The debt accumulated by Americans rose from 1.4 Billion to 3 Billion dollars. Such a large debt and rather small paychecks lead to Americans having no wages because their earnings would go straight to pay for their outstanding debts. Because of this, Americans fell deeper into debt. .
Although people were becoming farther and farther in debt, the 1920's prospered in America. American's were celebrating victory after World War I and morality was very high. People spent money they didn't have consistently. The decade became well known for its free spending and jazz music. However, economic crisis wasn't far removed from the Americans. .
Meanwhile in Europe, the countries were not enjoying the same vibrant social lives the Americans were living. The Europeans were affected much more severely by the war then the Americans. European countries had to pay the United States 10.3 billion dollars to pay for war costs. The Europeans attempted to repay the Americans with large amounts of gold. However, this hurt their economy even worse because without gold backing their currency, their money was worthless. During the depression, the United States also instituted many high tariffs against European goods to promote the buying and selling of American products. This further crippled the European economy. .
The third reason for the great depression is the most widely known. Americans did not only buy their goods and food on credit; the people began to look for quick fortunes in the stock market by paying for their shares on credit. When buying a stock on credit, the buyer would only pay for a small percentage of the share and loan the rest from a bank. After the person would make a profit and sell the share, he would only need to repay his remaining debt from the sale of the stock plus a five percent commission fee. Stories of quick fortunes caused hoards of citizens to try their luck in the stock market. By 1929, Americans owed eight and a half billion dollars in broker's loans.