US Domestic Policy since 1945

The Economic MiracleAnd Post-war Anxiety

1950’s Demographics

A. National Affluence• GDP almost doubled

1945-1960• Inflation remained

under 2% most of 1950’s• Defense spending

most important stimulant

1950’s Demographics

B. Consumption Patterns1. Home Ownership2. Consumer Credit3. Savings4. Shopping Centers5. Teen consumption

Materialism in US cultureI drive my car to supermarket,

The way I take is superhigh,A superlot is where I park it,

And Super Suds are what I buy.Supersalesmen sell me tonic –

Super-Tone-O, for relief.The planes I ride are supersonic.

In trains I like the Super Chief.Supercilious men and women

Call me superficial – me.Who so superbly learned to swim in

Supercolossality.Superphosphate-fed foods feed me;

Superservice keeps me new.Who would dare to supersede me,

Super-super-superwho?John Updike echoes complaints about American materialism, 1954

1950’s Demographics

C. Population Growth• 1950’s: Pop grew to 28 M(97% urban/suburban)• Life expectancy 66 in 195571 in 1970• Dr. Benjamin Spock’s The Commonsense Book of Baby and Child Care

1950’s DemographicsD. Suburbs• Grew 6x faster than citiesWilliam Levitt• Mass-produced housing development(built 10,600 houses on Long

Island, 1947 Levittown)• Auto production 2 M 1946 8 M 1955• White flight as black population in cities

1950’s DemographicsE. The Middle Classo 1947 5.7 million families classified as Middle

Classo 1960 ‘s 12 million American families classified

as Middle Class

1950’s DemographicsF. JobsFarm Workers

9 million 19405.2 million 1960

1960 more Americans white collar than blue collar

II. Post-war AnxietyA. Conformity and security1. Homogeneity Expansion of middle class?

I am beginning to think, whether it be for money, for notoriety, reputation, increase of pride, whether it leads us to thievery, slaughter, sacrifice, the quest is one and the same. All the striving is for one end. I do not entirely understand this impulse. But it seems to me that its final end is the desire for pure freedom. We are all drawn toward the same craters of the spirit – to know what we are and what we are for, to know our purpose, to seek grace. And, if the quest is the same, the differences in our personal histories, which hitherto meant so much to us, become of minor importance.

Saul Bellow’s character Joseph in Dangling Man (1946) expresses a feeling later echoed by many of the most memorable characters in post war American fiction.

II. Post-war Anxiety

Americans becoming “outer-directed” people rather than “inner-directed”

Society molded by peer-group pressures andCorporate culture indoctrination

II. Post-war AnxietyConformity in US Culture

Credits from TV Series, Weeds

II. Post-war Anxiety2. LeisureStandard work week

shrankTVBooks

II. Post-war AnxietyB. Roles of Women Women

Cult of feminine domesticity after WWII

II. Post-war AnxietyC. RebellionIntellectualism Critical of American life

suburban lifemass production

American education questioned

II. Post-war Anxiety Betty Frieden The Feminine Mystique“Each suburban wife struggles with it alone. As she

made the beds, shopped for groceries, matched slipcover material, ate peanut butter sandwiches with her children, chauffeured Cub Scouts and Brownies, lay beside her husband at night- she was afraid to ask even of herself the silent question-- 'Is this all?”

― Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique

II. Post-war Anxiety“What Friedan gave to the world was, "the problem that has no name." She not only named it but dissected it. The advances of science, the development of labor-saving appliances, the development of the suburbs: all had come together to offer women in the 1950s a life their mothers had scarcely dreamed of, free from rampant disease, onerous drudgery, noxious city streets. But the green lawns and big corner lots were isolating, the housework seemed to expand to fill the time available, and polio and smallpox were replaced by depression and alcoholism. All that was covered up in a kitchen conspiracy of denial...Instead the problem was with the mystique of waxed floors and perfectly applied lipstick.”

― Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique

III. Rebellion in the MindsA. Literature

Theater and Fiction Death of a Salesman 1949 and The

Crucible 1953 by Arthur Miller

Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger 1951Conflict of individual and society

III. Rebellion in the MindsScene from Arthur Miller’s play, Death of a Salesman, starring

Dustin Hoffman

III. Rebellion in the MindsB. Rebellious ArtEdward Hopper – isolated individuals Night Hawks

III. Rebellion in the Minds• Abstract Expressionism (spontaneous expression)Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, Willem de Kooning

Jackson Pollock

III. Rebellion in the Minds• Mark Rothko

III. Rebellion in the Minds

III. Rebellion in the Minds

Willem de Kooning

III. Rebellion in the MindsC. Counterculture and the Beat Generation

Began in Greenwich Village, NYAllen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, William Burroughs,

Neal CassadyFree-form poetry and mémoire-style writing

III. Rebellion in the MindsOn the Road, film released in 2012 based on novel by Jack Kerouac

III. Rebellion in the Minds

• William Burroughs“I am forced to the appalling conclusion that I would never have become a writer but for Joan's death, and to a realization of the extent to which this event has motivated and formulated my writing. I live with the constant threat of possession, and a constant need to escape from possession, from control. So the death of Joan brought me in contact with the invader, the Ugly Spirit, and maneuvered me into a life long struggle, in which I have had no choice except to write my way out.”

III. Rebellion in the MindsFilm Trailer, Beat 2000 based on William Burroughs’ life

HomeworkThe Unfinished Nation, Chapter 30

The Affluent Society

• Introduction – Economic Miracle & Timeline, p. 779• Science and Technology, p. 783• Bombs, Rockets & Missiles, p. 787• Space Program, p. 788• Consumer Culture, p. 789• Suburban nation, suburban family, p. 789• Birth of Television, p. 791• Travel, Outdoor Recreation, Environmentalism, p. 792• Organized society and its detractors, p. 793• Beats and Culture of Youth, p. 794• Rock n roll, p. 795