Chapter 15,
entitled, "Self-help in Hard times," takes a dim view of both the prosperity of the
1920s and the New Deal reforms brought on by the Great Depression. Zinn documents that most of
the money created by the economic boom of the 1920s went to the richest segments of society,
causing greater wealth disparities than those that had existed before. Furthermore, the economic
boom was based on unstable speculation. The working people, whose strikes and union movements
had been crushed during the early 1920s, were not, on the whole, sharing in the prosperity.
Rather, the working people were gaining just enough to keep from rebelling.
When the crash came at the end of 1929, the people in power were stunned and unprepared.
Roosevelt's election saved capitalism, Zinn argues, by offering workers enough concessions to
keep them from having a communist-style revolt while ensuring most of the real power in society
remained in the hands of the capitalist classes. Zinn says that Roosevelt was...
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