The Great Depression: Contraction, Households & Policy Responses — Drills · Grade 11 Social Studies
Chapter: The 1920s, Depression & New DealWhat these drills covers
By the end of The Great Depression: Contraction, Households & Policy Responses you should be able to:
- I can distinguish a stock crash from an economic depression.
- I can explain a historical connection using relevant evidence and qualify the conclusion.
4 questions, written answer, each with a worked explanation.
Vocabulary used: context, evidence, interpretation, contraction, bank run.
Problem 1
Answer and explanation
A depositor losing access to savings, an employer losing credit, and a farmer facing falling prices experience different mechanisms. Explain their connections rather than using one stock-market event as the whole causal account. International trade and monetary constraints extended the contraction beyond domestic financial markets.
Problem 2
Answer and explanation
A decrease in nominal prices is not automatically a gain when wages or employment fall and fixed debts remain. Measure income, prices, and obligations together. A cheaper basket of goods may still be unaffordable to a household that has lost its earnings.
Problem 3
Answer and explanation
Drought and soil practices affected agricultural regions unevenly and interacted with economic distress. The Dust Bowl was not the single cause of national unemployment. Compare environmental, market, landholding, and migration evidence to explain a particular community’s trajectory without assuming every displaced family followed the same route.
Problem 4
Answer and explanation
Compare a loan program, emergency bank action, direct relief, and work employment as different responses. Recovery indicators varied over time, including the 1937–1938 downturn. Later wartime mobilization changed conditions again; a policy’s contribution should be assessed through a mechanism and evidence rather than a single completion date.