Great Depression = Happy times?

I came across this article in CNN, which studies the positive aspects of the Great Depression, the impact it had on the people that lived in that time.

This research actually concluded that in times of depression, like there's a lot of unemployment, people get to spend more time with their families, they do not stress out, reasion why they do not recur to alcohol and drugs. Opposite to time of economical growth, where people get stressed out because of work.

Before reading the article, with just the title I imediately thought "but what about the suicides?" The rate actually did go up, but surprisingly, life expectancy grew 8.8 years. Also, during times of industrial and economical expansion. More pollution is produced, tampering with our health.

The study also shows that the increase of life expectancy is actually a pattern that can be found in many other countries during economic crisis. Examples of this are Japan, Spain and Sweden.

I think that we can conclude from this article that the Great Depression was a difficult time in the US and world economy, the people can deal with it and overcome the difficulties. Also, there had to be a positive side to things.

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/US/09/29/great.depression.benefits/index.html