bibliography
Note: I could not get the citations to indent five spaces. I tried to get it to work, but it refuses to format correctly. The citations are done correctly in my paper portfolio.
“American President: Franklin Delano Roosevelt: Domestic Affairs.” Miller Center of Public Affairs, 2010. Web. 2 November 2010.
I found this web page by going to Google and typing in the search terms “Franklin D. Roosevelt Recession.” The Miller Center of Public Affairs has a large staff of scholars. The web page I used gave detailed information about Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal. It has a realistic view of him, and does not glorify or condemn the New Deal. The web page includes what his critics as well as his supporters said about his policies.
Boone, Peter, and Simon Johnson. "Way Too Big To Fail." New Republic 241.18 (2010): 20. Business Source Complete. Web. 9 December 2010.
In the Business Source Complete database, I used the search terms “bailout” AND “effective*” to get this article. It says that the government was forced to bail out banks because they had become “too big to fail.” The majority of the article is spent talking about a loophole in financial reform that the authors say banks will take advantage of. I mainly used this article for some basic information about the bailout. Both authors have a lot of experience in economics.
Business Cycle Dating Committee. “Business Cycle Dating Committee Announces Trough Date.” National Bureau of Economic Research, 20 September 2010. Web. 11 November 2010.
During my research, I found many mentions of the National Bureau of Economic Research’s (NBER) decision about the trough date, but all of the articles I found had already formed an opinion about what the NBER had said. I only wanted the primary source, so I used the search term “National Bureau of Economic Research” to find the NBER’s original statement. The Business Cycle Dating Committee from the NBER is composed of many experts.
Clemmitt, Marcia. "Public-Works Projects." CQ Researcher 19.7 (2009): 153-176. CQ Researcher. Web. 5 December 2010.
I found this article in the CQ Researcher database when I used the search terms “recession and bailout* and stimulus.” It was not exactly what I was looking for at the time, but it did give me a lot of information on Public-Works Projects, which was useful for other portions of my I-search essay. This article uses a lot of research, and the author lists all of the sources she used. The author is a veteran social-policy reporter.
Elmhirst, Sophie. "Hard times." New Statesman 138.4963 (2009): 26-27. History Reference Center. Web. 9 December 2010.
In the History Reference database, I used the search terms “great depression” AND “mental*” to find this article. The author uses many interviews and facts as evidence. She is a contributing writer for the New Statesman. This article is easily understood by the layman. The article fits in with my essay about how a bad economy affects people psychologically.
Ferguson, Niall. "The End of Prosperity?." Time 172.15 (2008): 36. History Reference Center. Web. 20 October 2010.
I found this article in the History Reference Center using the search terms “great depression” AND “recession” AND “cause*”. The author is a historian at Harvard University, and his article was very useful to me in my research. The article talks all about drawing parallels between the Great Depression and the Recession. The only difficulty with this article is that it was written before the bailouts came into effect, so some of the issues he talks about, such as the bailout possibly not passing legislation, are no longer issues.
Kennedy, John Fitzgerald. “Inaugural Address.” The World’s Great Speeches. Ed. Lewis Copeland, Lawrence W. Lamm, Stephen J. McKenna. Mineola, New York: Dover Publications, Inc. 1999. 740. Print.
This speech was one of the required readings for this course. President John F. Kennedy’s mention that we need to work together against challenges gave a good opening for my essay about cooperation. The rest of his speech covers a broad range and would not have any bearing on the topic I was covering, but the part I quoted was useful.
Ramos, Eleanor. Personal Interview. 3 December 2010.
Eleanor Ramos is my grandmother. I interviewed her because her father was a member of the Civilian Conservation Corps. He told her stories about his time there, and she also had photographs of his. This interview helped me to get a more personal view of how the New Deal helped people who were out of work. It also gave me a better idea of what the Civilian Conservation Corps did as a group.
