Banking and Finance only? No flying? Aarrrrgh! Ok, fine, here's a poignant and interesting quote from a book I'm reading:
The year reached almost the end of its third quarter under the promise and appearance of increasing prosperity, particularly in the United States. Extraordinary optimism sustained an orgy of speculation. Books were written to prove that economic crisis was a phase which expanding business organization and science had at last mastered. “We are apparently finished and done with economic cycles as we have known them”, said the President of the New York Stock Exchange... But…a sudden and violent tempest swept over Wall Street. The intervention of the most powerful agencies failed to stem the tide of panic sales. A group of leading banks constituted a millard-dollar pool to maintain and stabilize the market. All was vain.
The whole wealth so swiftly gathered in the paper values of previous years vanished. The prosperity of millions of American homes had grown upon a gigantic structure of inflated credit, now suddenly proved phantom. Apart from the nationwide speculation in shares which even the most famous banks had encouraged by easy loans, a vast system of purchase by instalment of houses, furniture, cars and numberless household conveniences and indulgences had grown up. All now fell together. The mighty production plants were thrown into confusion and paralysis…Today the grievous pangs of falling wages and rising unemployment afflicted the whole community, engaged till this moment in the most active creation of all kinds of desirable articles for the enjoyment of millions.
…A general contraction of trade in the face of unemployment and declining production followed…The general crisis brought with it acute monetary difficulties, and paralysed internal credit. This spread ruin and unemployment far and wide throughout the globe...The entire banking system of the [USA] was thrown into confusion and temporary collapse. Howeve, nobody starved in the English-speaking world.
Who said it?