Question

How did president Hoover respond to the challenges of the Great Depression

Answer 1

Answer and Explanation:

President Hoover initially responded to the challenges of the Great Depression by telling Americans to remain strong, and requesting that organizations and businesses do whatever they can to keep workers employed. In attempt to inspire Americans, he wrongly predicted that the worst conditions would never be experienced, and that it would be foolish for anyone to lack confidence in the country’s economy which was failing at the time.

Much later, deep into the Great Depression, President Hoover responded a bit better by giving jobs to unemployed workers, raising prices of crops produced by farmers, providing loans for banks that were failing, and assisting troubled local and state charity organizations with aid.

Unfortunately, his responses which could only help a few people, were not strong enough to keep the country’s economy from plummeting and becoming greatly depressed.

Answer 2

Hoover's response was to keep a balanced federal budget until taxes collapsed because of the depression, making the government insolvent. Any increase in spending was incremental and not beneficial to the industries that had lost business or the people that lost jobs. His dogged reliance on balanced budgets turned a hiccup in the financial markets in 1929 into a huge national depression by 1932.