History can offer lessons for the present circumstances.  In a letter to W.E.B. Du Bois, Charles Clinton Spaulding
argued that the Depression would cultivate a generation of superior
business managers by forcing them to operate businesses more
efficiently.  His company, North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Company, had suffered a series of economic setbacks during the 1930s, and he adjusted by trimming expenses–to name one example.  For more, see Charles Clinton Spaulding on northcarolinahistory.org