https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_cycle
Maynard Keynes figured out how to tame it somewhat (now we have a "great recession" instead of a "great depression") It helps a lot that we don't have a gold standard because back then we had the "Panic of 18xx" and "Panic of 19xx" every few years... But we have inflation instead.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recessions_in_the_Unit...