Nazi living standards

• Reducing unemployment

  • Job creation schemes: 7000 km of autobahns, public buildings, sports facilities, rearmament
  • National Labour Service (RAD): compulsory 6-month service for men aged 18-25, working on job creation schemes and public works
• Official government figures showed unemployment had dropped from 4.8 million in 1933 to 0.3 million in 1939, but this did not take into account "invisible unemployment" of Jews forced out of jobs, women dismissed or leaving jobs, and opponents sent to concentration camps
• Nazi workers' organisations

  Organisations set up by Hitler to improve the lives and conditions of German people
• German Labour Front (DAP)


  • Replaced trade unions, workers had to be members, ran several schemes
• Schemes run by the German Labour Front

  • Strength through Joy (KdF)
  • Beauty of Labour (SdA)
  • The Volkswagen (people's car)
• Strength through Joy (KdF)


  Aimed to increase productivity by making workers happy, provided low-cost or free activities (e.g. concerts, holidays) for hard workers
• Beauty of Labour (SdA)


  Aimed to improve conditions by reducing noise in workplaces, providing canteens and even building swimming pools, but workers had to help construct these in their spare time so it wasn't very popular
• The Volkswagen (people's car)


  One of the KdF's schemes to promote car ownership, Hitler asked Porsche to design a family car and the VW Beetle was the result, workers paid 5 marks a week towards buying a car but by 1939 no-one had paid in enough so the money went towards rearmament
• Parade of KdF Volkswagen Beetles in 1939 was a propaganda stunt
• Standard of living by 1939

  • Better off: average wages rose by 20% compared to 1933, car ownership increased three-fold
  • Worse off: workers had few rights and worked longer hours: 43 hours a week in 1933 up to 49 hours in 1939