Monday, February 24, 2014
The Tough Years
The reason why an economic depression is worse than a recession is that it is longer. Like many countries, Argentina struggled with a weak economy and unemployment for most of the 1930s. What, in your opinion, were some of the more effective economic plans to pull Argentina out of the Depression? How do they remind you of programs we have already studied? Why?
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At first, the government took the prototypical route, they “reduced debts, cut government spending, boost trade, and maintain key industries.” In my opinion, one of the most effective economic plans to pull Argentina out of the Depression was the Roca-Runciman Agreement of 1932. This was a treaty between Britain and Argentina that, “guaranteed Argentina a fixed share in British markets for meat and ruled out tariffs on British cereal imports.” As I did some research, I believe that this program reminds me of the Canadian-American Trade Agreement of 1935. This was signed by Mackenzie King. This agreement would further the trade relationship between Canada and America. This seems similar to the Roca-Runciman Agreement of 1932 because the are both trade agreements.
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ReplyDeleteAfter i read the text, I felt that the most effective way to get Argentina out of the Depression was the Roca-Runciman Agreement of 1932. This was basically a tiny treaty between Argentina and Great Britain that basically was more beneficial for Argentina that G.B. Argentina got a good share of Great Britain's food market. All fare ness to Argentina they needed more help than Great Britain. Also Argentina is a lot more populated which means they need way more resources to maintain there country and also way more resources to help there people succeed economically.
ReplyDeleteAccording to the passage, it is clear that Argentina used a series methods to pull Argentina out of the Depression. Reducing debts, spending cuts, and increasing trades with Britain, which included many bilateral agreements. Argentina also developed its oil and steel market, in a word, Argentina used industry as one of the biggest factor to fix the economic situation, it could be proved by the establishment of ISI. But Argentina was somehow very different from Canada and the United States, when Canada and the United States were trying to add or create more jobs for people, Argentina cut many people, which might help average the wage standard but forced people to lose their job. At the same time, I felt that the agreements between Argentina and Britain were not fair sometimes, because Argentina was always asked to do more, and give more in order to gain more fix in its economy, which was different from the US and Canada.
ReplyDeleteBy 1930, when the Depression hit Argentina, the government tried many different plans to respond the depression and get along with it. The plans where such as reducing the foreign debts by devaluing the peso (after the devaluation of the dollar) so that argentinian goods were cheaper, decreasing the government spending, trading more and more especially with Britain. Argentina also tried to maintain their key industries such as oil (its production increasing form 0.5 million cubic metres to 3.3 a lot in less than 20 years) and overall meat packers and fraudulent practices.
ReplyDeleteThat is in terms of economy more specifically but also in terms of society, some things were modified: urbanization, people started to migrate to the cities and become more urban, control of organized labor, a greater education (increasing the spending on education and increasing its quality) and the promotion of middle classes.
In my opnion I think one of the more effective economic plans to pull Argentina out of the Depression was the Roca-Runciman Agreements 1932. This was a great plan because for three years it provided and secured Argentina a fixed share in British markets for meat and ruled out tarrifs on British cereal imports. Britain did receive many advantages through this agreement such as the currency exchanges were favourable to Britain. At the same time there were advantages to Argentina, such as all trade between Britain and Argentina was to be carried by British ships. This was an advantage to Argentina because using British ships creates costs for Britain for the transport. This "agreement" is better than others because in The Eden-Malbrán Treaty Britain is allowed to impose taxes on Argentine meat imports and more favourable terms for British-owned railways in Argentina.
ReplyDeleteI think the best decision they could have made to try and get Argentina out of the depression is securing their trading system. They had low income of imports and especially during the war when imports from great Britain were cut off. A huge part of their economy came from the trading, and markets. Securing a solid trading market, they could gain economical stability back because of how big the market was to Argentina. Basically all imports were a good start for Argentina to make money because they could use all the resources they could get to sell.
ReplyDeleteI think the Ronca Runcimen agreement was one of the most effective policies to stave off the symptoms of the Great Depression. It helped secure them fixed prices in Britains meat markets and overruled British tariffs on cereal imports. Other just general policies that helped was paying off Argentina's foreign debt which made their currency cheaper and therefore the goods in there country decreased in price. And, like the RR Agreement they increased trade, particularly with Britain, boosting their economy and income.
ReplyDeleteArgentina had a lot of plans to get out of the depression but only a few of them were actually successful. The Roca-Runciman Agreement of 1932 was one of the most successful plan for them to get out of the depression. This agreement was a commercial agreement between Argentina and the United Kingdom signed in London by the Vice President of Argentina, Julio Argentino Roca, Jr., and the president of the British Board of Trade, Sir Walter Runciman, the British envoy.The treaty ensured beef export quotas equivalent to the levels sold in 1932 (the lowest point in the Great Depression), strengthening the commercial ties between Argentina and Great Britain.
ReplyDeleteDuring the tough years, Argentina struggled just like a lot of other countries. The most effective method I think is Roca-Runciman agreements out the all of other ones: Reduce Debt, Spending cuts, Trade, Eden-Malbran Treaty, indroducing the income tax and the creating of central bank. Roca-Runciman ensured both British and Argentina the basic trading. Also their tariffs were kept low for each other which enhance their trading once more, which is important because the the depression comes from the lack of trade and money circulation. Argentina's income tax and the creation of central bank make me think of Canada. Canada did exactly the same thing during the depression.
