The Stock Market Crash and the Great Depression
The market collapses in 1929 and a quarter of the workforce loses its jobs
Quick facts
- Crash
- Late October 1929
- Peak unemployment
- 24.9 percent, about 12.8 million people, in 1933
- Wider effects
- Thousands of bank failures, collapsing farm prices
- Political result
- The election of Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal
What happened
After a decade of booming markets in the 1920s, the U.S. stock market crashed in late October 1929, wiping out billions of dollars of Americans' wealth and investment in a matter of days. The crash did not cause the Great Depression by itself, but it triggered a spiral of bank failures, collapsing demand, and business closures that deepened into the worst economic crisis in the nation's history. By 1933, at the height of the Depression, 24.9 percent of the total work force, about 12,830,000 people, was unemployed, roughly one worker in four. Farm prices collapsed, thousands of banks failed, and families across the country lost homes, savings, and livelihoods.
Why it matters
The Great Depression reshaped American politics and government for a generation. Mass unemployment and suffering discredited the hands-off economic philosophy of the 1920s, brought Franklin Roosevelt to power, and led to the New Deal's expansion of federal responsibility for the economy and for citizens' welfare. Its memory shaped American attitudes toward banks, work, and government well into the postwar decades.
How we know
The crash and its economic aftermath are documented in market records, federal economic data, and the unemployment statistics compiled and published by government sources and the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library.
Sources
- National Park Service. The American Home Front Before World War II · Reputable sourcenps.gov · The domain "nps.gov" is on our Reputable source registry. · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
- Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library & Museum. Great Depression Facts · Reputable sourcefdrlibrary.org · The domain "fdrlibrary.org" is on our Reputable source registry. · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
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Related timelines
- The Great Depression → · The 1929 crash, bank failures, the Dust Bowl, and the New Deal in depth