The Background
The Great Depression was triggered by the American Wall Street stock market crash, on 24 October to 29 October 1929.
The crash happened after an extended period of
speculation when millions of people invested or borrowed money to buy stocks, pushing prices to unsustainable levels.
The panic selling of stocks and about $14 billion of stock losses bankrupted thousands of investors, with some stocks having no buyers at any price.
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| Register News-Pictorial (Adelaide, SA : 1929 - 1931), Thursday 28 March 1929 |
The Wall Street crash led to a worldwide economic depression.
With financial instability and the rapid fall in commodity prices, exports fell, and local industries slowed or failed. The Australian economy collapsed.
Australia had
experienced inflation from 1919 to 1920 and a recession in 1923. The government then borrowed large amounts of money from overseas.
Reduced taxation revenues and falling wheat and wool prices made repayments difficult.
James Scullin and Labor won government in October 1929, just before the stock market crash, responding to the crisis with a range of tariff barriers and austerity measures that did not help.
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| Mail (Adelaide, SA : 1912 - 1954), Saturday 31 August 1929 |
In 1930, unemployment was 10 per cent, reaching a high of 30 per cent in 1933 --one of the highest rates of unemployment in the world.
Sir Otto Niemeyer, Director of the Bank of England, was invited to Australia in mid-1930, and advised cutting wages, government spending and balancing budgets.
Premeriers Fenton and Lyons wanted to follow Niemeyer's plan, but New South Wales Premier Jack Lang rebelled, wanting to default on foreign debts.
Edward Theodore's plan with monetary stimulation was a "middle way". But both Theodore and Lang's inflationary plans were rejected, and a schism developed in the Labor Party.
The Premiers' Plan was developed by four of Australia's leading economists to reduce government spending and repay government debt.
The Commonwealth Government encouraged
increased gold production, and many people tried their luck on the former goldfields.
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| Vic. Unemployed Qold Seekers —— Unemployed Orderly MarchSun (Sydney, NSW : 1910 - 1954), Friday 6 March 1931 |
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| GOLD-MINING INSTRUCTION FOR UNEMPLOYED. The Lord Mayor, Alderman Wälder, holding the pan, at a demonstration which the Redfernbranch of the U.A.P. arranged yesterday for the benefit of unemployed youths.Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 - 1954), Thursday 10 November 1932 |
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One of the habitations, constructed by unemployed in the Domain, which the Lord Mayor (Alderman Wälder) inspected yesterday.Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 - 1954), Wednesday 22 June 1932 |
The
Loan (Unemployment Relief Works) Act 1932 allowed the government in
1935–36, to provide full-time employment for about 55,000 from a total of 300,000 jobless.
It took Australia almost a decade to
recover from the Great Depression.
Humiliation of Poverty and Unemployment
Ordinary people were vulnerable to economic forces beyond their
control. And there was much suffering during the Depression years.
The Depression would have a lasting impact on a whole generation. Frugality wasn't a choice but a necessity.
In the 1930s, thousands of Australians were evicted from their homes and onto the streets after losing their jobs and being unable to pay rent.
"....military hats which have been
made available by the Federal
Government for the unemployed.
Assembling the dyed military clothing
made available to the unemployed by
the Federal Government at the Military
Ordnance Stores, Leichhardt,...."
Evening News (Sydney, NSW : 1869 - 1931) Fri 13 Jun 1930
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| Sun (Sydney, NSW : 1910 - 1954), Tuesday 26 August 1930 |
By 1932, more than 60,000 men, women and children depended on government payments called "susso" (short for 'sustenance') to buy food.
Over 40,000 men travelled from home around Australia, looking for work.
Shanty towns, ironically named ''happy valleys", made from scavenged corrugated iron, hessian, wood and cardboard, and illegal camps cropped up.
Many children had to leave school at age thirteen or fourteen to find work and support the family.
The government and charities provided some unemployed with soup kitchens, clothing, and relief work.
Many Aboriignal people also lost their jobs and had to move to government reserves. By 1941, almost half of the Aboriginal population of New South Wales lived on reserves.
Other Aboriginal people continued hunting and collecting traditional foods.
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| Aboriginal men peeling yams, 1930s, Tiwi Islands, SLSA |
Australian birth rates were relatively low during the Great Depression, falling to 2.1 babies per woman in 1934.
People had to use ingenuity, grit and
resourcefulness to survive during the depression years.
