The Great Depression took place from 1929 to 1939 and was a time of economic turmoil for the entire world. In October of 1929 the stock market crashed and initiated a snowball effect that culminated to become the Great Depression. The stock market crash threw Wall Street into disarray and caused millions of people to lose money. This extreme economic blow is what caused a decrease in the amount of money that people were willing and were able to spend on goods. Investments were no longer being made and companies were required to lay off workers because no money was being made. During the height of the Great Depression, it has been estimated the nearly 15 million Americans were out of work and virtually half of the banks in the United States had collapsed and gone bankrupt.