The Great Depression imposed a major strain on countries worldwide. In the United States, the people reacted to this crisis by electing Roosevelt into office who vowed to experiment with unorthodox solutions for the economic dilemma.

Other countries, however, reacted differently. By examining the differences between public policies chosen during the early thirties, this site isolates and examines the most genuinely American reactions to the crisis. These peculiarities can help in explaining what underlying values and beliefs characterized America in the thirties.