Many people started trapping wild rabbits, as in many areas, rabbits could breed the entire year. Rabbits not only provided meat, but also pelts, which could be sold.
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| RENMARK: A truckload of rabbits being delivered at Sonneman's Freezer, Mr. M. Brewer stands left. 1931, SLSA |
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| Two Aboriginal boys carrying rabbits they have hunted, Koonibba Mission Station, South Australia, 1920s-30s, SLSA |
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| Men collecting dole tickets from the Coffs Harbour Police Station. 1929-1930. Coffs Collections |
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| Australian Christian Commonwealth (SA : 1901 - 1940), Friday 6 June 1930 |
Many
people started growing fruit and vegetables at home and bottling and preserving produce.
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| Chinese Australian in his market garden, Northern Territory, ca. 1930. NLAUST |
There was social unrest. On 29 January 1931, 50 unemployed people in Darwin who had been refused additional relief work stormed Commonwealth offices and fought with the police.
On 6 March 1931, unemployed men rioted
outside the Treasury Building in Perth.
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| KERSBROOK: Tent accommodation used during the Depression for unemployed men who lived at the camp in exchange for two meals a day, working for two days a week clearing land which later became a pine forest. No known copyright restrictions, SLSA |
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| WENDING its way up Wcnlworlh-avcnue to-dny en route from. Belmore Park tothe Domain.— The unemployed procession organised by the Unemployed Workers Movement.Sun (Sydney, NSW : 1910 - 1954), Friday 6 March 1931 |
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| The home of the late Sir Wigram Allen at the Glebe, which will shelter 28 homeless families under the Housing Fund scheme.Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 - 1954), Wednesday 26 August 1931 |
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| SALVATION ARMY'S SHELTER FOR UNEMPLOYED. Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 - 1954), Tuesday 12 May 1931 |
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| Newcastle Sun (NSW : 1918 - 1954), Saturday 25 April 1931 |
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| Unemployed workers demonstrate on the veranda of the old police station. They were flying a socialist Red Flag. Doctor Cook took the flag down and took it away. 1931. Library&Archives NT |
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This dwelling at "The Boot," Bondi, is hewn out of rock. The precipice, in the background, forms the back wall. Unemployed artisans who will use it intend fishing for a livelihood. Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 - 1954), Friday 11 September 1931 |
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| PICKETS AND POLICE AT WEST PERTH EVICTION. ANEVICTION AT WEST PERTH this week was attended by a number of unemployed and police. The evicted family have been found other accomodatiun.Mirror (Perth, WA : 1921 - 1956), Saturday 30 May 1931 |
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| Red Cliffs, Victoria, Australia, Feb 1932, Billy Cans, Itinerant Workers, Swags. Jock Burns, Museums Victoria |
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| Labor Daily (Sydney, NSW : 1924 - 1938), Thursday 15 June 1933 |
Throughout the 1930s, communism gained increased support within the trade union movement in Australia.
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| Worker (Brisbane, Qld. : 1890 - 1955), Wednesday 7 December 1932 |
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A GIRL MACHINIST at work in one of the boot factories which are now turning out boots and shoes for the unemployed. The Atorney-General (Mr. Jeffries) said that the whole supply of clothing and footwear for the unemployed would be available within five weeks.News (Adelaide, SA : 1923 - 1954), Tuesday 8 August 1933 |
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| EVICTION OF UNEMPLOYED MEN AT FITZROY! Bedding and other teiongings of 75 Unemployed Men evicted from dwellings at corner of Fitzroy and James Sts., Fitzroy. Scene in James-st. shortly after eviction.Age (Melbourne, Vic. : 1854 - 1954), Wednesday 9 August 1933 |
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| Brisbane has her own shanty town, Telegraph (Brisbane, Qld. : 1872 - 1947), Friday 13 January 1933 |
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| Truth (Brisbane, Qld. : 1900 - 1954), Sunday 4 November 1934 |
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| Schoolchildren line up for free issue of soup and a slice of bread, 1934, State Library of New South Wales |
Campaigner Frederick Oswald Barnett recorded the poverty facing many in the Melbourne slums of the 1930s. Barnett said that after a tour of the slums, the Victorian Premier, Albert Dunstan, couldn’t sleep for days.
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| West Melbourne. A "Dudley Mansion."1935, SLVIC |
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| Herald (Melbourne, Vic. : 1861 - 1954), Monday 17 June 1935 |
Australia began to recover from the economic depression after 1932. Then, war broke out in 1939, and economic
conditions began to worsen again.
