Progressive Era Programs and the New Deal: Combating Economic & Social Issues

Despite New Deal reforms having been created to combat economic problems during the Great Depression, they were in many ways more effective at addressing social and economic problems than earlier Progressive reforms. The key component which differentiated Progressive Era and New Deal programs was their level of directness: whilst Progressive Era politics often involved negotiations with business to help the people, New Deal programs often directly helped the people by providing them with jobs and care. By getting involved directly with the public and helping alleviate their fears, providing government-funded work opportunities for the jobless and by giving social benefits to help people who could no longer work, various New Deal programs were much more effective and direct at fixing long-standing social and economic problems than Progressive Era program counterparts.

One of the key ways in which Roosevelt and his “New Deal” strategy helped America socially was through Roosevelt’s seeming direct involvement and interaction with the people. Throughout US history, many presidents had been extremely separated from “common” society. Although many presidents had been very energetic and people-oriented during their campaigns, they often subsequently focused more on speaking to fellow politicians than on speaking to the public. However, during the Great Depression, many people needed a president who could not only help them with new economic policies – instead, many people needed moral support in order for them to continue persevering through hard times. At a time when many people had severe economic problems, it was helpful to have a president who seemed approachable and sympathetic to the saddening plight of many Americans. In order to achieve this sympathetic and people-involving approach, the New Deal utilized regular radio fireside chats, in which Roosevelt spoke directly to the public as he explained his various policies and how he hoped they would help America. In these radio broadcasts, Roosevelt was able to directly encourage the nation to continue through the Great Depression, and his words of encouragement toward the American people through his optimism was a driving factor in keeping America under control even during hard times. Although Progressives had always hoped for presidents who were involved directly with the public, few presidents before FDR could compete with Roosevelt’s public nature and people-oriented spirit. Progressive candidates’ aims of spending time reforming various industries often caused them to unintentionally spend little time explaining their approaches to the public and giving moral support to many of the people they aimed to support. Although the Progressives were often able to provide some type of financial aid through businesses, they failed to support people from a moral and emotional perspective, thereby bringing less of a social benefit to the people than Roosevelt’s New Deal programs such as his fireside chats. Whilst both the New Deal and the Progressive Era were marked by some level of economic change, Roosevelt and the New Deal were able to keep the public morally supported and involved to a greater extent than politicians in the Progressive Era, thereby contributing to the social advantages of New Deal programs over Progressive counterparts in which few presidents doubled as public figures to provide people in need with emotional support.

The New Deal also had significant economic advantages over the policies adopted in the Progressive Era, since FDR and his New Deal programs often involved more direct and immediate support for people who were facing severe economic problems. During the Progressive Era, most politicians attempted to solve economic problems facing the many workers and impoverished American citizens through indirect action. Specifically, Progressives often negotiated higher wages with businesses, passed pro-union laws to allow for better wage negotiation from workers at factories and created legislation for issues such as minimum wages and minimum working age. All of these policies and general doctrines followed by the Progressives attempted to change how businesses operated, and thereby it was hoped that various changes in businesses would also cause changes in the lives of many workers. Despite these many attempts at reform, however, the Progressive Era was largely unsuccessful in halting various economic problems facing poor Americans. Much of the legislation enforced across the nation regarding business operation was ignored, and business leaders often found ways of manoeuvring governmental policies in order to continue crude business practices. Although the Progressive Era was marked by frequent “trust-busting,” in which large holding companies were separated and closed, the individual companies were often still controlled by the same people as before with increasing discrete measures which could not be caught by the government. Despite the many efforts during the Progressive Era to reform industries and thereby change working conditions, these efforts were largely unsuccessful due to corrupt business practices which thwarted government control through legal loopholes and well-planned ways of avoiding or faking government inspection. Although the policies during the Progressive Era may have shed a slight glimmer of hope for many poor Americans, the New Deal was able to have a much more direct and positive impact on Americans in need of help. During the Great Depression, funding businesses would almost certainly have not trickled down to help workers: instead, due to the shortage of work, businesses would have been able to drive wages down and thereby make large amounts of profit for themselves whilst keeping workers under terrible conditions. Instead of funding businesses, the New Deal was able to help the much-weakened American population through its direct employment program, by which unemployed people across the nation were hired by various government-created agencies and were in turn provided with various economic benefits and support. The New Deal was able to directly provide support to Americans in need through agencies such as the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps) or the WPA (Works Progress Administration). Both of these programs – and many more – provided economic relief to jobless Americans by providing young people with government-funded jobs (such as building national parks, constructing bridges or creating roads) in return for space in which people involved in the programs could live and some economic support which they could send to their families. The support given by governmental agencies such as the CCC and WPA provided immediate and direct economic relief to many jobless and impoverished Americans, thereby contributing to the much larger economic impact of New Deal programs than of Progressive Era counterparts. Whilst Progressive Era politics often involved negotiations and legislation in order to change business operations and thereby change conditions for workers, New Deal programs were able to implement economic change much more rapidly through immediate governmental employment programs.

Although providing social benefits to members of society who were in need of support had always been an aim of politicians in the Progressive Era, this dream only became a reality in the New Deal with the advent of social security, thereby demonstrating the higher success of New Deal programs in terms of their economic support. Social benefits for people in need, especially the elderly, are in many ways considered part of daily society in the modern world, but these programs were largely dreams before FDR’s presidency and the start of the New Deal. The aims of a system of social benefits were two-part. Firstly, one hope of social benefits were that these measures would provide the elderly with support and care even after they left the workforce such that they could have a joyous retirement instead of needing to work in order to finance themselves. However, a second aim of these retirement programs for the elderly involved nationwide economics – if elderly people had to continue working because they did not have a constant flow of retirement funds, this reduced the number of jobs available for younger people. Especially in times where the total number of jobs was very limited (such as during the Great Depression), having many jobs filled by the elderly reduced the amount of money which young people could earn in order to support their families. Although many Progressive era politicians recognized the need for a strong system of social benefits for the elderly, they were unable to find a way of providing enough funds to the elderly such that the elderly could retire peacefully, which ultimately stopped them from ever executing a social benefit plan. Roosevelt’s fine-tuned strategy for social benefits involved his Social Security plan, by which people paid into pension funds from which (upon their retirement) they were given monthly retirement funds in order to provide them with additional support. Although this program of social benefits did not entirely cover the many costs in the lives of the elderly, it reduced the work which most elderly people had to engage in and thereby opened up new opportunities for younger members of the population. Although FDR’s plan of social benefits through the Social Security Act did not allow the elderly to only survive off of social benefits, it was certainly a great improvement from an economic perspective from the Progressive Era – in which no social benefits were present for the elderly.

In conclusion, Roosevelt’s policies in the New Deal were much more effective at combating economic and social problems during the Great Depression than policies adopted by politicians during the Progressive Era. Through Roosevelt’s careful efforts at moral and emotional support, providing direct economic support through government employment and increased social benefits, the New Deal was able to guide the American population through the Great Depression with optimistic spirits for the future. Although many of the social and economic aims of the Progressive Era and the New Deal were similar, the differences in their executions resulted in New Deal programs often being more effective and increasingly able to provide immediate relief.