author and actress, described the change too, in the Washington Post in 1932,
comparing the Great Depression with the 1920s:
During those years of inflation, when we were right on the edge of a precipice
all the time, we lost our sense of perspective. We spent fabulous sums for
objects and pleasures out of all proportion to the value received. If it cost a
great deal of money, we promptly came to the conclusion that they must be
good.… Take the matter of home entertainment. Many of us had almost
forgotten how much fun it can be to gather friends around one’s own table.
Any number of us suffered from “restaurant digestion.”7
The Great Depression became a time of reflection about what is important in
life beyond spending money. Writing in the United Kingdom in 1931, columnist
Winifred Holtby asked:
In other words, can we not use this period to get rid of a little snobbery and
bunkum and live lives dictated by our own tastes instead of our neighbours’
supposed notions of “what is done”? With so much to do, and a world so rich
in experience, must we shut ourselves up into little genteel compartments in
which we all adopt the same arbitrary standards, wear the same things, eat the
same things, and produce the same sad monotony of “appearances”? … Can
we not remember the wisdom of Marie Lloyd’s old song, “It’s a little of what
you fancy does you good!”?—not a little of what you fancy your neighbours
will fancy that you ought to fancy. Can we not dare to be poor?8
In 1932, near the lowest ebb of the Great Depression, Catherine Hackett,
another writer, explained her view of the new morality in the Great Depression:
In the old Boom era I could buy a jar of bath salts or an extra pair of evening
slippers without an uncomfortable consciousness of the poor who lacked the
necessities of life. I could always reflect happily on the much-publicized day
laborers who wore silk shirts and rode to their work in Fords. Now it was
different. The Joneses were considered to be callous to human misery if they
continued to give big parties and wear fine clothes.9
Despite such narratives, it appears that some dimensions of the “hard times”
of the Great Depression were a desirable improvement over the 1920s. Anne
O’Hare McCormick, a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist for the New York Times,

wrote in 1932:
There are times when the complacency, the rugged selfishness and the greed
for hokum of one’s compatriots are hard to bear. This is not one of those
times. At the bottom of the market we are much nicer than we are at the top.
Main Street in a depression is the most neighborly street in the world. It is a
very patient thoroughfare.10
In addition, it was noted during the Great Depression that there was no increase
in crime despite the high rate of unemployment.11 Perhaps this phenomenon was
related to the increase in “neighborly” and “patient” sentiments that softened the
sense of personal failure created by unemployment that might otherwise have led
to crime.
Though the streets may have become more neighborly, the human misery was
palpable on the street corners. In the early 1930s there was “a perfect epidemic
of pan-handling and street begging.”12 In 1932 the Washington Post reported,
“Panhandlers have become especially active during the depression. They find
that people who do not believe in giving to professional beggars are especially
soft-hearted at present.”13
An epidemic of apple sellers, starting in New York City in the fall of 1930,
spread nationwide.14 The sellers were practically admitting that they were
beggars, often displaying signs saying “Unemployed” or “Eat an apple and help
me keep the wolf away.”15 In effect, they were begging, but selling the apples
made them look more reputable and approachable. Newspapers also carried
stories of crimes committed by beggars who hadn’t received the requested alms,
so their presence created an atmosphere of fear, which surely discouraged
conspicuous consumption.16
Beyond the visible beggars there were narratives about the internal struggle of
others not visibly unemployed. Benjamin Roth, a lawyer, wrote in his personal
diary on August 9, 1931:
Most professional men for the past two years have been living on money
borrowed on insurance policies, etc. The only work that comes in now are
impossible collections on a contingent fee basis. Everybody is digging up old
claims and trying to realize on them. Tempers are short and people are
distrustful and suspicious. There is nothing to do but work harder for less
money and cut expenses to the bone.17