Roosevelt, Franklin Delano. “First Inaugural Address.” The World’s Great Speeches. Ed. Lewis Copeland, Lawrence W. Lamm, Stephen J. McKenna. Mineola, New York: Dover Publications, Inc. 1999. 508. Print.
This speech was not one of the required readings, but it did come from a book we used throughout the course. This speech was useful to me because it comes from the time period I am writing about. Franklin Roosevelt was president of the U.S. for most of the Great Depression. This speech was written when he first became president. This speech is widely quoted, especially the portion of the speech I used. The point he makes about not letting fear control your actions fit in exactly with the speech I wrote.
Stoddard, Scott. "Economic Optimism Hits 17-Month Low." Investors Business Daily 14 July 2010: 1. Business Source Complete. Web. 10 November 2010.
I found this article in the Business Source Complete database. I used the search terms “recession” AND “economy” AND “optimism.” The article spoke on how depressed people have been in the shaky economy, and how they have lost faith in the government. It helped to make my point in my essay about how fearful and depressed the economy has made us. It gave useful, current information, and was easily understandable. The author of the article writes regularly for Investors Business Daily.
“American President: Franklin Delano Roosevelt: Domestic Affairs.” Miller Center of Public Affairs, 2010. Web. 2 November 2010.
I found this web page by going to Google and typing in the search terms “Franklin D. Roosevelt Recession.” The Miller Center of Public Affairs has a large staff of scholars. The web page I used gave detailed information about Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal. It has a realistic view of him, and does not glorify or condemn the New Deal. The web page includes what his critics as well as his supporters said about his policies.
Boone, Peter, and Simon Johnson. "Way Too Big To Fail." New Republic 241.18 (2010): 20. Business Source Complete. Web. 9 December 2010.
In the Business Source Complete database, I used the search terms “bailout” AND “effective*” to get this article. It says that the government was forced to bail out banks because they had become “too big to fail.” The majority of the article is spent talking about a loophole in financial reform that the authors say banks will take advantage of. I mainly used this article for some basic information about the bailout. Both authors have a lot of experience in economics.
Business Cycle Dating Committee. “Business Cycle Dating Committee Announces Trough Date.” National Bureau of Economic Research, 20 September 2010. Web. 11 November 2010.
During my research, I found many mentions of the National Bureau of Economic Research’s (NBER) decision about the trough date, but all of the articles I found had already formed an opinion about what the NBER had said. I only wanted the primary source, so I used the search term “National Bureau of Economic Research” to find the NBER’s original statement. The Business Cycle Dating Committee from the NBER is composed of many experts.
Clemmitt, Marcia. "Public-Works Projects." CQ Researcher 19.7 (2009): 153-176. CQ Researcher. Web. 5 December 2010.
I found this article in the CQ Researcher database when I used the search terms “recession and bailout* and stimulus.” It was not exactly what I was looking for at the time, but it did give me a lot of information on Public-Works Projects, which was useful for other portions of my I-search essay. This article uses a lot of research, and the author lists all of the sources she used. The author is a veteran social-policy reporter.
Elmhirst, Sophie. "Hard times." New Statesman 138.4963 (2009): 26-27. History Reference Center. Web. 9 December 2010.
In the History Reference database, I used the search terms “great depression” AND “mental*” to find this article. The author uses many interviews and facts as evidence. She is a contributing writer for the New Statesman. This article is easily understood by the layman. The article fits in with my essay about how a bad economy affects people psychologically.
Ferguson, Niall. "The End of Prosperity?." Time 172.15 (2008): 36. History Reference Center. Web. 20 October 2010.
I found this article in the History Reference Center using the search terms “great depression” AND “recession” AND “cause*”. The author is a historian at Harvard University, and his article was very useful to me in my research. The article talks all about drawing parallels between the Great Depression and the Recession. The only difficulty with this article is that it was written before the bailouts came into effect, so some of the issues he talks about, such as the bailout possibly not passing legislation, are no longer issues.
