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INFLATION AND NAZISM.   Term Paper ID:29473 Click to get this paper

Essay Subject: Examines the German economy from 1919-1939.... More...

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Paper Abstract: Examines the German economy from 1919-1939. Post World War I German economy. Continuation of wartime inflationary trend. Economic revival in later 1920s. Impact of the 1929 American stock market crash; resulting economic decline. Economic crisis in Germany. The 1932 election of Hitler and rise of Nazism; policy of economic recovery and rearmament. Paper Introduction: INFLATION AND NAZISM The German Economy, 1919-1939 World War I was essentially a contest of mutual exhaustion: moral, human, and economic. France had been come close to the breaking point in 1917, and Russia had been driven past it, leading to the Russian Revolution and Russia's withdrawal from the war. In 1918, however, Germany reached the end of its resources, while the Allies were revitalized by the influx of American manpower and resources. In November 1918, Germany had not been invaded, and only a few scattered bombs had fallen on its cities. The German army was still able to launch offensives in mid-1918, and even at that point Germany had a credible chance Text of the Paper: The entire text of the paper is shown below. However, the text is somewhat scrambled. We want to give you as much information as we possibly can about our papers and essays, but we cannot give them away for free. In the text below you will find that while disordered, many of the phrases are essentially intact. From this text you will be able to get a solid sense of the writing style, the concepts addressed, and the sources used in the research paper. 29-3 ), the economicturmoil that had shaken Germany during the first five postwar years seemedat last to be at an end. Hitler and the Nazis emerged from the fringes; in the 1932elections the Nazis became the largest single party in the Reichstag(though still an overall minority). NewYork: Vintage Books. Then, in October of 1929, the American stock market crashed. When its last offensive fell short, however, Germany had nooption left to capitulate. In the longer term, though, the concentration onarmaments rather than economic infrastructure was costly to Germany, andmight well have led to economic collapse even without war and defeat(Johnson, 1987, p. Thus, through the middle and later 192 s the German economy enjoyed abroad-based revival, and the troubles of 1919-23 seemed gradually torecede. The economic decline of 193 -33 hit different countries with varyingforce. TheGerman army was still able to launch offensives in mid-1918, and even atthat point Germany had a credible chance of winning the war on thebattlefield. In 1936, Hitler abrogated theVersailles Treaty restrictions on the German military, and rearmament movedinto high gear. After World War II, at least in what became West Germany,the US Marshall Plan poured in short-term reconstruction assistance, aidingthe German economy in getting back on its feet. In general, however, the Great Crash marked, if it did not itselftrigger, a series of forces that revealed the weakness of the 192 sinternational economy (Johnson, 1987, p. In 1918, however, Germany reachedthe end of its resources, while the Allies were revitalized by the influxof American manpower and resources. In contrast, at Versaillesin 1919 the vengeful Allies imposed heavy war reparations on Germany.These reparations had a dual effect: They placed a tax on resources thatcould otherwise have gone into reconstruction, and drained Germany of goldat a time when that metal was still almost universally regarded as thebasis of "real" money (Hardach, 1976, p. The American economy, andthen the world economy, entered an accelerating downward spiral, with noend in sight. This had begun (sometimes covertly)even in the Weimar years; for example the first Panzerschiff ("pocketbattleship") was laid down in 193 . Hughes, Michael L. The German hyperinflation of 1923 has entered economic legend,though other countries have undergone even worse inflationary spirals(Hardach, 1976, p. 19-2 . Adolf Hitler was afringe figure in German politics. Nevertheless, recoverywas possible, as it was even in the much worse conditions of 1945. The prosperity of thatdecade, at least of its later years, had been based excessively oninvestment in productive capacity (especially in "new" industries andtechnologies) that far exceeded short-term demand. The United States, which had enjoyed the greatest boom, was hardest-hit. Obviously a holder of Rentenmarks could not cash themin for (say) a piece of a German state post office, the way dollars andpounds of the era could be cashed in for gold. Berkeley: University of California. With the "Miracle of the Rentenmark," and the international debtadjustment of the Dawes Plan (Hardach, 1976, pp. The farm economy was equally devastated by the war: theshortage of men and draft animals, both sent to the front in millions,brought the population to the edge of starvation. Theexact relationship between the Great Crash of 1929 and the Great Depressionof the 193 s is complex and uncertain; it is not a simple matter of onecausing the other. While its contractionwas not as severe as the American contraction, it was severe enough;unemployment briefly hit 34 percent in January of 1934 (Silverman, 1998, p.261). The short-term effect was to continue the process ofeconomic recovery. The hyperinflation was at last checked by the introduction of a newGerman currency, the so-called Rentenmark (Hughes, 1988, p. Other (but related) factors, such as the Hawley-Smoottariff act of 193 , which largely closed the American economy to importsand set off a general international tariff war, may have done more toundermine the world economy. Socially, the hyperinflation reinforced the social dislocations ofwar and defeat, just at a time when these were starting to recede. While ordinary peoplehad done well, they could not afford to buy as much as was being produced.As inventories of unsold goods piled up, factories laid off workers --cutting buying power and demand still further. 