Migrant Workers In The 1930s

The Dust Bowl delivered a crazy drought to the fields of the Great Plains and crushed the economy during the Great Depression. Massive dust clouds destroyed just about everything from crops, farms, and the lives and jobs of thousands of farmers. This resulted in even more economic despair during the Great Depression. The Dust Bowl happened in the 1930s in the Great Plains due to farmer’s poor cultivation techniques. Although the farmers cultivation options didn 't work, the federal government really helped them out with after five years went by.

To add to the stock market crashing and unemployment rate soaring, the United States suffered severe drought. The drought impacted agriculture greatly, and was seen to cause the failure of many farms. The United States fell into a food shortage soon after. Food became rationed to a very scarce level, people were hungry and poor. People became fed up with Herbert C. Hoover, because he seemed to not do anything about the depression.

Population numbers were at an all-time high, so securing employment was difficult for many. If ones’ parents had money and/or family ties to money, one had several options, such as going into the family business (if one’s father was a blacksmith you could apprentice as a blacksmith beginning at a young age.) On the other hand, if ones’ parents were peasant farmers, they would most likely have little option other than working the farm along with the mass population, which came with poor pay and limited opportunities. However, the Black Death pandemic changed much of this system. With mass death, there were fewer and fewer peasant farmers, which lead to a limited supply of farm workers.

At one time in 1932, there were near to 250,000 homeless children throughout America. By far the ones who fared much worse off were African Americans owing to the fact that they were already impoverished anyway. The fact was white Americans were preferable as employees at that day and age, so black Americans were considered the first to be fired in

They over worked and underpaid their staff who desperately needed money. Farmers were also heavily hit by this depression. By 1920 almost all farmers went into debt by buying machinery and land. They borrowed money to buy this machinery thinking it would help them produce goods faster and make more money however, that didn’t really happen. By 1930 over production caused

The dust bowl was a man-made and natural disaster that devastated America and messed with millions of lives. To begin the dust bowl lasted for many years. To follow, Farmers plowed fields when there was no water and dried up the land, the crops took all the water, and the drought killed crops. Furthermore, One-third of people lived on farms, they were being kicked of the land because WW1 made the prices fall, and raised how many crops were made.

Workers for these railroads and factories faced many hardships. “Thomas Hobbes described life in nature as poor, solitary, nasty, brutish, short—and for many workers that was the case” Unfortunately their tough lives were mostly inescapable. The only available jobs at the time was working for companies owned by a lot of the same men with the same intentions. All wages for these jobs were so low, workers couldn’t fare the expense of trying to find better work.

On the list, there were some men without known jobs. A few off the unknown men may have known a little about farming, but most likely not enough. Droughts were also a problem. From “The Lost Colony and Jamestown Droughts,” the charts show that the drought lasted from “1605-1612.” With a drought that long, crops didn’t grow and colonists died from hunger and thirst.

During this time, technology was advancing, but the economy was on a downfall. The 1930s was one of America’s early decades that changed culture and life forever. There was economic struggle, technological advancement, and an effect on the economy due to changing technology. The 1930s was a time of advancement in America, but it wasn’t necessarily a good time.

The Great Depression all started when the stock market crashed in 1929. People stopped using banks. The dust bowl started. People got employed. People waited in long lines just for bread.

Because of the little money the farmers were making many were forced to leave and find work elsewhere. One-fourth of the people who lived in the Dust Bowl left the region. Many of them had skills beyond farming, and when they didn’t find work they suffered extreme poverty.(UXL Encyclopedia of Weather and Natural Disasters. Ed. Amy Hackney Blackwell and Elizabeth Manor.)(p223-225).

Families moved from town to town in hopes to find a good job, but that was very hard to do because most people could not afford to pay others, forcing some small businesses to close down. When work was found, it would be hard to keep that job for long because they would run out of money and close down, or someone would bargain to work at a lower cost. “The miserable failures of capitalist economies in the Great Depression were the root causes of worldwide social and political disasters.” (James Tobin). As the economy went down, people went to the banks for loans and to withdraw money, but the banks were unable to assist them.

When they saw the amount it was clear that the grain would help but they wouldn’t last the winter.

The Great Depression The Great Depression was by far one of the worst times of America’s history, and the world’s history. The Depression affected everyone except for the politicians and the wealthy. During the depression a lot of people lost their jobs which caused the unemployment rate to sky rocket to 14% of America’s population was unemployed, and the number would stay their till World War 2, and the depression started in the 1920’s. Middle class workers were hit the hardest in the depression. Most of the middle class citizens lost their jobs.

Unlike Tennessee, Mississippi suffered from decreased farm prices throughout the depression. The great depression caused many farms to go into debt, and also a lot of banks lost many people to go hungry, because of their life savings gone to waste. . One reason that the banks went into debt is that they had loss of income. As a result a lot of African American people lost their jobs, because the owners would not be able to pay the employees their money. People who had farms had to do the most work , they had to grow their own food, rather then “ cash crop “ like cotton or tobacco .