Kennedy, John Fitzgerald. “Inaugural Address.” The World’s Great Speeches. Ed. Lewis Copeland, Lawrence W. Lamm, Stephen J. McKenna. Mineola, New York: Dover Publications, Inc. 1999. 740. Print.
This speech was one of the required readings for this course. President John F. Kennedy’s mention that we need to work together against challenges gave a good opening for my essay about cooperation. The rest of his speech covers a broad range and would not have any bearing on the topic I was covering, but the part I quoted was useful.
Ramos, Eleanor. Personal Interview. 3 December 2010.
Eleanor Ramos is my grandmother. I interviewed her because her father was a member of the Civilian Conservation Corps. He told her stories about his time there, and she also had photographs of his. This interview helped me to get a more personal view of how the New Deal helped people who were out of work. It also gave me a better idea of what the Civilian Conservation Corps did as a group.
Roosevelt, Franklin Delano. “First Inaugural Address.” The World’s Great Speeches. Ed. Lewis Copeland, Lawrence W. Lamm, Stephen J. McKenna. Mineola, New York: Dover Publications, Inc. 1999. 508. Print.
This speech was not one of the required readings, but it did come from a book we used throughout the course. This speech was useful to me because it comes from the time period I am writing about. Franklin Roosevelt was president of the U.S. for most of the Great Depression. This speech was written when he first became president. This speech is widely quoted, especially the portion of the speech I used. The point he makes about not letting fear control your actions fit in exactly with the speech I wrote.
Stoddard, Scott. "Economic Optimism Hits 17-Month Low." Investors Business Daily 14 July 2010: 1. Business Source Complete. Web. 10 November 2010.
I found this article in the Business Source Complete database. I used the search terms “recession” AND “economy” AND “optimism.” The article spoke on how depressed people have been in the shaky economy, and how they have lost faith in the government. It helped to make my point in my essay about how fearful and depressed the economy has made us. It gave useful, current information, and was easily understandable. The author of the article writes regularly for Investors Business Daily.
An Interview About The Civilian Conservation Corps
An Interview with Eleanor Ramos (my grandmother)
I had two interviews with my grandmother. I conducted one interview over the phone, and another one through e-mail. I have posted both here.
My Notes from the Phone Interview:
Me: What were the CCCs (Civilian Conservation Corps)?
Ramos: It was one of President Roosevelt’s programs in the Great Depression. Lots of young people were out of work, and the CCCs hired young men. It was set up in an army style, and the young men were given army training. They mainly worked in the National Parks. When World War II started, a lot of the men became soldiers because they had that army training in the CCCs.
Me: How did the CCCs change your father’s life?
Ramos: It saved him. He was young, and he couldn’t find work anywhere. In the CCCs he was able to get a salary.
Me: Was the salary large enough to support a family?
Ramos: Probably not enough to support a family, but it helped, and it was better than being unemployed.
Me: How did he join?
Ramos: I don’t know… He joined at the same time as my Uncle George. They were unemployed and it was one of the only options at the time.
Me: What did your father do in the CCCs? How did it change his life?
Ramos: He fought forest fires and planted trees at Yellowstone. The CCCs were where his love of nature really grew. One of the pictures I have from his time there shows all the men going to Mass outside by Jackson Lake with the Grand Tetons behind them. The CCCs not only gave jobs, they also trained the men to be responsible citizens.
Me: Thank you for letting me interview you!
E-mail Interview (my questions are italicized):
Hi Marina, Here are some background facts about my father, your great grandfather that I had written a while back.
