World War 1, New Deal, and Woman in the 1900,1920s. and 1930s - Essay Example

Download file to see previous pages... Roosevelt, with the help of his closest advisers, nicknamed the Brain Trust, prepared the social program which included reforming of the administrative and partly judicial power, economic planning and legislative regulation of economic relations. He explained the main objective of the New Deal in a speech to the electorate – it was a more equitable distribution of wealth and goods. The new course was formed from a number of legislative and administrative measures. Some of them were expected to fight the current crisis and some to act long term. In general, they formed a new regulatory system of social and economic relations. The new policy can be divided into four major blocks: measures to stabilize the financial system; measures to improve the situation in production sector and agricultural industry; labor and social legislation. The New Deal economic policy was aimed at the recovery of the fully unbalanced banking and financial system. For this purpose, Congress passed the Emergency Banking Relief Act (March 9, 1933), which granted the President broad powers in the financial sector. All the accounts of banks in the country were blocked to audit them in detail. The President got the right to monitor international financial operations, to confiscate gold from private ownership. Exchange of bank notes for gold was stopped. The state started to control banks’ gold reserves. The government devalued the dollar (in January 1934 to 14%). The number of banks was reduced by one fifth. The government strictly limited the banks. The Glass-Steagall Act (1933) prohibited the banks from combining deposit and investment functions. State deposit insurance was introduced in all the banks (up to five thousand dollars). The National Industrial Recovery Act was passed on 16 June 1933 and is the most significant legislation of the New Deal. It was enacted to provide general welfare, fight poverty, improve cooperation between workers and employers, eliminate and solve labor disputes and destructive competition leading to lower profits and reduced investment. It introduced the so-called Codes of Fair Competition - the special guidance documents for branches of industry, which were formulated by entrepreneurs and sanctioned by the President. All antitrust laws temporarily ceased to be effective and the government could cartelize companies by force. The codes also contained the rules of pricing, production, sale of goods and terms of employment in the industry. The norms of minimum wage per hour and maximum working hours (44 hours) were set. That was the most fundamental turn in the history of legal regulation of the U.S. economy. The New Deal’s agricultural policy was embodied primarily in the Agricultural Adjustment Act. A special administrative authority was created to regulate agriculture and balance supply and demand for agricultural products, raise their prices. For this purpose, a uniform percentage acreage reduction was introduced along with the compensation for raw land, which was harmful for the small farms. At the same time large-scale commercial farms received most of the premium payments and could, thereby, intensify production and get a considerable profit. The federal social insurance programs were introduced. The Social Security Act of 1935, for the first time in the U.S., guaranteed unemployment benefits and old-age pension. The next step was to reduce unemployment and its negative effects. Those activities were supervised by the Federal Emergency Relief Administration. The National Labor Relations Act (1935) officially proclaimed, for the first time in U.S. history, the recognition of trade unions and also provided legal guarantees for these rights. Fair Labor Standards Act of ...Download file to see next pagesRead More