By mid-1920, prices, output, and employment were all plummeting. The United States experienced one of the most intense deflations in its history: wholesale prices dropped 26 percent between June and December 1920; by June 1921, wholesale prices were 42 percent below where they had been a year earlier, and farm prices had fallen even more. Real output also declined sharply: farm production dropped 14 percent in 1921, and industrial production fell 26 percent in the year after June 1920. The unemployment rate jumped from 2 percent in 1919 to 11 percent in 1921.50
