Talk:Wall Street Crash of 1929

message: not very long for one of the biggest events of the 20th century... or is that more effects?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.44.202.213 (talk) 01:06, 4 August 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: The Associated Press today (09/29/08) said that the 700 point drop in the Stock Market is the BIGGEST EVER. Does this make the Crash of '29 the second worst?--208.179.153.163 (talk) 20:16, 29 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: No, declines are typically measured in percentage terms. Point totals are just headline fodder. Eusebeus (talk) 20:34, 29 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  and even at that, the percentage is not among the information on the page.  Somebody needs to put both figures in there for the number-crazies. 4.249.198.253 (talk) 20:55, 29 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  A part of the text had been obliterated by vandals. I have restored the missing section. Eusebeus (talk) 21:09, 29 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Recent crash

message: Seems no one has cited the root cause of all this, without which the bubble, and therefore, the subsequent crash, couldn't have happened, or at least not been so severe: The creation of the Federal Reserve Board in 1913, which allowed artificial manipulation (almost always upward) of the money supply, leading to the "Roaring 20s", and to the inevitable bursting of the balloon. Sorry I don't have time to find the citations and edit the article, but here it is on the talk pages, so anyone who's truly interested in fundamental causes and cause/effect can research it for themselves, and maybe edit the article. We continue to suffer from this mistake to this day (*literally* to this day), as another Fed-induced boom crashes. Unimaginative Username (talk) 09:11, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: That's an opinion, not an established fact. Galbraith's book on the crash for example is pretty dismissive of that explanation. G-Man ? 17:20, 5 October 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Galbraith's book is Galbraith's opinion. The adoption of Galbraith's theories has done nothing to alleviate the problem; the hyperinflationary stagnation of the 1970s occurred while Galbraith's policies were in full force. Try reading alternative sources and economists, e. g., von Mises, Hayek, Milton Friedman. I readily acknowledge that the above post was my own opinion, which is why I didn't edit the article accordingly; as I explained, I haven't the time to dig up the proper citations from these sources. Contrary to popular belief, Galbraith isn't the only economist in the world, nor are his theories the only ones. They're just the only ones taught in Econ 101 in most (politically-liberal) colleges. His dismissal, appropriately sourced, is worthy of inclusion; my point was that the above theory, advocated by people with the appropriate letters after their names and therefore noteworthy, wasn't even mentioned in the article. Regards, Unimaginative Username (talk) 00:58, 6 October 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  Although Milton Friedman's work should be acknowledged adding words like 'the now standard intrupretaion' when describing his views and describing History of Money as 'monumental' is unneeded. Inturpreting his work as either right or wrong is the job of an economist not a wikipedia contributor. If you're an economist that believes his work was correct then you can submit your arguement to another site or blog. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.140.22.117 (talk) 12:07, 9 March 2009 (UTC)

text: I find the arguments here fascinating. Has something meeting Wikipedia norms been extracted and added to the article yet, I wonder? --Jonathan G. G. Lewis 09:32, 9 July 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: I hope very much that an economic historian will take the time to add the competing theories to the article. I hope it is someone familiar with the topic. Someone like me would not be competent to do so. --Jonathan G. G. Lewis 22:34, 10 October 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  The root cause of the crash is missing from the article 

message: As to the crash itself, however, "Niall Ferguson, professor of history at Harvard University says 'Everybody assumes that 1929 was the big one, but 1914 was far, far worse.'"
Is there a way to work this quote in? Please do not delete my requests for help. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/money/article552371.ece  Johndoeemail (talk) 16:44, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I disagree that it's "far, far worse."  The decline in the Dow from a peak in October 1912 at 94 down to 53 in December 1914 was not even 50%. --Robertknyc (talk) 18:51, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Key line from the Times article: "Ferguson believes that if the markets had remained open, the collapse would have been more serious than the Wall Street crash of 1929." Can't see any academic sourcing mentioned though (presumably Ferguson's published something on this), and don't have time to follow it up. Rd232 talk 11:23, 3 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  As to the crash itself 

