Recovery from the Great Depression in the United States, Britain and Germany

Abstract

This paper examines the process of the recovery from the Great Depression in the United States, Britain and Germany in a comparative perspective. The U.S. and German governments spent more actively, while all three countries manifested monetary ease. This expansionary switch was made possible by currency devaluation (Britain and U.S.) or by exchange control (Germany), though the banking sector remained passive in industrial finance in Germany. Investment allocation, in particular, was more favorable to recovery in the U.S., and perhaps to a larger extent in Germany, where the Motorisierung and rearmament had greater repercussion effect to boost up total industrial production, partly because Britain suffered a long run depression of a more "structural" character.