Farm, Industry, and

Relief19-1

Farms and Industry

FDR: farmers/businesses suffering because prices were too low and production was too high

Competition inefficient and bad for economy

Create federal agencies to manage the economy

The AAA

Prices too low because supply too high

Program (Agricultural Adjustment Administration): gov’t pay some farmers not to raise certain livestock and not to grow certain crops

Some farmers not to produce dairy

Farmers slaughtered 6 million baby pigs

Plowed under 10 million acres of cotton

The AAA

Farmers received $1 billion in support payments

Farm surplus fell by 1936

Food prices rose as did farm income

BUT: country in a Depression…so this hurt the public

Not all farmers benefited. Large commercial farmers (one crop) benefitted more than small farmers

Poor tenant farmers became homeless and jobless when landlords stopped using fields

The NRA

National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) Suspended antitrust laws and allowed

business, labor, and gov’t to cooperate in setting up voluntary rules for each industry

Codes of fair competitions Prices, min wages, two shifts per day, shorter

hours, unionize

National Recovery Administration (NRA) Ran NIRA Displayed NRA symbol in window

The NRA

Small companies complained Large corporations wrote the codes to favor

themselves

Employers didn’t like unions

High min wages forces higher prices

Codes hard to enforce, business owners didn’t have to sign agreement

Productions fell after the NRA was established

NRA unconstitutional in 1935

Relief Programs

Fundamental cause of GD low consumption?

Money to needy = recovery

Solution = work programs

The CCC

Civilian Conservation Corps Offered unemployed men 18-25 opportunity to

work under the direction of the forestry service planting trees, fighting forest fires, and building reservoirs

Planted 200 million trees to prevent another Dust Bowl

Lived in camps, earned $30 a month, $25 of which sent directly to families

Average: returned home after 6-12 months 40,000 recruits taught to read and write

FERA and the PWA

Federal Emergency Relief Administration

Harry Hopkins ran agency

In two hours he spent $5 million on relief projects

Didn’t make sense in the long run “People don’t eat in the long run—they eat every day”

FERA and PWA

Public Works Administration

1/3 of nation’s unemployed were in construction agency

PWA build highways, dams, sewer systems, schools, and other government facilities

Awarded contracts to construction companies

Insisted on no discrimination against African Americans

CWA

Neither FERA nor PWA reduced unemployment significantly

Civil Works Administration Hired workers directly Employed 4 million people (300,000 women) 1,000 airports, 50,000 miles of road, 40,000

school buildings, and 3,500 playgrounds/parks Spent $1 billion in just 5 months

The CWA

FDR shut it down in the spring of 1934, afraid that people would get used to the gov’t providing them with jobs

Success of the First New Deal

Tons of legislation passed during FDR’s first year

Did not restore prosperity, but reflected FDR’s zeal for action and willingness to experiment

Did reopen banks and less people were losing their houses and farms

Most important change: change in spirit of American people