Q&A - American Business Enterprise History
Address the following questions:
1) What are the problems of marshalling the economic energies of a nation at war? Are these problems eased or aggravated if the nation is a democracy? Why? Why is there a need for rationing and price regulation?
2) In the context of Babbitt and Major Barbara, consider the plight of Undershaft, the industrial magnate and that of Babbitt, the small businessman as they moved through the vicissitudes from war to prosperity to depression to war.
3) Discuss the growth industries of the 1920's. Why did they prosper? Why did they fail to perpetuate the prosperity?
4) What were the causes of the Great Depression? Consider, among other factors, the following: the plight of the farmers, the status of labor unions, factory worker wage levels, speculation, lack of regulation.
What were the goals of the New Deal? To what extent were they realized?
5) Franklin Roosevelt has been called "the greatest conservative since Alexander Hamilton." Explain. To what extent does the adage, "The more things change the more they remain the same," apply to this period.