The Great Depression By Jacob Silvester
By 1933, nearly 11,000 banks had failed, destroying the life savings of millions of Americans.
At the cruelest depth of the Depression, in 1932-1933, some 13 million people--one out of every four who had held jobs in 1929--were unemployed. In that age of single-income households and virtually nonexistent welfare programs the real human misery implied by those cold statistics was incalculable.
The NRA was one of Franklin Roosevelt's first New Deal programs, designed to improve working conditions and wages. It was declared unconstitutional in 1936, though many of its components appeared in later legislation.