Economy, society and the Nazi winners and losers
Economy, Society and Nazi Winners and Losers
The Nazi regime’s economic performance is one of the most contested areas of its history. Headline statistics look striking: unemployment fell from approximately six million in early 1933 to under 200,000 by 1939. But these numbers conceal as much as they reveal. Understanding who benefited from Nazi economic policy, and who paid for it, is essential to any balanced assessment.
Economic Recovery and Rearmament
Initial recovery owed something to policies already in train under Brüning and von Papen, and to the normal business cycle turning upward from the 1932 trough. But the Nazis accelerated recovery through massive state spending, particularly on rearmament and public works. The RAD (Reich Labour Service), established in 1933, removed young men from the unemployment register and put them to work on public projects. The new Autobahn network was presented as evidence of national renewal.
Economist Hjalmar Schacht’s “New Plan” of 1934 directed imports towards rearmament priorities and managed the foreign exchange crisis. From 1936 the Four-Year Plan under Hermann Göring took over, explicitly prioritising military production. Germany was to be war-ready by 1940. Schacht resigned in 1937, warning that the pace of rearmament was economically unsustainable — he was correct, but ignored.
Nazi unemployment statistics excluded women (many of whom were removed from the labour market by policy), Jewish workers, and those on compulsory RAD or military service. The real unemployment picture was more complex than the headline figures suggested.
Winners and Losers: Workers
Workers were in an ambiguous position. On one hand, the return of employment after the misery of the Depression was genuinely welcomed. The German Labour Front (Deutsche Arbeitsfront), led by Robert Ley, replaced independent trade unions (banned in May 1933) and provided leisure activities through the Strength Through Joy (Kraft durch Freude) programme, including subsidised holidays, concerts and even ocean cruises.
But workers lost the right to strike, lost independent trade unions, and saw real wages stagnate or decline as government spending on rearmament crowded out consumer goods. The Strength Through Joy holidays were real but accessible mainly to better-paid workers; many working-class families remained poor throughout the 1930s. The promise of a Volkswagen (“People’s Car”) through a savings scheme attracted 340,000 subscribers by 1939 — yet no civilian vehicle was ever delivered before the war began.
The Nazi ideal for women was encapsulated in the three Ks: Kinder, Küche, Kirche (Children, Kitchen, Church). Women were encouraged to leave paid employment, marry, and produce children for the Aryan nation. The Reich Mothers’ Cross, introduced in December 1938, awarded medals to women for having four (bronze), six (silver) or eight or more (gold) children. Marriage loans were offered to couples on condition that the woman gave up work.
In reality, policy contradicted ideology. As rearmament accelerated and male labour was absorbed into the army, women were increasingly needed in factories and farms. By the late 1930s the regime was actively encouraging women to work again, despite its own propaganda. During the war years female employment rose dramatically. The “ideal” of the stay-at-home mother was always in tension with military-economic reality.
Youth and the Hitler Youth
Young people were a priority target for the regime. The Hitler Youth (Hitlerjugend) enrolled boys from age 14, with the younger Jungvolk for ages 10–14. Girls joined the League of German Girls (BDM — Bund Deutscher Mädel). Membership was made compulsory in 1936 and universal by 1939. The Hitler Youth combined outdoor activities, sport, camping and marching with ideological indoctrination. It was genuinely popular with many young Germans, offering excitement, community and a sense of purpose.
But the Hitler Youth also crowded out older youth organisations — church youth groups, sports clubs — and subjected young people to constant ideological pressure. Teachers who tried to resist found their authority undermined. Some young people rejected the organisation entirely, joining underground youth subcultures like the Edelweiss Pirates.
Three groups who lost under Nazi policy: workers (lost trade unions and collective bargaining, real wages stagnated); women (pressured to leave work, but later recalled for the war economy anyway); the Mittelstand (small business owners who gained initially from anti-department-store measures but were squeezed by the war economy).
Farmers had been among the earliest Nazi supporters, attracted by promises of agricultural protection. The Reich Entailed Farm Law of 1933 guaranteed peasant ownership of medium-sized farms from seizure for debt — a genuine protection. But agricultural prices remained relatively low, farm labour was drawn into better-paid industrial work, and the Four-Year Plan’s demand for food self-sufficiency placed heavy demands on farmers without adequate reward.
The Mittelstand (lower middle class) had been enthusiastic Nazi voters in 1930–32. The regime made some gestures — closing some Jewish department stores, protecting artisan trades — but the Four-Year Plan’s focus on heavy industry left small businesses at a disadvantage. The economic “miracle” benefited big business and armaments manufacturers far more than the independent small trader.