message: Most of the references that have been added by JohnDoe above are internet-available newspaper articles from sources like the FT & NYT that offer substantiation for the more serious aspects of the crash and its aftermath.
For a topic such as this one, however, those are simply too lightweight and insubstantial to be considered serious references. The encyclopedic treatment of this topic in other sources (Britannica, Economic History, etc...) would not permit such material and neither should we. 
Now, the impulse to provide references is an excellent one, of course, and kudos to Johndoe for taking the time and effort to provide at least something to what was a hideously unsourced article - even unscholarly journalistic rehash is better than nothing. 
Ultimately, if one wants to undertake a serious sourcing of the article, you would need to consult the scholarly material available. This is accessible on the web via Google Scholar and Google books - subscription access to any of the main scholarly journals would help. There is a standard literature on the subject of the Great Depression (of which this is a subset in the literature) and in order for this article to be considered as authoritative, it will need to be cited and the main arguments articulated. Let me hasten to add, this is not a criticism of any effort to provide references to an article. But if editors are serious about wishing to improve the overall quality, then much better material needs to be adduced. Encyclopedia articles on well known topics are not sourced from the New York Times. (I have refactored this discussion to make it easier to read.) Eusebeus (talk) 15:13, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok, you are right. I just looked at the featured article tulip mania on wikipedia and all the references are books or scholarly journals. Thanks for your input. Johndoeemail (talk) 18:51, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  General Comment on Sources 

message: The last paragraph cites a Washington Times article for the proposition that the depression was caused by a lack of lending to bail out Wall Street.  Many people, both liberal and conservative, view the Washington Times as a conservative news source and I believe this to be a conservative view point.  I believe the liberal view point is that the crash and the ensuing depression were caused by the income disparity. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_depression#Inequality_of_wealth_and_income
Thanks, 66.31.203.141 (talk) 00:20, 5 October 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Or you could consider my suggestion, three paragraphs above as of this version, that the crash was not the problem, it was the result of the problem; the proximate cause being a speculative bubble, and the root cause being the creation of the Federal Reserve System with its virtually unlimited power to print worthless dollars and pump them into the economy. Some economists, notably the "liberals", believed, contrary to the laws of reality, that the creation of the Fed and its worthless "notes" could actually put the economy in a state of perpetual boom. Actual prosperity and wealth are created by producing actual goods and services, not by printing more money to chase the existing goods. So it wasn't the lack of lending to Wall Street that caused the crash, it was the lending to Wall Street that caused the bubble. You can't have a crash without a zoom or a bursting bubble without a bubble. You're welcome. Regards, Unimaginative Username (talk) 09:24, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

text: *Couldn't agree with you more. See my concurrent post, responding to G-Man, above. Thanks, Unimaginative Username (talk) 01:04, 6 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  NPOV Problem 

message: I think there may not be enough nicknames for the 1929 Wall Street Great October Crash (my preferred name, which is not in the article) listed in the first sentence of the article. Can we consider adding more? Ideally, we should include every combination of the words "Wall Street," "1929," "Crash," "Great," and "October."  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.83.156.189 (talk) 20:04, 4 January 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: It would be nice if someone could put them all in a section of their own, I don't want to just delete them but I don't think they should all be up there. 131.227.209.140 (talk) 21:09, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Yeah they should all be deleted, those are simply the names used by authors of the articles and sources, anyone can call anything anything, that doesn't mean it is "also known as", known implies popular use, not "this one source that we used called it..", the entire sentence should be removed, "also known as" also implies that the nicknames would make the event or given subject unrecognizable as in "abraham lincoln, also known as abe or honest abe" since those ARE nicknames which a total stranger might not recognize. if anyone hears any one of these they will immediately recognize its about the crash or realize it was in october of 1929. -FranzSS (too lazy to sign in now that im stuck in editing....) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.4.22.124 (talk) 04:48, 9 February 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Great Crash nicknames

message: Was there ever a movie made based on the wall street crash because if there is i would like to see it.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.80.106.105 (talk) 00:34, 10 January 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: If someone can figure this out, I think we should include it in a new trivia section on this page.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 152.23.114.84 (talk) 00:57, 19 January 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Movie based on the crash ? 

