Key Question 3: Life under the Nazis

• How were the lives of the German people affected by Nazi rule between 1933 and 1939?

  Economic control; control of workers; the treatment of women; children and education; the treatment of Jews up to 1939
• Economic control

  • Hitler tried to deal with Germany's economic problems through Construction of the Autobahnen (motorways), and spending money on public works such as building houses, schools, and hospitals. The National Labour Service provided jobs on public works for men aged between 18 and 25 on very low pay. From 1935 it was compulsory for all men aged 18-25 to serve in the National Labour Service for six months.
• Control of workers

  • Strength through Joy (KDF) organised leisure activities for the workforce, such as cheap holidays (including cruises on ocean liners for the most productive workers), entertainment, theatre and opera trips and subsidised, cheap sport. The idea was to make longer working hours more acceptable through improved working conditions.
• The treatment of women

  • The Nazis had clear ideas of what they wanted from women.

  Women were expected to stay at home and look after the family.

  Women doctors, teachers and civil servants were forced to give up their careers.
• • A Nazi woman's job was to keep the home nice for their husband and family - their life should revolve round the three 'Ks': church, children and cooking.
  • The Law for the Encouragement of Marriage gave newly wed couples a loan of 1,000 marks, and allowed them to keep 250 marks for each child they had. Mothers who had more than eight children were given a gold medal.
• Children and education

  • Hitler took great trouble to make sure that young people were loyal to him and the Nazi Party. It was important that young people thought that Hitler and the Nazi Party were the best thing to happen to Hitler. He set up youth movements and re-structured the education system. Outside school, boys had to join the Hitler Youth organisation and learned military skills. The girl's version taught domestic skills. Posters encouraged children into recognising that Hitler was a saviour. Schools became places to pick on the Jews.
• • Nazi schools - the Napolas was for boys aged 10-18 who were entering the armed forces, especially the WaffenSS, the military wing of the SS. Adolf Hitler Schools intended to train the future members of the Nazi government. The Ordensburgen or Order Castles Named after fortresses built by the Teutonic Knights. The entry qualification was six years' attendance at an Adolf Hitler School, plus state labour service and Nazi Party work. A finishing school for young Nazis in their twenties.
• The treatment of Jews up to 1939

  • There were laws against the Jews from 1935 onwards (Nuremberg laws) which meant they had to wear a Star of David, were banned from many public places, could be forced out of their

  homes at any moment, they were not allowed to own businesses and lost their German citizenship. The Final Solution and Holocaust was decided by the Nazis as the way to rid Jews from Germany and surrounding territories. Jews were sent to concentration camps such as Auschwitz and 6 million Jews were killed in total.