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From the wheelbarrows of money needed to purchase a loaf of bread in 1923 to the long queues of the unemployed during the Depression, Weimar Germany is mainly remembered for industrial-strength economic disasters and political instability. Ever since Hitler became Chancellor in 1933, economists, historians, and political scientists have pored over Germany's first, brief experiment with democracy, producing study after study on economic and social policy, productivity performance, management of the currency, and the reparations issue.
Theo Balderston's brief text is a heroic attempt to survey and summarize this vast literature, and to highlight key areas of debate. By and large, it succeeds admirably--the book is ideal classroom material for a short course on interwar German economic history. In little more than 100 pages of chronologically organized text, Balderston covers the period from demobilization to the slump's end in 1933/34. Except for the editorial sloppiness that has become commonplace, the text is highly readable throughout. A glossary of key economic terms and concepts nicely complements a well-chosen bibliography. Balderston, who himself has made important contributions to some of the debates, begins his chapters with an overview of key facts and figures, and then moves on to a summary...