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The Stock Market Crash of 1929 The stock market crash of 1929 and the preceding depression are undoubtedly the most economically memorable events of the 20th century. Although there are many different theories as to who or what caused the crash, author John Kenneth Galbraith impressively backs up his theories through his novel The Great Crash: 1929. He points out that the five key reasons for this disaster were because of bad distribution of income, bad corporate structure, bad banking structure, questionable foreign loans, and weak economic intelligence. On December 4, 1928, in his state of the Union address, President Coolidge talked about the economic success of the country. “There was much good about the world of which Coolidge spoke… The rich were getting richer much faster than the poor were getting less poor. ” According to Galbraith, there was a high employment rate as well as production. “Wages were not going up much, but prices were still stable. ” People had high hopes that everything was going to get even better because of the success in the market. The Idea of getting rich quickly without having to do much rapidly caught on, causing the market to sky rocket. Often times, people would buy stock o