Historians generally find it impossible to identify just one or two causes for the Stock Market crash of 1929 and the subsequent Great Depression. So a simple explanation is difficult, however the following factors were all relevant and need to be understood for the test: A weak banking system that did not garner consumer confidence caused many Americans to rush to the banks to withdraw their money the moment the crisis began causing rapid deterioration; A crippling tariff system that was closing the United States off to profitable trade with Europe; Far too much stock and property purchased on margin or credit (similar reasons to our modern recession); A complete lack of diversity in the American economy, as the industrial and car manufacturing industries were dwindling their was nothing rising to fill the gap, leading to widespread unemployment; Overproduction of crops causing prices to drop and farmers to be unable to make ends meet. Therefore we understand that there was no shortage of crops nor rapid food price inflation, quite the opposite. It is important to remember that there was no one single cause of the Great Depression, but rather it was a combination of several factors. 

During the 1920s, the country was prosperous mainly because of American goods that were being produced within the country. America did not have to do as much trading with other countries to get the products they needed because they were being created on American soil. People also wanted to buy American goods.

Herbert Hoover was President for the first three and a half years of the Depression. He was widely criticized for his slow reaction, then not reacting strongly enough as it became obvious that the nation was falling further and further into economic decline.

In what became known as the run on banks, many people rushed to their banks to withdraw their money, only to find the bank had no money to give them. Banks do not keep anywhere near enough money to cover the value of all their accounts, so after the first wave of people the banks had no more money to hand out, and due to defaulting loans and the market crash, had no money coming in. This meant many banks went under and the account holders would not get back the money they had deposited.

Most of the industrial base in America had, at this point, been built at least 30 to 40 years earlier. This meant that most of the technology in the industrial space was very old and outdated. This coupled with the toll the years and constant ware that the equipment and the buildings themselves had been through, and it helped to cause a massive slowdown in industrial output as the system ground down.

Although the Smoot-Hawley Tariff was well-intentioned, it was a major contributing factor to the Great Depression. Without going into needlessly complicated detail, foreign trade is a major component of basically every developed economy—the U.S. in 1930 was no exception. The Tariff (because it artificially increased the prices of many imported goods) caused a major slump in foreign trade, leading (in part) to the Great Depression.

Belgian engineer, Étienne Lenoir, is generally credited with having invented the first commercially viable internal combustion engine.

Ferdinando Nicola Sacco (b. April 22, 1891) and Bartolomeo Vanzetti (b. June 11, 1888) were convicted of murder and executed on August 23, 1927.

The New Deal was a widespread series of government programs undertaken by Roosevelt when he became President to boost the American economy during the depths of the Great Recession.  In general, the programs sought to expand government’s role in the economy, making the answer about lowering taxes the only answer choice that does not fit in as a New Deal program.

Although many of the New Deal actions were later pushed through the fireside chats for public appeal, the original intent of the broadcast was to disseminate the panic related to the closing of the banks as the unemployment skyrocketed, and the markets crashed dramatically.  This was later dubbed the Emergency Banking act.