Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Germany, enabling the Nazi regime to begin reshaping economic policy around unemployment reduction, rearmament, and state-directed labor control.
The regime organized a one-day boycott of Jewish shops and professionals, an early step toward systematically excluding Jews from economic life and later large-scale expropriation (“Aryanization”).
After union offices were seized and independent unions abolished, the German Labour Front (DAF) was created as the regime’s single mass labor organization, eliminating collective bargaining and independent worker representation.
The Law on the Trustees of Labour established state-appointed “Trustees of Labour” to regulate labor relations and wage-setting, replacing collective bargaining and helping enforce “labor peace” under Nazi control.
The DAF announced Strength Through Joy (Kraft durch Freude) to organize subsidized leisure and workplace programs, part of the regime’s strategy to manage worker morale while restricting independent labor rights and limiting wage pressure.
To fund rapid rearmament while obscuring state borrowing and managing inflation risk, Hjalmar Schacht’s system of Mefo bills was introduced, allowing banks to discount these promissory notes and the Reichsbank to rediscount them.
The Work Order Act reorganized workplaces around the leader principle (Führerprinzip), making owners/managers “factory leaders” and workers “followers,” strengthening authoritarian control over shop-floor relations.
A law re-established the Reich Labour Service (RAD) and made labor service obligatory for young Germans, expanding state capacity to direct manpower into public works and later war-related tasks.
Hitler initiated the Four Year Plan and put Hermann Göring in charge, aiming to accelerate rearmament and prepare for war through greater autarky (e.g., synthetic substitutes) and intensified state direction of resources.
A decree required Jews to register assets above a set threshold, providing the administrative basis for intensified expropriation and forced transfers of property under “Aryanization.”
Fritz Todt founded Organisation Todt (OT) as a state-directed construction organization that expanded large-scale infrastructure and, increasingly, militarized projects—later relying heavily on coerced and forced labor.
Göring signed the regulation to eliminate Jews from German economic life, barring Jews from operating retail and trade businesses from 1 January 1939, accelerating forced sales and closures of remaining Jewish enterprises.
A decree dated 3 December 1938 tightened controls over Jewish assets, enabling forced liquidation and restrictions on disposal of property—deepening the regime’s economic dispossession of Jews.
The Reich created a dedicated Ministry for Armaments and Munitions, with Fritz Todt appointed to lead it, formalizing centralized direction over key inputs to Germany’s war production effort.
After Todt’s death, Hitler appointed Albert Speer as Minister of Armaments and Munitions, a shift associated with tighter industrial coordination and expanded use of coerced labor in armaments production.
Hitler appointed Fritz Sauckel General Plenipotentiary for Labour Deployment, centralizing the procurement and allocation of labor—especially through mass deportations and forced labor from occupied Europe for agriculture and industry.
Goebbels publicly demanded “total war,” pressing for deeper mobilization of manpower (including women and previously exempted groups) and further subordination of civilian life to armaments and military needs.
The armaments ministry’s official name expanded to Reich Ministry of Armaments and War Production, reflecting widened authority over industrial output and inputs crucial to sustaining the war economy.
Hitler created the office of Reich Plenipotentiary for the Total War Effort for Goebbels, empowering him (in principle) to maximize manpower for the Wehrmacht and armaments by cutting “nonessential” civilian activities.
Germany’s surrender ended Nazi rule; institutions that had enforced state-directed labor control, rearmament finance, and mass forced labor were dismantled under Allied occupation.
Nazi Economic Policies and Labor Mobilization (1933–1945)
