To those DU'ers who lived through the "Golden Age of Capitalism" (1940s to 1970s)-some questions...

[YoungDemCA]

What were the main differences between that time and the present day? In what ways has American society improved since then, and in what ways has American society gotten worse?

From what I've head from my parents and grandparents, life was "simpler" back then, certainly compared to the present day. There was more economic security (job security, the social "safety net", rising wages and amazing economic growth), a stronger sense of community (particularly at the local, neighborhood level), and more optimism about the way America was going, which was connected to a greater trust in the ability of America's institutions (government, business, media, etc.) to solve problems and lead the nation forward.

Of course, we cannot forget the darker sides of the Post-WWII era. For much of that time, black Americans and other racial minorities had few political rights and freedoms at all. There was still plenty of poverty and generally grim conditions in certain parts of America, especially in the inner cities (where African-Americans were concentrated). And I don't think anyone on a forum like this would actually argue a return to the 1950s sexually conformist gender roles. Not to mention, the Cold War was horrible on a number of different levels.

I think the fact that the incredible growth of the American middle class and the astonishing economic growth during that period both masked and exacerbated underlying social tensions within the American population. After all, if it really was such a great time, what were the late 60s/early 70s massive social movements for? And yet....a broad segment of the population was undoubtedly better off during that time than nowadays. Just compare income inequality from 1970 to 2010, to see how much it has increased since then.

But anyway, enough of my opinions...what are yours, DU?

[Brickbat]

1. A simple answer? Unions.

[etherealtruth]

64. Unions built a strong middle class n/t

[geckosfeet]

2. Another simple answer: government was not as deeply in the pockets the rich and corporate interests.

[Skittles]

76. and a lot of the rich were like Romney's dad

happy to give back

[Egalitarian Thug]

81. Don't fall for the postmortem hype. He was a greedy, stupid man who drove a marginal company into

the ground while looting it every day. He regularly made just plain stupid decisions, the consequences of which were borne by those unfortunate enough to work for him, while he got richer. He was just another soulless parasite.

He wasn't the worst, but that doesn't alter the fact that he was his son's father and taught his son all the lessons that made that son as clueless as he is.

[femmocrat]

3. Your second paragraph pretty much sums it up.

A family could live comfortably on one income (usually Dad's). They could buy a home and a car and send their kids to college.
Kids seemed a lot safer, too.... we could roam around freely with no adult supervision. I don't know if there was "less" crime or that we just seemed insulated from it in our community.

There are a million reasons for the social movements. Viet Nam pretty much shredded that middle class complacency of the early 1960s. Historians can explain it better... I am only speaking from personal experiences.

[annabanana]

16. about the "safer" part...

The neighborhoods had a Mom in every house, with an eye out for ALL the kids. The car was at work with Dad, so there was hardly any traffic. (Talking about first generation suburbs here). There was homogeneity in income, race and background.. so nothing to make a sheltered person "uncomfortable."

[life long demo]

63. Yes, felt safe, lived in a community

Towns were different back in the 50's. I started 1st grade in Sept. 1947, grad. from 8th grade June 1956. My family didn't have a car, but you really didn't need one. Most of the dad's worked in the same town, mom's stayed home. Children walked to school, home for lunch. Almost every mom knew who the children belong too. The town I lived in was blue collar working class, getting by, and mostly union. I went to Catholic school, public school was in the next block. People didn't have much but they had enough. Most didn't "go on vacations", except maybe a bus day trip to the shore, or a bus to the county park. It was exceptional if one of your friends family was able to send a kid to college. But rarely were people out of a job. Grad. from HS in 1960, Things started to change in the 60's in both a good way and a bad way, more kids were able to go to college but then there was the war. 70's were bad but I seem to remember the 80's being much worse. Looking back IMO it was Reagan and then greed took hold, at least that's how I remember it. I so remember hating Reagan and never understood why people liked him.

[JDPriestly]

84. Actually, we kids were not as safe as we all thought.

It's just that no one dared to talk about some of the things that were going on.

Remember the scandals over "juvenile delinquency"?

And child molestation happened, but nobody admitted it or dared mention it. Sex was taboo. And people got hurt because of that taboo.

[Warpy]

4. We used to have a social contract even without unions

that said a day's work was worth a day's living wage, supported by a minimum wage which was geared to support a family of four on a "thrifty" lifestyle, which meant chuck instead of sirloin and vacations in a tent rather than in a big hotel.

The minimum wage was allowed to fall relative to inflation from the early 70s onward and now it won't support a single worker in safe housing with a diet nutritious enough to keep him healthy.

That is the main thing that has happened, a government policy of depressing labor's wages as far down as they will go. When they hit the floor, they started shipping jobs to the third world, aided by trade policies that disadvantaged the US labor market.

The New Deal + strong unions gave labor the best deal it had ever had. A strong middle class was created and it was stable, giving a great deal of stability to the country. If the rich paid attention to what was going on, they got richer. If they didn't and just spent money without keeping an eye on what was coming in, they got poorer.