message: The first sentence of this article reads as follows (I've left out the citations):
:The Wall Street Crash of 1929 also known as the ’29 Crash, the Great Crash of 1929, the Great Crash of October 1929, the Great Wall Street Crash of 1929, 1929 Great Crash, or the Great Crash was the most devastating stock market crash in the history of the United States, taking into consideration the full extent and longevity of its fallout.
If you want to catalog all of the names that people have used (meeting notability requirements) for the Great Depression, you will get a very long list -- much longer than the list in the aforewritten sentence. The article names seven of the undoubted dozens of alternate names for the '29 Crash that have been used in publications over the last 75+ years. Doesn't this seems like a bit much to anyone? It sure does to me. Why stop at just seven? One could easily name fifteen alternate names with citations on each of them to boot. The bottom line is that having each of these seven names listed in the first sentence of the lede makes the sentence sound muddled and, well, ridiculous. Yes, it is true that other articles do list multiple names that the given subject goes by. But these articles usually limit the number of alternate names to two or three at most. Perhaps some editors who are invested in this article can pick out the two or three most common of alternate names and keep them in the article, deleting the remaining ones. If not, the lede will continue to sound messy and absurd. ask123 (talk) 22:58, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I totally agree with this and suggest we cut it down to two or three.  My recommendations would be: The Wall Street Crash of 1929, The Great Crash, and 29 Crash. --Robertknyc (talk) 19:39, 22 January 2009 (UTC)

text: No, I completely disagree. We should have at least seven nicknames listed, and my top choices are "1929 Wall Street Great October Crash," "Street, Wall October 1929 Crash of Greatness," and "The '29, 19 October Street Crash of the Great Wall."  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.14.92.118 (talk) 22:18, 6 February 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  A lot of names 

message: Is it a bad idea to state the actual date, October 29, in the very first paragraph?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.248.163.195 (talk) 23:45, 16 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Actual date in very first paragraph

message: In the second paragraph of the Effects and academic debate section, the fourth sentence has an error. It says: The main question is: Did the "'29 Crash spark The Depression?", or did it merely coincide with the bursting of a credit-inspired economic bubble? I think that the quotation marks should only be around '29 Crash, or around the whole question (Did the "'29 Crash spark The Depression?", or did it merely coincide with the bursting of a credit-inspired economic bubble?). JoshE3 (talk) 00:37, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: The quotation marks seem to be around the part of the sentence which is exactly present in the quoted NY Times source.  The ugly cut off is a consequence of the newspaper title style leaving out "the", something which doesn't look good in an encyclopedia article.  --Ørjan (talk) 01:31, 13 December 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Quotation Mark Error

message: Would someone please make a section on how the crash impacted the rest of the world and not just America? JoshE3 (talk) 01:03, 28 October 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Worldwide Affects

message: The article stated that 1987's crash was "Even more severe" than that of 1929.  I'm sure almost all of you understand that this is incorrect, indeed nonsensically so.  I replaced the text with "Although much less significant (since it wasn't part of a multi-day trend) the one-day crash of Black Monday, October 19, 1987, when the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 22.6% was worse in percentage terms than any single day of the 1929 crash."
I thought that would be the end of it, but someone reverted to the old version.  I reverted back to mine.  Glad to help. Jamesdowallen (talk) 08:12, 10 February 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Corrected nonsense about 1987 

message: The article has "The October 1929 crash came during a period of declining real estate values in the United States (which peaked in 1925)".
Did the real estate values peak in 1925?  Or was that the peak of "declining values"?  I can *guess* the correct answer from context ... but I'm not supposed to need to guess.Jamesdowallen (talk) 08:05, 23 March 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: The decline of real estate prices that began in 1926 was triggered by multiple hurricanes that popped the real estate bubble in Florida and spread to other states as national banks became more cautious. Greensburger (talk) 03:51, 11 January 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Minor nit about wording. 

