Effects of the Great Depression (internationally) essays

Effects of the Great Depression (internationally) essays The Great Depression had a major affect on the United States but soon the Depression was spreading to the rest of the world, especially to Europe. In Europe the single country that was most affected was Germany, whose extremely weak economy could not deal with the slow loss of American capital. The United States pushed Great Britain and France to pay them back for the debts they owed from World War One, forcing the allies to push Germany to pay back their debts; this created a big cycle of lending and paying back that really just put Germany into a bigger debt. At the time of all of this confusion the German dollar was devaluating. During this time the United Kingdom also represented another global economic force in the world. The British economy was not hit as hard or as fast as Germanys. However, as the set-backs of the world crisis became more and more clear, Great Britain experienced a large decline in its exports which was even greater than the decrease in its imports. Those two factors contributed to generate a deficit in its balance of payments. Still, compared to most other industrialized countries, the U.K. got through the Depression in better economic health. The case of Great Britain was different than others because the U.K. got through the Depression years easier than other nations. The British economy recovered easier for three reasons: the abandoning of the gold standard in 1931, the adoption of higher tariffs and the devaluation of the pound. When the U.K. abandoned the gold standard, it gave itself a competitive advantage over the countries which didnt. The new tariff laws helped by protect ing domestic industries and the 30 percent devaluation of the pound added to the competitive edge of the U.K. because it made British products cheaper to the rest of the world. With France, things went much differently. First off, out of the four biggest industrialized countries of the time (U.S., Germany, U.K. ...