Wednesday, December 8, 2010

A Brief History of Economic Recession in the USA

With today's economic turmoil many people are probably wondering when this recession is going end, what caused it to happen and is it going to reoccur. In this article I will give a brief history of recession in the U.S.A. what caused it to happen and some of the after effects.  I never would have thought in my wildest dreams that there has been almost one recession every decade since the late 1700's, having said that lets get started with the panic of 1797.

1797-1800

o    Caused by deflating effects of the Bank Of England

o    Considered first U.S. recession

o    Disrupted commercial real estate markets

1837-1843

o    Attributed to failing banks

o    Banks stopped paying in Gold and Silver

o    People had no confidence in paper currency

1893-1896

o    Brought on by the failure of " The Reading Railroad Company"

o    Once again European investors with draw and leave U.S financial systems in a mess

o    Stock markets and banks collapse

1918-1921 (Also Known as the Post War Recession)

o    Hyperinflation in Europe had spread to the U.S causing a recession

o    Lost production that was halted due to the end of the war

o    There was a huge influx of labour as Troops returned home, the skyrocketing unemployment

1929-1938 (The Great Depression)

or The Case of the "Great Depression" is a matter of great debate among economists

OR Here are a couple of a depreciation in asset prices and commodity prices, dramatic drops in demand and credit, and disruption of trade

or 30 million Americans with no income what so ever, WW II, similar effects

1973-1975 (oil crisis of the1970's)

o    Oil prices were quadrupled by OPEC along with government spending on the Vietnam War

o    OPEC stopped exporting oil to the U.S. and other western nations to punish them for supporting Israel

o    Gas went from 25 cents to over a dollar in just a few  short months

1987-1989 (Black Monday)

o    Stock markets around the world crash

o    Dow Jones looses 22.61% in one day

o    Debate of the fallout continues many years later with no definite resolve

March2001 - Nov2001

o    Terrorist attacks on the "World Trade Centre"

o    Collapse of the dot.com bubble

o    This is still affecting the U.S today

2007 - Present Day

o    Caused by reckless and unsustainable lending practices

o    First time since the 1930's that any major The banks fail

o Some people say that this is the worst recession since World War II

Although the causes of the recession, very powerful, as you can see there are new economic phenomena, happen again and again throughout history. Depending on what the cause was at that time could know anywhere from a few months to several years, only that it happened, happens and will happen again in the future.

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