Panic of 1873

The Panic of 1873 was a financial crisis that triggered an economic depression in Europe and North America that lasted from 1873 to 1877 or 1879 in France and in Britain. In Britain, the Panic started two decades of stagnation known as the "Long Depression" that weakened the country's economic leadership. In the United States, the Panic was known as the "Great Depression" until the events of 1929 and the early 1930s set a new standard. The Panic of 1873 and the subsequent depression had several underlying causes for which economic historians debate the relative importance. American inflation, rampant speculative investments (overwhelmingly in railroads), the demonetization of silver in Germany and the United States, ripples from economic dislocation in Europe resulting from the Franco-Prussian War (1870–1871), and major property losses in the Great Chicago Fire (1871) and the Great Boston Fire (1872) helped to place massive strain on bank reserves, which, in New York City, plummeted from $50 million to$17 million between September and October 1873. The first symptoms of the crisis were financial failures in Vienna, the capital of Austria-Hungary, which spread to most of Europe and to North America by 1873. The American Civil War (1861–1865) was followed by a boom in railroad construction. of new track were laid across the country between 1868 and 1873, with much of the craze in railroad investment being driven by government land grants and subsidies to the railroads. The railroad industry was the largest employer outside agriculture in the US and involved large amounts of money and risk. A large infusion of cash from speculators caused spectacular growth in the industry and in the construction of docks, factories, and ancillary facilities. Most capital was involved in projects offering no immediate or early returns. A period of economic overexpansion arose from the northern railroad boom before a series of economic setbacks: the Black Friday panic of 1869, the Chicago fire of 1871, an outbreak of equine influenza and the Boston fire of 1872, and the demonetization of silver in 1873.