But a better comparison could be found in Fredrick Allen's classic book "Only Yesterday" (on line HERE) which compares the world of 1919 with that of the early 1930's.
and it's narration on the start of the great depression seems to be hauntingly similar to that of today.
One more word about Mr. and Mrs. Smith and we may dismiss them for the night. Not only have they never heard of radio broadcasting; they have never heard of Coue, the Dayton Trial, cross-word puzzles, bathing-beauty contests, John J. Raskob, racketeers, Teapot Dome, Coral Gables, the American Mercury, Sacco and Vanzetti, companionate marriage, brokers' loan statistics, Michael Arlen, the Wall Street explosion, confession magazines, the Hall-Mills case, radio stock, speakeasies, Al Capone, automatic traffic lights, or Charles A. Lindbergh.
sigh
At first it seemed as if the Administration would succeed not only in preventing drastic and immediate wage cuts, but in restoring economic health by applying the formula of Doctor Coue. After sinking to a low level at the end of 1929 and throwing something like three million men upon the streets, the industrial indices showed measurable signs of improvement. .... For a time it seemed as if perhaps the hopeful prophets at Washington were right and prosperity was coming once more...
But in April this brief illusion began to sicken and die. Business reaction had set in again. ... The Coue formula was failing; for the economic disease was more than a temporary case of nervous prostration, it was organic and deep- seated.
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