message: I've fixed the dead link to the initial statement, but it seems, that as before, it states that it was the 'most savage bear market' of all time - not just in the history of the US. Pestergaines (talk) 10:10, 23 March 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: Worst crash of all time

message: The statement in the first paragraph that the Depression "did not end in the United States until the onset of American mobilization for World War II at the end of 1941," is inaccurate.  According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average unemployment rate in 1941 was 9.9%.  American mobilization for World War II began in December of 1941 after the bombing of Pearl Harbor.  I do not know exactly what unemployment rate constitutes a "depression" but we can safely say it is substantially above 10%.  Therefore the Depression was over before Pearl Harbor and the American mobilization.
The link for the BLS page is: http://www.bls.gov/opub/cwc/cm20030124ar03p1.htm
AsFields (talk) 05:36, 13 August 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: It would be accurate to say "until the start of US rearmament in 1940 prior to World War II".  The reason for the rearmament was WWII, so it is factual that the end of the depression was directly related to the war. See the graph at Great_Depression#Turning point and recovery. VMS Mosaic (talk) 00:27, 14 August 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Statement about end of the Depression is inaccurate. 

message: The edit Black Tuesday by User:David.moreno72 does not hit the mark, as Tuesday October 24, 1929 (Black Tuesday) was just one of the days to follow the "Big Crash". Eponymous was the Big Stock Market Crash of 1929 of October 24, 1929 (Black Thursday). Other days just followed: October 28, 1929 (Black Monday), October 29, 1929 (Black Tuesday) ... — See also:  . . . As a result of this the stock-market crashed, a day that would go down in history as, “Black Thursday.” --Gerhardvalentin (talk) 22:29, 25 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Black Thursday 

message: There has been a spate of vandalism and/or edit war on the common name for the Wall Street Crash of 1929.  Although the start of the crash started on "Black Thursday", and continued on "Black Monday", most historians agree that it is more famously known as "Black Tuesday", as this was the day of a record breaking volume and is considered as the day that the stock market crashed and the start of the Great Depression. I provided a link to a reputable source in the hope that the vandalism would stop. It hasn't. I have therefore provided a citation to a government source in the hope that it will stop. Also, a search for "Black Thursday" at the Library of Congress has only 1 relevant result, whereas a search for "Black Tuesday" returns 9 relevant results, a clear indication that "Black Tuesday" is the more famous name  — Preceding unsigned comment added by David.moreno72 (talk • contribs) 08:44, 26 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wall Street Crash of 1929. Known as Black Thursday or Black Tuesday ? 

message: Paragraph four of the Timeline section suggests that the London Stock Exchange crashed as a result of the conviction of Clarence Hatry for fraud and the freezing of his company's shares. I have found references to a "drop", but nothing that describes it as a "crash". Perhaps it should be altered? Cwbr77 (talk) 17:59, 8 September 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: London Stock Exchange

message: I assumed that the name of the article was based on the metonym of "Wall Street"  referring to the entire U.S. financial sector, as didn't the crash affect the entire United States and even help to precipitate the Great Depression? I know that the area considered in New York when referring to the Great Crash would literally have been Wall Street, but a lot more than Wall Street in New York went down. With that being said, why is every single image in the United States just of New York's Wall Street? There were certainly gatherings in places other than New York during the Stock Market Crash and the Great Depression. Dustin (talk) 16:21, 6 December 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: The article Great Depression, mentioned in this article's 2nd sentence, discusses the wider effects at length. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 06:49, 1 January 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Didn't the crash affect the entire United States? 

message: Did the crash happen on Tuesday or Thursday  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:241:4200:1D10:10BE:B1DE:E653:DFEB (talk) 07:11, 5 July 2017 (UTC)
thread_title: Tuesday or Thursday?

