• November, Herbert Hoover elected president.

1929
• Herbert Hoover—Republican—becomes President.

• August, economic expansion peaks.

• Average annual income is $750.

• Average annual income for farmers, is $273.

• Automobile sales decrease by one third during the nine months before the stock market crash.

• Construction down $2 billion since 1926.

• Two months before stock market crash production declines at an annual rate of 20 percent, wholesale prices at 7.5 percent, and personal income at 5 percent.

• Stock market crash begins October 24. Investors call October 29 "Black Tuesday." Losses for the month total $16 billion.

• Congress passes Agricultural Marketing Act to support farmers temporarily.

1930
• By February, the Federal Reserve cuts the prime interest rate from 6 to 4 percent.

• Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon announces that the government will stand by as the market works itself out.

• The Smoot-Hawley Tariff is passed on June 17.

• October, Committee for Unemployment Relief informed.

• Treatise on Money, by John Maynard Keynes, published.

• The first bank panic occurs; results in bankruptcies across nation. About 1350 bank failures and deposit losses are responsible for the contracting money supply.

• Supreme Court rules that the monopoly U.S. Steel does not violate anti-trust laws as long as competition exists.

• The unemployment rate climbs from 3.2 to 8.7 percent.

1931
• A second banking panic occurs in the spring.

• Unemployment rises to 15.9 percent.

• March 31st, Davis-Bacon Act becomes a federal law, requiring federal construction contracts to pay prevailing union workers.

• September, Japan invades Manchuria.

• September 21st, Britain becomes the first major power to go off the gold standard.

• December, Japan leaves the gold standard.

• December 11th, New York Bank of the United States crumbles.

1932
• June 6th, Revenue Act of 1932 passed by Congress, the largest peacetime tax increase in the nation's history up to that point

• July 21st, Emergency Relief and Construction Act passed

• The first of two of the worst years of the Great Depression. For 1932, GNP decreases to 13.4 percent; unemployment increases to 23.6 percent.

• Industrial stocks have lost 80 percent of their value since 1930.

• 10,000 banks have closed since 1929.

• Around 2 billion dollars in deposits have been lost since 1929.

• Over 13 million Americans have lost their jobs since 1929.

• Capital growth investments have dropped from $16.2 billion to $300,000 since 1929.

• Prices on farm products have fallen 53 percent since 1929.

• International trade has fallen about 67 percent since 1929.

• Congress passes the Reconstruction Finance Corporation on February 2nd.

• Congress passes the Federal Home Loan Bank Act and the Glass-Steagall Act of 1932.

• The tax rate is moved up from 25 percent to 63 percent.

• A large portion of the public considers Hoover's measures “too little too late”. Franklin Roosevelt defeats Hoover in the fall election. Democrats win control of Congress from Republicans.

1933
• Roosevelt has made his inauguration speech. Next, he begins his “First 100 days” the special session with Congress.

• March 6th, another panic happens with the banks; Roosevelt therefore declares a Bank Holiday.

• Many private owning businessmen became alarmed by Roosevelt’s plan to aide in getting the poor people more money. For this reason a group of them, led by J.P. Morgan and Du Pont empires, planned to overthrow Roosevelt using the military in order to establish a fascist government. The group proposed the idea to General Butler for recruiting, promising an army of 500,000, unlimited financial means, and media control. The plan is ruined when Butler reports it to Congress.

• Congress agrees to the creation and passing of the Public Works Administration, the Agricultural Adjustment Administration, the Federal Emergency Relief Administration, the Farm Credit Administration, the National Recovery Administration, the Civilian Conservation Corps, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, and the Tennessee Valley Authority.

• The Emergency Banking Bill, the National Industrial Recovery Act and the Truth-in-Securities Act are passed by Congress.

• April 19th the United States goes off the gold standard.

• Roosevelt makes a large effort to help give money back to the poor from the wealthy. He becomes fixated on a balanced budget, and later rejects the idea to begin in deficit spending.

• The GNP and unemployment only change slightly during this year. GNP falls only to 2.1 percent, while unemployment rises to 24.9 percent from 23.6 percent in 1932.

