Impact of World War I on Germany

Political Challenges:

• Stresses of World War I lead to revolutions in Oct. & Nov. 1918.
• Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicates in Nov. 1918.
• As a result, Germany became an unstable democratic republic.
• Many ex-soldiers and civilians despised the new democratic leaders and came to believe that their heroic leader Field Marshal Hindenburg had been betrayed by weak politicians.

Social Challenges:

• War left 600,000 widows and 2 million children fatherless.
• War deepened divisions in German society (huge gaps between the living standards of the rich and the poor).
• Many people see women working in factories as damaging to traditional family values and society as a whole.

Economic Challenges:

• National income was about ⅓ of what it had been in 1913.
• Industrial production was about ⅔ of what it had been in 1913.
• Many German workers were bitter at the restrictions placed on their earnings during the war while the factory owners made vast fortunes from the war.
• By 1925, the state was spending about ⅓ of its budgets in war pensions.