<P> The Great Depression affected France from about 1931 through the remainder of the decade . The crisis affected France a bit later than other countries, hitting around 1931 . While the 1920s grew at the very strong rate of 4.43% per year, the 1930s rate fell to only 0.63% . The depression was relatively mild: unemployment peaked under 5%, the fall in production was at most 20% below the 1929 output; there was no banking crisis . The depression had some effects on the local economy, which can partly explain the 6 February 1934 crisis and even more the formation of the Popular Front, led by SFIO socialist leader Léon Blum, who won the election of 1936 . </P> <P> Like the United Kingdom, France had initially struggled to recover from the devastation of World War I, trying without much success to recover war reparations from Germany . Unlike Britain, though, France had a more self - sufficient economy . In 1929, France seemed an island of prosperity, for three reasons . First, it was a country traditionally wary of trusts and big companies . The economy of France was above all founded in small and medium - sized businesses not financed by shares . Unlike the English - speaking world and particularly Americans, the French invested little on the stock exchange and put their confidence into gold, which in the crisis of 1929 was a currency of refuge . Gold had played the same role in the first world war, which explained French attachment to it . Finally, France had had a positive balance of payments for some years thanks mainly to invisible exports such as tourism . French investments abroad were numerous . </P> <P> The German reparations decided by the Treaty of Versailles in 1919 brought in large amounts of money which served principally to repay war loans to the United States . Reparations payments ended in 1923 . In January of that year, Germany defaulted on its payments and the French president, Raymond Poincaré, invoked a clause of the Versailles Treaty and sent troops to occupy the Ruhr valley in the hope of enforcing payment . Germany responded by flooding the area with inflated money, ruining its currency and denying France any hope of full reparations . Poincaré accepted an agreement mediated by the United States in which it received smaller payments, but Poincaré's government fell soon afterward . </P>

What did france do during the great depression