9. Withthe end of prosperity, all the demons of defeat, and of 1919-23, re-emerged. 3 6). Silverman, Dan P. Economic recovery was the first order of business, often takingprecedence at first even over the repression of Jews. Kennedy, Paul (1987). In fact there was considerably less of a truly global economy than inthe free-trade years prior to World War I (Johnson, 1987, pp. Inspite of wartime losses, Germany had still a large and well-educated workforce, and in spite of wartime strains the economic infrastructure wasstill more or less intact. Hitler was made chancellor, and atonce assumed dictatorial powers. The French economy, still only semi-industrialized andlittle tied to the rest of the world, was still held back by France'sstaggering manpower losses in the war. 282). The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers. The heart of Nazis was not in public works, however; it was inrearmament; military considerations played a major role in Autobahnplanning (Silverman, 1998, p. Hitler's Economy: Nazi Work CreationPrograms, 1933-1936. Itsfactories were not bombed-out shells, as in 1945, but they had been worndown by the strains of four years of war production with nothing left overfor upkeep. Nevertheless even atheoretical backing was sufficient to restore confidence in the currencyand thus a return to economic stability. Theprosperity of the 192 s stalled, then faded -- then went into a dive. 281-82).Recovery in Britain was sluggish, and beset by frequent social tensions andlabor strife. Worse than the purely economic crisis was the social impact. The Political Economy of Germany in theTwentieth Century. Paying for German Inflation. INFLATION AND NAZISM The German Economy, 1919-1939 World War I was essentially a contest of mutual exhaustion: moral,human, and economic. 177). One key result was a continuation of a wartime inflationary trend.The war had caused inflation everywhere, but in Germany it continued, andgradually accelerated, after the war. 19). To alleviate massunemployment, a vast program of public works was undertaken, the mostfamous result being construction of the Autobahns, the first large-scalefreeway system. 19. Germany was an intermediate case. In the early yearsof the Nazi regime, its economic policies bore some resemblence to theAmerican New Deal -- indeed, one German policy, the Voluntary Labor Service(which predated the Nazis) served as a model for FDR's CivilianConservation Corps (Silverman, 1998, p. Cambridge: Harvard University.----------------------- 8 31 ). Ever since that time, the German Bundesbank (andindeed central banks everywhere, such as the US Federal Reserve) haveregarded inflation with particular fear, and have been prepared to inflictsevere recessionary pain in order to nip inflationary spirals in the bud. The premiseof the Rentenmark was that it was issued against the physical assets of theGerman state, and was therefore backed by tangible value, rather than beingan arbitrary piece of paper. The postwar German economy was thus left in a shambles. Berlin became a cosmopolitan cultural center, something it hadnever really been before; if conservatives were offended by itsfreewheeling lifestyle few shared their concerns, at least not visibly.Anxiety about Communism was widespread among the middle classes, as it waseverywhere, but the extreme Right was marginalized. France, which had shared little in the growth of the 192 s, was onlymildly hit in the early 193 s, though it went into a slide later (Johnson,1987, p. The middle years of the 192 s were generallyprosperous in the western world, and Weimar Germany now shared in theprosperity. France had been come close to the breaking point in1917, and Russia had been driven past it, leading to the Russian Revolutionand Russia's withdrawal from the war. Though overshadowed by the sheer output of the Americaneconomy, German industries remained among the most advanced in the world,and German products had a well-deserved reputation for quality. References Hardach, Karl (1976). (1988). In November 1918, Germany had not beeninvaded, and only a few scattered bombs had fallen on its cities. The "Miracle of the Rentenmark" was in fact asort of benign sham. ChapelHill: University of North Carolina. 148). (The low cost of living in Francewas a major factor in its popularity with American expatriates.)Nevertheless, prosperity in the Western world was broad-based enough to re-open the export markets that had been so important to German industry inthe prewar years. (1998). Two related factors, however, contrasted the period after 1918 fromthat after 1945. The acceleration itself became morerapid, until it reached nearly unimagineable proportions: Put simply one can say: it took about five and one-half yearsfrom the beginning of the war for the mark to fall to about one-tenth ofits prewar value; the next decrease to one-tenth took only two and onehalf years; the following one only 1 8 days; while in October 1923 themark was down to ten percent of the value of the previous period every 8 to 11 days (Hardach, 1976, pp. As suchit would contribute to the mood of resentment and anxiety within the Germanmiddle class that would later contribute to the rise of Nazism. In the United States these were years of spectacular boom, theRoaring Twenties, and for the first time the US economy played a role thatwould later become familar as the "engine" of the world economy. Creditors, particularly small savers, were financially wiped out.Ordinary economic life became impossible, with prices at the end rising bythe hour. 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