From 1945 to 1973, the United States economy generated an unprecedented amount of wealth. Despite economic fluctuations, the overall trend during this period remained positive: business flourished, real wages rose, a strong industrial sector provided working-class mobility ladders, and organized workers had a political voice in the Democratic Party. Though significant segments of American society did not share in this prosperity – especially minorities and rural whites – millions moved into the middle class. Veterans returning from World War II and the Korean War utilized opportunities such as the GI Bill and cheap Federal Housing Administration loans as bridges into the middle class. Capitalizing on the previous generation’s hard-fought labor gains, an adult male with a union job could support a family on a single income by working forty hours a week, with evenings and weekends away from the job, a paid vacation, full job benefits, affordable healthcare, regular pay raises, unemployment insurance, and a guaranteed pension and Social Security.From 1973 to 2012, the United States continued to generate significant wealth, yet real wages stagnated, and the share of national wealth and income held by the poor and middle classes shrank, while the share of the rich increased. According to the Institute for Policy Studies, “The United States exhibits wider disparities of wealth between rich and poor than any other major developed nation” (inequality.org/wealth-inequality/). But why?

The most striking feature of American society in the 1950s and early 1960s was the booming economic growth that made even the heady 1920s seem pale by comparison. Identify which of the following statements correctly describe the effects of the postwar economic boom on American society. 1. The suburban population grew almost as fast as the population as a whole. 2. The economic expansion lasted for almost twenty years with only brief interruptions. 3. Economic growth was held back only by the frugality developed by most Americans during the Depression. 4. The gross national product grew by a staggering 250 percent. 5. The prosperity was notable because it had very little influence on the standard of living in the United States. 6. Economic expansion triggered a sharp increase in the birthrate.

During the postwar years, the middle class was:A.growing in numbers.B.decreasing in wealth.C.getting less education.D.all of the above

Despite the increased affluence of the white middle class, large groups of Americans remained outside the circle of abundance and shared neither in the affluence of the middle class nor in many of its values. Identify which of the following statements correctly describe the realities of American life in this period. 1. Inner cities filled up with young urban professionals, eager to take advantage of the proximity to newly created jobs. 2. In 1960 at any given moment, more than one-fifth of all U.S. families lived below the poverty line. 3. In 1956 alone, nearly ten percent of the rural population moved into or was absorbed by cities. 4. Factory work flourished as a continued effect of the Second World War; automation was not yet a factor. 5. Between 1940 and 1960, nearly a million Puerto Ricans moved into American cities, especially New York. 6. The proliferation of automobiles spurred urban growth as more and more people chose to live in densely populated cities.

Evaluate the extent to which economic growth led to changes in United States society in the period from 1940 to 1970.

“In the decades following the Civil War, American capitalism began to produce a distinct culture, unconnected to traditional family or community values, to religion in any conventional sense, or to political democracy. It was a secular business and market-oriented culture, with the exchange and circulation of money and goods at the foundation of its aesthetic life and of its moral sensibility. . . .“By World War I, Americans were being enticed into consumer pleasure and indulgence rather than into work as the road to happiness. . . . For generations, America had been portrayed as a place of plenty, a garden in which all paradisiacal longings would be satisfied. . . . By the early 1900s this myth was being transformed, urbanized and commercialized, increasingly severed from its religious aims and focusing ever more on personal satisfaction and even on such new pleasure palaces as department stores, theaters, restaurants, hotels, dance halls, and amusement parks. . . . This new era heralded the pursuit of goods as the means to all ‘good’ and to personal salvation.”William Leach, historian, Land of Desire: Merchants, Power, and the Rise of a New American Culture, 1993QuestionWhich of the following long-term developments in the second half of the 1800s best helps to explain the change in United States culture depicted in the excerpt?ResponsesSome Americans began to move away from urban areas to form utopian communities.Some Americans began to move away from urban areas to form utopian communities.The formation of farmers’ cooperatives increased resistance to the business practices of corporations.The formation of farmers’ cooperatives increased resistance to the business practices of corporations.Some wealthy Americans used the doctrine of Social Darwinism began to justify economic inequality.Some wealthy Americans used the doctrine of Social Darwinism began to justify economic inequality.The creation of new manufacturing methods allowed factories to greatly increase production.