Monday, February 3, 2014

Argentina's "A-ha" Moment

 Consider how Argentina experiences the early years of the Great Depression.  Why is it important to consider its national past? To what extent did the country follow the economic practices of the rest of the Americas in the early 20th century?

18 comments:

  1. It is important to consider Argentina’s national past because originally, before the Great Depression Argentina saw themselves as the leader of Latin America. Before the Great Depression, Argentina was faced with three very serious issues that seemed unsolvable; “ a crisis in the beef industry, tariffs and debts, and oil.” Soon after the Great Depression hit, everything went downhill for them. By 1930, “ the Great Depression devastated the Argentinian economy, the budget deficit was 350 million paper pesos.” Argentina followed the economic practices of the rest of the Americas because when President Coolidge banned the import of beef for fear of disease, Argentina shot back, “ with embargo's against Standard Oil.”

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  2. In the early years of the Great Depression, Argentina was really really hit and suffered a lot. Economic problems emerged such as the crisis in beef trade which meant a decrease in the exports of Argentina (it was a really good economic activity in Argentina) and prices had fallen by half. Also, Argentina increased their tariffs to protect their exports but it had no effect and their debts increased by a lot since the government's revenue was much smaller than the government spending. The oil industry had no more money even though it had been a huge discovery in 1907 and was also a big revenue for the country. It is therefore important to consider the national past of this country because in my opinion they were maybe too confident at one point and it might had had negative consequences when the Great Depression hit South America especially Argentina.

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  3. It is important to consider Argentina's past when talking about the Great Depression, because they were the most unprepared or "were not [a] well equipped" country to experience a great depression. Ultimately there seemed no way to solve the three problems at hand. "[Yrigoyen] was faces with three on-going problems, none of which he could solve." These three problems were the crisis in the beef industry, tariffs and debt, and oil. It seemed as though Argentina had its own ideas and coping mechanisms for the depression.

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  4. It is important to discus the nations past before the Great Depression because it prospered especially in Buenos Aries. Buenos Aries was considered the "Paris of the South" because of its ability to structure itself as a port city for much of southern South America. The way Yrigoyen tried to fix the economy was "opened three universities offering more opportunities to the middle classes" and "supported strikers." These moves were intended to "alienate conservative forces" and have the middle class people on his side.

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  5. In the reading, it states three economic problems - a crisis in the beef industry, tariffs and debt and oil. It is important to look at the nation's past. The past is related to the problems. For example, beef industry experienced from a demanding of high quality beef to cheap beef during World War I. After the war, ranches has already invested inferior stock. When the market suddenly drops the demand on cattle slaughtered, in the higher part of the chain has to lower the price for their own profit but then the ranchers gained control of the "influential Rural Society". They pressurize the government which cause the crisis. Tariff is related to Argentina's past as well. In the first term of Yrigoyen's office, he introduced income tax, state bank etc. to diversify the revenue. However, they were all rejected by the congress. The only revenue is the Tariff. Therefore, when the depression strikes the U.S and Europe, trading is influenced and Tariff drops and debt goes up. Same for oil crisis, the lack of government funding in developing oil producing is the cause of the crisis. And the congress has always been like that for the past decades.

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  6. The reading mainly talked about Argentina before the Great Depression and the Radical government by Yrigoyen. The port city, Buenos Aries, Paris of the South could be seemed as a miniature of Argentina before the Great Depression. "Buenos Aries looks good on the surface, but when one begin to investigate further, serious problems soon emerged." Argentina seems to be the most powerful country in South America with its large amount of export rate. However, its export products are primary such beef and wheat. For example, before the 1st World War, Argentine's beef industry targets on middle-class with taste for high-quality beef, but as the war starts, demands for high quality beef fall. Many ranches shift their direction to cheap beef for the growing population of troops. However, the end of the World War again put the meet industry in Argentina in a dilemma. Just like beef, there are other crisis go on in Argentina such tariff and debt, and oil. These problems remained unsolved under Yrigoyen's first term's successor Alvear. With existences of these problems, the Great Depression makes Argentina's economic situation even worse. The main focus would be the middle-working class. Initially, Yrigoyen supported the middle-class. He establishes 3 universities to offer equal opportunities for the middle-classes; he supports trade union; he opens up more job opportunities in the government for the middle-class. Despite all these effort, with the hitting of Great Depression, the middle-class still lose control. Strikes become increasingly violent, which eventually led to the tragic week. The government is compelled to switch to a military dictatorship. Overall, the great depression does strike Argentina so hard that its government change to military dictatorship.

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  7. Argentina was one country that relied on exporting goods but the continuation of this led to the preventation from Argentina to modernize. Argentina started out with "great potential" however, it was dominated by primary production, and other larger countrys. This being the nations past, it was important to keep in mind because that the three biggest problems in the depression were its economy, and since Argentina had not been a huge industry/ product producing country when the depression hit it was not prepared. Argentina had to rethink its whole economic stance, but the fact the Yrigen kept the same type of government as it had before, didnt help argentina. The main reason for Argetina and its upset was over how the country didnt have a government like the us or other larger countries which led its economy to more of a downfall during the depression than others.

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  8. It is important to consider Argentinas past when talking about the Great Depression because its important to look at all of Argentinas past government problems that eventually lead to a government change of a military dictatorship. In the reading it talked about how "the city had developed primarily as a port, eventually handling not only the majority of Argentina's import and export trade but also that of Bolivia and Paraguay." the reading also said "As in the country as a whole, Buenos Aires looked good on the surface, but when one began to investigate further, serious problems soon emerged". The first quote shows how Argentina appeared to be in a good place in the trading world now being a main import and export place, but the second quote suggests that the country was in way to deep over their heads and was headed for some serious trouble which eventually dug them deeper into the Great Depression and resulted them in a military leader.

