The Great Depression represents the worst economic crisis in US history, with unemployment reaching an estimated 25% by 1933. Following the stock market crash on Black Thursday in October 1929, more than 15 million Americans lost their jobs over the course of the decade. By 1932, nearly one in four Americans was unemployed.
The economic collapse followed a period of prosperity in the 1920s and was attributed to several factors including vast wealth inequality, overproduction of goods, stagnant wages, rising personal debt, and government mismanagement. The crisis resulted in widespread hunger, desperation, and desolation across the country.