ALPHABET SOUP AGENCIES

ALPHABET SOUP AGENCIES We now know FDR was a progressive president…. Progresso?...eh?...anyone?.... He developed TONS of new agencies to help achieve his 3 New Deal Goals: • Jobs for the jobless • Fix the economy • Prevent another depression

There are A LOT of these… use your handy-dandy grid that I’ve created for you to help with studying/ understanding.

In 1933 when FDR took office, 13,000,000 Americans were out of work! • Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC): hired unemployed single men 18-25 • For $1 a day, they planted trees, built bridges, worked on flood-control projects, parks • Conserved natural resources & gave jobs to young people

Works Progress Administration (WPA): 1935 – put the jobless to work • Making clothes & building hospitals, schools, parks, playgrounds, and airports • Hired artists, photographers, actors, writers & composers to entertain & educate the public • WPA writers collected information about American life, folklore & traditions

Promoting Recovery To bring recovery, the President had to boost industry & farming

Helping Industry • Overproduction & declining prices had been a major cause of the depression • Low prices had caused businesses to fail & had caused high unemployment rates

National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA): each industry wrote a code, or a set of rules & standards for production, wages, prices & working conditions • The NIRA tried to end price cutting & firings

To enforce the new codes, Congress set up the National Recovery Administration (NRA) • Companies that followed the NRA codes stamped a blue eagle on their products • The gov’t encouraged people to business only with companies displaying the eagle • This caused competition between companies

The NIRA also set up the Public Works Administration (PWA):promoted recovery by hiring workers for thousands of public works projects • Workers built dams, schools, aircraft carriers for the navy

Helping Farmers • On farms, overproduction remained the major problem • Surpluses kept prices and farmers’ incomes low • Surplus: when company or farm produce more than they can sell

Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA): gov’t paid farmers NOT to grow certain crops • Roosevelt hoped that with smaller harvests, laws of supply & demand would cause prices to rise • By limiting the amount of “available” options, people would pay more lump sums for staple crops

The gov’t paid for farmers to plow surplus crops under the soil & destroy surplus cows & pigs • People thought this was crazy when people in cities were starving • The plan was necessary to help farmers recover & keep them growing food

Rural Electrification Administration (REA): help people in rural areas get the same electrical service as people in urban areas • Provided $$ to extend electric lines to rural areas • # of farms with electricity rose from 10-25% • Electricity helped to save many farms from ruin • Refrigeration – dairy farmers could keep milk & eggs longer

Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA): set out to remake the Tennessee River Valley – a vast region that had suffered from terrible floods that had caused ½ of the areas farms & families to fail • 49 dams were built in 7 states – also produced cheap electric power • The TVA deepened river channels for shipping • Planted new forests to conserve soil • Developed new fertilizers to improve farmland • Set up schools & health centers • Result: transformed a region of desperation & poverty into a prosperous & productive area

Preventing Another Depression • During the Hundred Days, Congress passed laws regulating the stock market & banking system

Truth-in-Securities Act: end the risky buying/ selling of stocks in the hope of making a quick profit

Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC): Insured savings accounts in banks approved by the gov’t – if a bank insured by the FDIC failed, the gov’t would make sure depositors received their $$

ALPHABET SOUP AGENCIES