ReplyDeleteWell Argentina had many plans of what possibly they could do but few worked. the government had a huge part in this. They can make anything and everything happen, they needed to make a secure trading system, This was the key. They needed to make a steady income using the triangular trade. This is the trading of North America, South America, and Europe. This is just one example of something that helped during the depression.
ReplyDeleteArgentina had many ideas as to what they could do to pull themselves out of the Depression. A lot of them went under because since they relied heavily on England, they were very appeasing and turned a blind eye to things like tax evasion and supposedly fair agreements that favored Great Britain. They needed to secure their trading system. They needed to make bilateral agreements that favored them if anything, and they needed to stop relying on Great Britain. That is what made them so fearful of losing trade with Britain.
ReplyDeleteStarts from the U.S., depression hits hard in every country it visits. Argentina is not lucky enough to run away from the depression. With a rapid fall in aggregate production rate, exchange value and so on, the government comes up with many solutions to "combat the effect of the depression". In my personal opinion, these solutions do not help significantly despite government's effort. The government does offer solutions such as reduce debts, spending cuts and trade agreement, etc. Roca-Runciman Agreement might not be very effective, nevertheless, it is the most known and significant solution. Argentina makes an agreement with Britain, which secured Argentina a fixed share in British market for meat. In return, British demands Argentina to rule out tariff for British cereal import and "preserve British commercial interests in Argentina such as railway." There are other policies on importing in Argentina favor Britian such as textile. The Argentina's government only imports British manufactured goods which are expensive oppose to Japanese goods. This act does not help Britian by Argentina's domestic production. Due to the high price of British manufactured goods, Argentina's domestic goods see a rapid growth. With the increase of nationalism-sentiment, the domestic production becomes even more popular. Therefore, this agreement could be consider as a success out of all the solutions.
ReplyDeleteOf course Argentina struggled with the economy just like many countries do today, and even though Argentina is still continuing to struggle with their economy today, during the 1930’s they tired many ways to pull themselves out of the depression. One way they tried to pull themselves out of the depression was to put some spending cuts in order. In the reading it says, “Uriburu sought to save government expenditures by savage spending cuts, for example, dismissing 20,000 government employees in Buenos Aires. National government expenditures fell from 934 million paper pesos in 1929 to 702 million by 1934”. This quote explains how by letting some people go of their jobs, the government was able to save more money overtime because it sounds like they had less people to pay. Also, Argentina participated in the Roca- Runciman Agreements in 1932. The agreement helped the Argentinean economy a lot because, “this treaty between Argentina and Britain, secured for three years, guaranteed Argentina a fixed share in Britain markets for meat and ruled out tariffs on British cereal imports”. Overall, the two things that I listed are just a few ways that Argentina tired to help themselves get out of the depression.
ReplyDeleteThe effect of the depression was very severe in Argentina. Aggregate production fell by 14 percent and the exchange value of the peso fell by 20 percent. Plus, not only did export fall by 34 percent but also the cost of bankrupcies and company liabilities soared to 105 million paper pesos. Government of Argentina reponded by reducing debts by repaying its loans to the USA on favorable terms and by saving government expenditures by savaging spending cuts. Plus, Argentina saw the solution to the depression in increased trade, particularly with Argentina's old partner, Britain. Because Argentina was scared by the Imperial Preference, Argentina negotiated a trade agreement such as Roca-Runciman Agreement of 1932 and The Eden Mabran Treaty, which favored Britain not only by reducing tariff to British goods but also by preserving British commercial interest(railways).
ReplyDeleteduring the depression Argentines economy was hurt by the end of world war one. during the war Argentina was a key supplier in beef and wheat products to feed the troops in the trenches. once the war ended the demand for Argentinean beef fell as well. the economy thats was built on inflated production busted and it was not until the government passed a tariff on selective taxing that favored british goods that the economy started to recover.
ReplyDeleteThe Argentinian government enacted many plans by-the-book for reviving it's economy from the Depression.Sadly, many of these were agreements with England such as Eden-Malbran Treaty which all heavily favored the British. This was due to the fact that Argentina depended on England more than the Brits needed Argentina, so England was able to get it's bawdy demands. Nevertheless, these bilateral agreements saved the Argentinian economy from further ruin.
ReplyDeleteThe government also followed the idea of Import Substitution Industrialization by diversifying it's domestic production from just primary products. Part of this diversification included the Direccion General de Fabricaciones in which the military built the ships, planes, and explosives itself. This is similar to the public works projects of the New Deal in which the government funded and ran the construction for the benefit of the country.
Argentina was hit hard by the Depression, production fell by fourteen percent in between 1929 and 1932, the value of the peso fell by twenty percent, thirty four percent of exports were lost, and Banco De La Nacion was overdrawn by one hundred fourty million pesos. In other words, their economy was terrible and they were greatly in debt. They were impoverished so the government retaliated by reducing spending, reducing debts, and improving trade. Their way of reducing debts was very interesting, they took advantage of the devaluation of the dollar to pay back their debts, and they used the devaluation of their own peso to help the people be able to afford living commodities. However, this did not help too much. Their way of cutting government spending was even worst, they laid off thousands of workers which only worsened the economy by taking jobs from the Argentinians and causing more unemployment. Even their trading agreements back fired. They were so desperate to try and trade with Britain that they really took the bad end of the bargain. In the Roca-Runciman Agreement of 1932 they agreed to reduce tariffs for Britain, reduce Britain's previous debt, and have all trading on British ships. In the next few agreements they would continue to get an even worst trading agreement with them. For example, Britain began to control Argentinian railroads. They just took a hit to allow some sort of trade but it didn't really help their economy too much.
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