depression
noun [ C or U ]
ECONOMICS uk/dɪˈpreʃən/ usa recession (= time of low economic activity, when investments lose value, businesses fail and people lose their jobs) that lasts for a long period of time, usually several years:
plunge/slide into depression The Thirties saw the world plunge into depression.
The Wall Street Crash of 1929 brought severe economic depression and hardship to Canada.
This was a period of deep depression.
For most of the 20th century, economists focused on understanding and controlling inflation and depressions.
New mines are being developed and old mines reopened, lifting communities across Northern Nevada out of the depression left by the industry's last crash.
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boom
recession
slump
the Depression (also the Great Depression)
the period in the years after 1929 until the middle of the 1930s, or, in some cases, the 1940s, when there was a very low level of economic activity in the US, Europe, and many other countries. Many people lost their jobs and were very poor:
The Federal Home Loan Bank system was created in the 1930s by the federal government to stimulate lending during the Depression.
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Wall Street Crash