• January 31st, Adolf Hitler named Chancellor of Germany.

• March 20th, FDR signs Economy Act.

• March 20th, Credit Act passed, identifying those veterans and dependents of veterans who were entitled to a pension.

• March 31st, Reforestation Relief Act passed, creating the Civilian Conservation Corps.

• April, New York becomes the first to pass a state law regulating minimum producer, wholesale, and retail milk prices (25 other states will take similar action by the end of the 1930s).

1934
• Congress passes the Federal Communications Commission, the National Mediation Board and the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Securities and Exchange Act, and the Trade Agreement Act.

• The economy turns around, GNP rises 7.7 percent from 2.1 percent, and unemployment falls to 21.7 percent from 24.9 percent in the previous year.

• Sweden becomes the first nation to recover fully from the Great Depression.

• January 30th, Gold Reserve Act passed.

• November 6th, Democrats expand in the House of Representatives by 9 seats.

1935
• The Supreme Court declares the National Recovery Administration unconstitutional. Being a part of the administration was peoples’ choice; those who accepted the codes set by the NRA put blue eagle symbols on their packaged products and on their office buildings. This made any product that did not have the blue eagle symbol unpatriotic, which the Supreme Court deemed unfair.

• The Works Progress Administration, the Rural Electrification Administration, and the Emergency Relief Appropriation Act.

• Economic improvement continues: the GNP grows another 1.4 percent, and unemployment falls 1.6 percent.

• July 5th, National Labor Relations Act (Wagner Act) passed.

• August 14th, Social Security Act passed.

• August 23rd, Banking Act passed.

1936
• The Supreme Court declares part of the Agricultural Adjustment Act to be unconstitutional. A tax was being imposed on those that processed food products in order to pay the farmers to stop planting so much produce, in the event that supply would then be down therefore leaving demand and prices high.

• As a counter act, Congress passes the Soil Conservation and Domestic Allotment Act. In this Act, soil erosion surveys and prevention methods were beginning to be conducted, and the Secretary of Agriculture made agreements with farmers to change cropping patterns and land in order to do so.

• The tax rate is increased to 79 percent from 63 percent.

• Economic improvement continues still: GNP grows a record 14.1 percent; unemployment falls to 16.9 percent.

• Through heavy deficit spending in preparation for war, Germany becomes the second European nation to recover fully from war.

• February 29th, Soil Conservation and Allotment Act is passed

1937
• The Supreme Court declares the National Labor Relations Board (the federal agency in which the National Labor Relations Act / Wagner Act was established) to be unconstitutional.

• Roosevelt seeks to enlarge, therefore liberating, the Supreme Court. This attempt fails, but deeply angers the public.

• Economic growth is attributed to heavy government spending. Roosevelt fears an unbalanced budget, and budget cuts spending for 1937. That summer, the nation falls head first into another recession.

• Despite these problems, the yearly GNP rises 5.0 percent, and unemployment falls to 14.3 percent.

• March 1st, Supreme Court Retirement Act passed, permitting Supreme Court members are to retire at age 70 with full pay after 10 years of service. This Act was to benefit Roosevelt. At the time that he began the New Deal, the old fashioned ideals of the Supreme Court members caused some Act not to be passed.

1938
• Congress passes the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 (this time without the processing tax).

• Roosevelt’s political power weakens. No major Acts are passed for the new deal after this time.

• The recession lasting all year proves a problem. The GNP falls 4.5 percent, and unemployment rises to 19.0 percent.

• Great Britain becomes the third European nation to recover fully from the depression as it begins deficit spending in preparation for war.

• June 25th, Fair Labor Standards Act passed, beginning first national minimum wage law.

• Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act passed.

1939
• GNP rises 3.4 percent; unemployment falls 2.8 percent.

• The United States begins emerging from the Depression, then borrows and spends 1 billion dollars to build armed forces.

• We manage to seem to remain neutral by offering to loan supplies to the European nations, however we knew that Britain was the only one that could be helped, for they are more accessible. Then, when the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor, we go to war in 1941.

• The Depression begins to end worldwide as nations prepare for the coming hostilities.