Do Fish Drink Water? Quotes

“Oddly enough, Tootsie Rolls and Tootsie Pops aren’t classified as chocolate under the definitions federal officials use when collecting data on the candy industry.”
― Bill McLain, Do Fish Drink Water?

“Many complex elements contributed to the Great Depression of 1929. However, most economists believe that the two main causes of the Depression were the immensely uneven distribution of wealth during the previous decade and the extensive speculation in stock that took place in the latter half of the decade. The decade preceding the Depression was a time of tremendous prosperity and became known as the “Roaring Twenties.” However, prosperity was not for everyone. The number of wealthy people in the country was less than a tenth of a percent of the total population yet they controlled most of the money in the country. In a well-functioning economy, demand must equal supply. But in 1929 wealth was so unevenly distributed that the supply of products far exceeded the demand for them. People may have wanted the products at the time but they couldn’t afford them. If supplies keep building and demand lessens, the economy can collapse. One way to balance the equation is to allow people to buy products over time. By the end of the Roaring Twenties, over 60 percent of all automobiles and 80 percent of all radios had been purchased on credit. With this new influx of money into the market, the economy was booming at the end of the 1920s. Stock speculation became rampant. Profits as high as 3,400 percent could be made in less than a year and people could buy on margin. In other words, they only had to put down 10 percent cash when buying a stock. Because of this, everyone was buying stocks. The poor were equal players with the rich. This buying spree pushed the market to new highs. In 1928 alone the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose from 191 to 300. There were warning signs as minor recessions occurred in the spring of 1929. Investors became nervous. In October people started selling their shares of stock. As the market started dropping, more and more people sold stock, margins were called, and by October 1929 there was panic selling. Stock prices dropped so fast that many rich people became poor in a matter of hours.”
― Bill McLain, Do Fish Drink Water?