Question

1)Describe the factors leading to the Economic Depression of the 1890s. What was the role of Governmental Regulation? Consider the activities of the various Industrial monopolies in the financial markets prior to the collapse

2) Discuss this chapter. Why did urban infrastructure fail to keep pace with industrial demand for immigrant workers.? What effect did municipal governments have on managing urbanization? Why did political machines and Bosses grow so powerful? What role did the recognition of the value of leisure and natural spaces have on the populations of growing cities? What was the impact of differing ethnicities within urban areas?

Answer 1

The reasons of 1890s depression were

1) Bank failures: The collapse of railroad and various other infrastructural developments led to the bank failures which brought economic unrest in the country. Banks and investors fed the growth of the railroads with ever-increasing investment in industry and related businesses.

2) Bubble formation: With the wrong idea of development, a bubble was formed and that made business invest huge in the projects of rail road which was still growing on speculations.

3) The strikes: The strikes that was conducted by labors as they were not satisfied by the businessdue to the negligence they faced by the owners led to them giving up on their jobs and hence consumption was affected. One such example is Pullman strike.

Before the collapse the monopolies were doing huge investments in to the speculation of rail roads being an advantage and also with the idea that by investing in these schemes they would earn huge profits. A similar situation of Housing bubble of 2008 financial crisis.

II) a) The amount of immigration surpassed the pace with which there were development taking place. The social structure also did not support the development as the natives did not support the settelment of the immigrants. As per the data, from the period of 1877 and 1900 immigrants prompted much more concern among native-born white Americans than did either black people or Indian peoples. During these years there was a net immigration of approximately 7,348,000 people into the United States.

b) The fact that political machineries and bosses gained important was based on redeeming the confidence of the working class. America had started growing industrially and there was no stopping. It was necessary that political framework supports a system where industries and working culture could flourish. At the same time the labors unrest was addressed to gain their support under the political stances as well.

c) With more leisure and space the ideas of inventing and discovering came in to being.People were now interested to invent and innovate. A proper town planning was put in to place. Cities like NewYork and Philadelphia started to see growing population and more and more development took place. Aspects like electric lightning and government and Churches collaborating helped people to establish the confidence lost.

d) Different ethnicities just made the society more diverese, however, had its own pros and cons. On one hand where it gave the opportunity to people to know and live with diversity, Racism started to take grounds also and would hence become a major issue for the political framework to address.