Crash!: How the Economic Boom and Bust of the 1920s Worked

by Phillip G. Payne

Overview

The irrationally exuberant highs and lows of the 1920s can help students recognize boom and bust cycles past, present, and future.

Speculation—an economic reality for centuries—is a hallmark of the modern U.S. economy. But how does speculation work? Is it really caused, as some insist, by popular delusions and the madness of crowds, or do failed regulations play a greater part? And why is it that investors never seem to learn the lessons of past speculative bubbles? Crash! explores these questions by examining the rise and fall of the American economy in the 1920s.

Phillip G. Payne frames the story of the 1929 stock market crash within the booming New Era economy of the 1920s and the bust of the Great Depression. Taking into account the emotional drivers of the consumer market, he offers a clear, concise explanation of speculation's complex role in creating one of the greatest financial panics in U. S. history.

Crash! explains how postWorld War I changes in the global financial markets transformed the world economy, examines the role of boosters and politicians in promoting speculation, and describes in detail the disastrous aftermath of the 1929 panic. Payne's book will help students recognize the telltale signs of bubbles and busts, so that they may become savvier consumers and investors.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781421418568
Publisher:	Johns Hopkins University Press
Publication date:	12/01/2015
Series:	How Things Worked
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	152
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.80(h) x 0.50(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Phillip G. Payne is a professor of history at St. Bonaventure University. He is the author of Dead Last: The Public Memory of Warren G. Harding’s Scandalous Legacy.

Table of Contents

Preface vii

Prologue: How Panic Spreads 1

1 How in the 1920s the American Economy Promoted Speculation 5

2 How Business Culture Encouraged Consumer Spending 29

3 How the Market Grew Bullish 47

4 How the Economy Crashed 70

5 How the New Deal Changed the Financial Sector 93

Epilogue: How This Time Is (Not) Different 115

Notes 129

Suggested Farther Reading 133

Index 137

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

A well-organized overview of the boom-bust sequence that unfolded in the 1920s and early 30s, Crash! brings to life the interesting Depression-era characters that populated business and government.
—Mark Hendrickson, University of California–San Diego, author of American Labor and Economic Citizenship: New Capitalism from World War I to the Great Depression

Mark Hendrickson

A well-organized overview of the boom-bust sequence that unfolded in the 1920s and early 30s, Crash! brings to life the interesting Depression-era characters that populated business and government.

Editorial Reviews

Comparing favorably with works by John Kenneth Galbraith, Frederick Lewis Allen, and Maury Klein, Crash! is an invaluable resource for students of history as well as economics. Essential.

Choice

Payne does what he sets out to do and he is to be credited for such a readable book (indeed I read it twice!).

EH.Net

Comparing favorably with works by John Kenneth Galbraith, Frederick Lewis Allen, and Maury Klein, Crash! is an invaluable resource for students of history as well as economics. Essential.
—Choice

Payne does what he sets out to do and he is to be credited for such a readable book (indeed I read it twice!).
—EH.Net

From the Publisher