“Work and Bread” – the Socio-Economic Nazi Propaganda Before 1933

The NSDAP not only copied the style of the labour movement from the start, but also shifted the focus of its propaganda from 1928 onward from nationalistic foreign policy to domestic and social issues. Until 1932, however, the new socio-economic focus was not underpinned by any concrete economic policy programme. This changed in the final phase of the Weimar Republic, when the NSDAP recognised the political importance of taking action against mass unemployment like no other party. Ideas for active economic policy using central bank-financed employment programmes, which the leading National Socialist Gregor Strasser adopted from early Keynesian and trade union circles, served as the programmatic basis. The topic was job creation, the slogan was “work and bread” and the explicit main opponent, the SPD, was blamed for unemployment, misery and bankruptcy. This socio-economic focus may have contributed significantly to the electoral success of the NSDAP in July 1932, when it replaced the SPD as the strongest party in the Reichstag. The Nazis were able to garner more than a quarter of the workers‘ votes and became the strongest party - even among the workers. With this, the NSDAP turned into a people‘s party, which was drawn from all milieus.