How Far Did the US Economy Boom in the 1920s? (Cambridge (CIE) IGCSE History): Flashcards

False.

The First World War had both positive and negative impacts, including inflation, unemployment for returning soldiers and a drop in demand once peace was declared.

The 1917 Immigration Law required all immigrants to prove that they could read English.

An economic boom is a period of rapid economic growth and prosperity within a country.

Mass production is a way of making lots of products quickly, often involving machinery and improvements to the manufacturing process.

Hire-purchase is a small loan that enables a person to purchase goods on credit and pay for them in monthly instalments over many months.

Laissez-faire is a French term meaning 'allow to do', describing the Republican approach of not interfering with how businesses were run.

Henry Ford mass-produced the Ford Model T on a moving assembly line.

By 1929, there were 23 million cars in the US.

The Fordney–McCumber Tariff of 1922 placed a tax on foreign goods entering the US.

The UK repaid $7.5 billion to the US after the First World War.

By 1927, the proportion of American homes with electricity had increased to 70 per cent.

Workers who borrowed money using low-interest loans to buy shares were buying on the margin.

True.

In the 1920s, mass production on the assembly line meant one Model T was made every ten seconds.

False.

The number of radios owned by Americans increased from 60,000 in 1919 to 10 million by 1929.

Synthetic materials are man-made fabrics, such as rayon, whose growing popularity reduced demand for cotton and woollen textiles.

Rayon was a new synthetic fabric manufactured by US companies such as Dupont, which was in high demand from customers.

The motor industry had the biggest positive knock-on effect on other industries in the 1920s.

Dupont manufactured the synthetic fabric rayon.

The success of the motor industry increased demand for steel, glass, rubber and leather.

Demand for coal fell because of the increased use of electricity, gas and oil to heat US homes.

The increase in car ownership meant that the railways also declined during the 1920s.

Mass car ownership led to the expansion of the road network, which helped the construction industry.

False.

The end of the First World War led to reduced demand for ships, so the shipbuilding industry declined and jobs were lost.

True.

The fashion for synthetic materials caused a slump in demand for cotton and woollen textiles, affecting both farmers and the mills.

Overproduction is when more goods are produced than are needed, which in 1920s US agriculture caused crop prices to collapse.

The boll weevil was a parasite that devastated many cotton crops during the 1920s, causing further struggles for cotton farmers.

Mechanisation is the introduction of machines such as tractors and harvesters, which took many jobs previously done by unskilled farm workers.

Corn and wheat prices fell by nearly 50 per cent between 1920 and 1921.

Demand fell because European nations were able to grow their own crops once the First World War ended.

Canada and Argentina competed with the US to sell crops on world markets in the 1920s.

Harvesters and tractors took many jobs from unskilled farm workers in the 1920s.

The gap in wealth between town and country increased during the 1920s.

Cotton farmers struggled during the 1920s due to the boll weevil, which devastated many crops.

True.

The boom was concentrated in cities and urban areas, and rural areas did not benefit from the prosperity.

False.

Unlike unskilled workers in cities, rural workers had few opportunities to find work elsewhere and were often trapped in low-paying jobs.

Reservations were areas of poor-quality land, unsuitable for growing crops, where Indigenous Americans were forced to live in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The poverty line is the income level below which a family cannot afford basic needs; in 1929, 60 per cent of American families still lived below it.

Americans who were male, white and already wealthy benefitted most from the economic boom.

60 per cent of American families still lived below the poverty line in 1929.

The urban middle class benefited because consumer goods became available and affordable, dramatically improving their standard of living.

Black Americans were often the last to be hired and first to be fired, working in the lowest paid sectors.

Women continued to be paid less than men for doing exactly the same jobs during the 1920s.

Indigenous Americans had been forced to live on reservations with poor-quality land.

False.

Although some wealthy, white, upper-class women benefited, most women did not and continued to be paid less than men.

True.

The stock market rose throughout the 1920s, so investors benefitted by selling shares for more than they had paid.

Recently arrived immigrants were frequently discriminated against, and only the lowest paid jobs were usually available to them.