John James Lovas, Jr. (12/28/1909 to 2/16/1965)
Born in Erie, Pennsylvania, Dad was the second child in a family of four boys and three girls. He grew up speaking Hungarian. When his older brother Joe started school at Sacred Heart Parochial School, Dad missed him so much that the nuns let him come to school, too, at age four. But he spoke no English and Uncle Joe had to translate for him. Dad remained bilingual all his life. Dad told me once that no one could trace the roots of the Hungarian language; it is not related to any of the Indo-European tongues. I was fascinated by the strange-sounding and mysterious-looking language that I heard him use with my grandparents and that I saw embroidered on the wall hangings in their home.
Young John or Janos (his parents called him “Yanch”) was an altar boy at the Hungarian church. He would go to two churches every Sunday, first to serve on the altar in the Hungarian liturgy, then to Mass in English.
Dad did not like high school at all and dropped out after two years. He would always be defensive about his deficient education; perhaps that was why he valued learning so much and like my Mom, encouraged his children to get as much schooling as they could.
Aunt Elizabeth remembers walking home from the store when she was six or seven years old. She met Dad (he was 16 or 17 at the time) and he told her he was leaving, to say goodbye to Mom and Pop. He would up in Ohio and came home a few years later. Once again he encountered his sister Elizabeth , this time on the train. He was very ill with the flu. Later he went to New York because Aunt Anna and Aunt Helen, my grandmother’s sisters, visited Erie with stories of how it was easier to find work in New York City. Dad lived with Aunt Anna in NY. This was the time of the Great Depression and finally Dad took advantage of one of the programs of the New Deal; he joined the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) and traveled to Idaho and Wyoming to fight forest fires and plant trees. This experience shaped his life immensely and enkindled a great love of nature that he passed on to all of us.
Now for your questions.
1. What were the CCCs? (Also, I remember you saying that a lot of men fought in WWII after the CCCs. Did your father do that too?) The CCC's (Civilian Conservation Corps) were one of Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal programs to bring the country out of the Great Depression. The CCC was for young men only and sent them to work on park projects in all of the 48 (at that time) states. They were responsible for building the roads and amenities in the National Parks and for conservation projects, fighting forest fires and planting trees. My Dad was sent to Idaho and Wyoming and I think that his love of nature deepened greatly through this experience. The CCC's organized the men in a military model, giving them discipline and good work habits and skills that served them well later. When my Dad got a job later on after the CCC's, it lasted the rest of his life.
2. How did your father join the CCC? My Dad joined the CCC's because there were no other jobs. The CCC's offered food, lodging and a small stipend that the men sent home to their families who were also struggling in the Depression. I am not sure how he heard about it but I think his brother George was also in the CCC's so maybe they joined up together. My Dad tried to enlist in the Navy when WWII broke out but they wouldn't take him because he was "old" (31!) had a baby (me!) and was working at a defense plant which supported the war effort. But my Uncle George did join the Navy.
3. What did your father do in the CCC? He worked in the National Parks in Wyoming and Idaho. Mostly he talked about the Grand Teton Park. The picture of him and the other men attending Mass on the shores of Jackson Lake with the Teton Mountains in the background sums up his spirituality: he was a devout Catholic and found God in nature. This portrait was the perfect setting for him. (I'll bring the photo for you to scan). I remember him telling me he fought forest fires and planted trees; maybe you can get a better sense from the photos which I will bring to you.
4. Was the salary large enough to support a family? I don't think the men who were in the CCC's were married; I doubt the salary could support a family even in those days. But it probably helped the family back home to have a few dollars more. Most likely it was a small stipend like the Peace Corps and VISTA that were 1960's service programs. My brother Jim was in VISTA and they had barely enough money to live on. He did social work in Miami.
5. How did the CCC change his life? I believe the CCC's changed my Dad's life significantly. It kept him out of trouble, gave him a practical education that helped him develop good job habits that lasted a lifetime. Most of all it gave him a deep love of his country and nature.
6. Can you remember a specific story or event that he told you about his time there? I can't remember a specific story or event. You could use the Mass picture in front of the Tetons. That was memorable.
Ramos, Eleanor. Personal Interview. 3 December 2010.
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