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  9. After I read the reading, I felt that country should not forget the past because in today's world life is all about revenge. In the early years of the Great Depression, Argentina was really really hit and suffered a lot. Economic problems emerged such as the crisis in beef trade which meant a decrease in the exports of Argentina (it was a really good economic activity in Argentina) and prices had fallen by half. Also, Argentina increased their tariffs to protect their exports but it had no effect and their debts increased by a lot since the government's revenue was much smaller than the government spending.

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  10. By the start of the Great Depression, Argentine economy was still dominated by production of wheat and beef, its politics dominated by “landowners and owners of meat-packing factories.” Argentina was faced with “a crisis in the beef industry, tariffs and debt, and oil.” When the First World War started, the demand for high-quality beef went down. Countries wanted the cheap stuff to feed their soldiers. Now, Argentina was able to adjust to this, but suffered a crisis after the war after this demand collapsed. Between 1918 and 1921, prices had fallen by half . Also, between 1921 and 1922, “Argentina’s debt grew from 682 to 893 million paper pesos.”

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  11. In the early years of Depression in Argentina, Marcelo T. De Alvear, a wealthy landowner who may have been expected to enjoy happier relations with the elites, became the successor of Yrigoyen. However, he was faced with three on going problems. non of which he could solve. The problems were a crisis in beef industry, tariff and debt and oil. The pre-war chilled beef trade which dominated exports was generally geared to middle-class tastes wanting high quality beef. However, with the onset of the First World War, demand fell while demand for cheap beef products to feed the groops grew vastly.However, after the war, even this demand collasped. This was a big problem for the Argentina. The 1923 tariff extended protection to various raw materials in an attempt to diversify the agricultural sector, but it had no greater effect than to restore duties to 1914 level. In the mean time, the national debt had increased significantly; from 682 to 893 million paper pesos. Oil had been discovered in 1907 in Patagonia and the government, fearing foreign involvement, had created a 5000-hectare reserve in Comodoro Rivadavia from which all foreign firms were excluded. However, Congress were unwilling to give sufficient funding for the proper development of an Argentine oil industry and as time went on foreign interests grew in other fields.Eventually, Argentina failed to protect domestic oil from foreign involvement.

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  12. when Argentina was enveloped with economic struggle like much of the world it was taken harshly as a economy and morally. Argentina believed itself to be a domain south american nation and when the depression hit Argentina spiraled into the abyss. their beef industry was overcome with disease and plummeted and the deficit spending grew uncontrollably into the hundreds of millions. the only real profitable venture for Argentina was its oil foundries unfortunately they were never set up properly and effectively which led investors into more developed sources. Argentinean goods were also heavily taxed and it forced the nation to wait out the depression while the world powers oriented themselves.

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  13. Consider Argentina's past, you will find how different Argentina was before/during/after the Great Depression. As we read before, Argentina regarded itself as the leader of Latin America, when the United States and Canada were suffering from the Great Depression but still remain the same, Argentina turned into a dictatorship. During the Great Depression, Argentina was dealing with some major economic problems such as crisis in the beef trade, tariffs and debt, oil import/export, and the trading relationship with the United States. Argentina realized that it had to follow the economic practices of the rest of the Americas and it actually tried, the government tried to reform universities, win support from middle class by creating more jobs in government, win support of urban working classes... but it was hard and rough.

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  14. It is necessary to take into account Argentina's national past so you can see why they have certain outlooks on issues such as US and British involvement in their economy, tumultuous presidential leaders, etc. Argentina followed the economic practices of many other countries in the early 20th century when it implemented tariffs, racked up a large debt to pay for increased government spending, and was very dependent on foreign trade. Argentina was a large beef export as well as economically dominated by the US and Great Britain.

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  15. There are a lot of things in the history of Argentina to consider that in a way lead and also help acknowledge the differences in them both before and after the Depression. On the surface, Argentina seemed to be very prosperous, they had just opened their eyes to international trading and had a great relationship with the UK when exporting goods. They had begun to create their own resources such as oil and were over all one of the greatest powers in Latin America. They also had just moved to a new era of leaders. Before, the Argentinian goverment had been corrupt and had no consideration of its people. Now a new government was in its place that was voted on: the radicals. However, there was more to the story than just that. Problems began to arise in the beed industry, tarrifs, and oil. Not to mention the prices began to drop because of peoples confidence in the system, similar to the US. So when the stock market crash and prices dropped people didn’t know what to do.

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  16. Argentina had a difficult time in the depression. But they were a prosperous country with opportunities for international trading. They had good relationships with many countries such as the UK, which has economic power. And other countries because they have many immigrants coming from there to Argentina. Their own resources were exported for good profit. But eventually, the system became untrusted and their big industries started to fail. And this is because prices started to drop, and they could not make any money.

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  17. Yrigoyen was leader of the Radical party and President before he was overthrown by the military. Since the Conservatives controlled Congress, they vetoed a lot of what he proposed. Yrigoyen's successor after his first term was Marcelo T. de Alvear, who had to deal with a beef industry problem, tariffs and debt, and oil. In 1928, Yrigoyen was re-elected. By 1930, the budget deficit was 350 million paper pesos, so he had to cut public spending. As a result, many of his supporters lost their jobs.

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  18. Its important to consider their past because a lot of things happened with their government. Their government has changed a lot and their leader was highly untrusted throughout the country. In the early years of the depression they were just like any other country was or would be at the beginning of a depression. They didn't know what to do and were thinking of any solutions that they could. They were similar to canada and the us because they had been through the beginning stages of the depression and they made decisions that argentina could make as well. The only thing that was different from the us and canada and argentina was that argentinas president got overthrown by the military which meant that they didn't really have a leader to make decisions.

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