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: What does this sentence in "Economic Fundamentals" even mean: For the economist John Kenneth Galbraith, this exuberance also resulted in a large number of people placing their savings and money in leverage investment products like Goldman Sachs' "Blue ridge trust" and "Shenandoah trust". Why is this "For John Kenneth Galbraith"? Does this mean, instead, "According to economist John Kenneth Galbraith..."? rowley (talk) 20:24, 6 November 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree that "according to" would be much clearer. And Blue Ridge, a company, ought to be spelled as a proper name. -- Michael Bednarek (talk) 02:25, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
replies: text: Done. rowley (talk) 08:13, 7 November 2018 (UTC)
thread_title:  Wrong preposition, perhaps? 

message: The stock market crash ended on October 29'th 1929. HistorianL (talk) 05:36, 1 July 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. JTP (talk • contribs) 06:00, 1 July 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Semi-protected edit request on 1 July 2020 

message: The Crash was notable in folk memory for the suicides allegedly triggered, eg bankrupt individuals throwing themselves off buildings. It would be interesting to know to what extent it was true, the article would benefit with a discussion of this as there have surely been studies by those who had access to news and statistics. According to the book by Robert Pilpel, Churchill in America, 1895-1961: An Affectionate Portrait, Winston Churchill who had shares in Wall Street and was visiting NYC during the days of the crash recalled a man being 'dashed to pieces' dropping himself into the street while traffic was held up when people who noticed a building worker seen alone on top of a girder mistook him for 'a ruined capitalist' about to end his life, so there was a sense of suicide panic out and about at the time.Cloptonson (talk) 07:15, 4 June 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Suicides?

message: In the crash section of the article, there are two citations that are needed and I think I found them. However, there is a problem. I am not sure this is a reliable source because I think it is a study guide. The source is called United States Academic Decathlon Curriculum by Pedia Press, and its editors are Wikipedians. Link: http://pediapress.com/books/show/united-states-academic-decathlon-curricul/
Contribiter423 (talk) 17:24, 29 October 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  I found citations 

message: I see problems in these 2 paragraphs. Take a look at the mention of which day, and the percentage drop on that day:
:On October 28, "Black Monday", more investors facing margin calls decided to get out of the market, and the slide continued with a record loss in the Dow for the day of 38.33 points, or 12.82%.
:On October 29, 1929, "Black Tuesday" hit Wall Street as investors traded some 16 million shares on the New York Stock Exchange in a single day. Billions of dollars were lost, wiping out thousands of investors. The next day, the panic selling reached its peak with some stocks having no buyers at any price. The Dow lost an additional 30.57 points, or 11.73%, for a total drop of 68.90 points, or 23.05% in two days.
Here's what I see. There was a 12.82% drop on Black Monday, no mention of the percentage drop on Tuesday, but an 11.73% drop on "the next day" which would be Wednesday. It calls this a total drop of…23.05% in two days. Was this a three day drop? Or (more likely) does "the next day" still refer to Tuesday? I had always heard that the crash took place over two days, so that's probably what it's supposed to say, but it's worded very poorly. It looks to me like "The next day" should be removed. This makes sense because the drop of 38.33 points on Monday, plus the drop of 30.57 points on "the next day" adds up to the 68.90 points over two days. I removed "The next day." I'm pretty sure this is now correct. —MiguelMunoz (talk) 23:23, 29 October 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Problem with crash description 

message: Since May 2020 this article has had an infobox which describes the cause of the crash as "Fears of excessive speculation by the Federal Reserve". I won't try to comment on the accuracy of that claim, but it is both uncited and, more importantly, not supported by the text of the article. I'm going to revert the infobox in its entirety for now; it is preserved below if anyone wants to attempt a better summary.
LetsEditConstructively (talk) 02:47, 20 February 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Cause" in Infobox 

message: By standards of consumer spending and social conditions, the quality of life in America was better in early 1939 (before WWII) than in 1939. Americans had more of the expensive goodies  (cars, stoves, refrigerators, radios, and phonographs) than in 1929. More people had electricity. During World War II the federal government strongly discouraged economic speculation of any kind. Not until 1952 did stock market prices reach the nominal values of the 1929 peak, and then such ignores significant inflation.Tax policies (high rates on 'unearned' income) may have kept stock prices depressed long after the general recovery of the economy. Pbrower2a (talk) 21:42, 11 March 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  World War II as the end of the effects of the Crash of 1929