Please enable JavaScript.
Coggle requires JavaScript to display documents.
German History 3: Living Standards - Weimar Germany - Coggle Diagram
German History 3: Living Standards - Weimar Germany
Impact of WW1
Severe shortages
Due to food going to the front lines and allied blockades of ports
Led to 'alternative foods' which lack nutrients (malnutrition was common)
Infants mortality and still birth were common due to poor health of mothers
90% of children aged 2-6 were undernourished
Ruhr crisis of 1923
Led to sharp decline in industrial production
Led to widespread unemployment
Dramatic decrease in living standards
Government responded by calling for a campaign of passive resistance which only worsened the situation (due to more arrest and imprisonment)
Hyperinflation negatively impacted those with savings and fixed incomes
Positively impacted those with debt or morgages
Improvement in living standards 1924-27
Weimar had a period of relative stability and economic growth in the mid 1920s which led to an improvement in the standard of living
Introduction of a new currency (Rentenmark 1924)
Helped to stabilise prices
Meant inflation fell sharply
Earnings increased from 1924-29
The Weimar 'Golden years'
Due to growth of industrialisation
Due to improvements in technology
Due to reduction in working hours
Had a thriving film industry and Germans enjoyed travelling
Principles of the welfare state in the constitution
Establishment of a national health insurance system (basic healthcare was then accessible to all)
Government provided financial support to hospitals etc
Provided number of labour protections eg minimum wage
Provided social welfare programmes (eg old age pensions)
Established protections for children (eg right to basic education)
Aimed to protect women (equal pay and work)
The nations health improved
Declining death rates
Medical professions expanded
Social welfare institutions provided support
Building of new housing (300,000 new/renovated home 1927-30)
Workers living standards improved from Stinnes-Legien agreement
Made a new relationship between labour and capital
Agreement recognised workers rights
Cause increased influence of SPD
Advances in social services
Rural areas were lagging behind
Agriculture didn't prosper in the 1920s
Due to cheap foreign imports
Emergence of mass unemployment meant cut back in food purchases
Farmers faced high tax demands and substantial rents or interest payments on mortgages
Nazi won support over this group
The impact of the Depression
Great Depression began in 1929
Caused by global economic downturn
Led to widespread unemployment, decline in production and decrease in international trade
Unemployment caused by firms and factories closing down (6 million by 1932)
Decrease in living standard
Basic necessities became scarce
People relied on government assistance or charitable aid
Prostitution, hawking goods and begging/ criminality increasing
Those who managed to keep their jobs had lower wages and reduced hours
Bruning combatted this by cutting welfare payments
So the budget for war pensioners was reduced
Therefore Germans were forced out of their homes and had to live in Shanty towns
Reduced demand for food causing agricultural prices to drop even more
Led to increases debt in farms
Many couldn't pay for their mortgages