The generation that benefited the most was the generation born during and after WWI and who were teenagers during the Depression and came of age just in time for WWII. There was a lot of pent up demand there and their bliss was to be able to go out and buy the things their families had been deprived of when they were growing up. To their children, they seemed crass and materialistic, ready to settle for toys rather than achieve the progress that would break down regimentation and social segregation across ethnic, racial, religious, sexual, occupational and class lines.

That's basically what the 60s were about, that and a nasty little war that we should never have gotten into.

We brats did a lot when it comes to kicking down the barriers, especially the ones that said women were only teachers, nurses, waitresses and maids and only until they married. After that, they were SOL when it came to jobs.

The rich declared war on us during Nixon's paranoid administration and it's been that way since then. The economy now is the direct result of 44 years of conservative, pro business, anti labor government policy.

[annabanana]

17. EXCELLENT summation. . . n/t

[unrepentant progress]

54. To add to what Warpy said, which was excellent

There wasn't a moral condemnation of poverty either. Hell, even fucking Milton Friedman understood that people are poor not because of moral or personal failings but because they have no money.

[bemildred]

91. Word.

Never seen it put better.

[Bandit]

92. Sears & Roebucks helped a lot

Consumption was the way.

[HereSince1628]

5. The post war years benefited from many things.

There was much pent-up demand...~4 years of rationing and diversion of production into war goods that were preceded by lean consumption of the depression. People needed EVERYTHING.

North America was the go to place for manufactured goods...much of Europe and east Asia were devastated by war.

The baby-boom created demand in EVERYTHING... and booms in food-ag products, clothing, education, energy, housing, medical care, transportation.

Advances in technology created demand for new universal services...electricity, supply chain logistics, telephone, telegraph, and deeper options for transportation.

It was an expansion ideally suited for ponzi-scheme style of American capitalism.

America IS NOT expanding the same way. The ponzi-scheme style of American capitalism can't continure to produce greater and greater profits.

Now, in a stalled economy similar profits for capitalists/investors can only be made by cutting American workers out of much of the equation.

[RebelOne]

6. I was born in 1939 and led mostly a sheltered life,

but I remember the racist years of the '50s. I lived in Miami and pretty much accepted it since I did not know any better.

[reformist2]

7. LOL @ the 70s being the golden age of anything.

Economically, it was a near-total disaster decade.

[HiPointDem]

20. compared to what?

[frazzled]

22. It was the golden age of shoulder pads

and bad hair. Very bad hair.

[landolfi]

30. It was the golden age of silliness

I still can't believe "Three's Company" was the #1 show for several years. I didn't even think it was funny after smoking reefer. I still find it offensive, but it encapsulates the era for me, with its unsubtle nonstop sexual innuendo and implicit homophobia.

[KoKo]

34. Think about that, though. "Pot" as the generation before called it

was being accepted marginally into mainstream and sexual enlightenment was coming to the forefront after the Hippies were doing it in the late 60's through the 70's and there was the looming AIDS Deaths after the "Creative Culture" managed to achieve much in the 80's in the Theater and elsewhere.

It seemed to me to be a TRANSITION TIME to now. That's just my personal perception as an "older DU'er" who went through so many decades...sort of observing while living and coping...but aware enough to notice.. all those changes...the subtle and the aggressive that caused the PTB to get into tizzies.

[landolfi]

59. Now that I think about it

Where I was at the time, northern Indiana, the sexual enlightenment really came to the fore after the women's liberation movement. There was a lot more focus on gender and what it meant. I remember Mike on "All in the Family" carrying a bag that looked like a purse and thinking at the time that was a little much, but the fact that it was brought up at all was indicative of what was going on. Then there was the Monty Python thing with all the cross-dressing, and wasn't that also the time of "Bosom Buddies"? I had a sense at the time that all we could be remembered for when people looked back on the 70s was our obsession with nostalgia ("American Graffiti", 50s bands on "In Concert&quot . In other words, nothing remarkable enough was happening to remember the period for itself (except maybe "Whip Inflation Now" buttons). So yes, I agree it was transitional.

[HiPointDem]

86. powell memo = 1971

n 1971, Lewis Powell, then a corporate lawyer and member of the boards of 11 corporations, wrote a memo to his friend Eugene Sydnor, Jr., the Director of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The memorandum was dated August 23, 1971, two months prior to Powell’s nomination by President Nixon to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Powell Memo did not become available to the public until long after his confirmation to the Court...Though Powell’s memo was not the sole influence, the Chamber and corporate activists took his advice to heart and began building a powerful array of institutions designed to shift public attitudes and beliefs over the course of years and decades. The memo influenced or inspired the creation of the Heritage Foundation, the Manhattan Institute, the Cato Institute, Citizens for a Sound Economy, Accuracy in Academe, and other powerful organizations. Their long-term focus began paying off handsomely in the 1980s, in coordination with the Reagan Administration’s “hands-off business” philosophy...

http://reclaimdemocracy.org/powell_memo_lewis/

[KoKo]

95. Good Point...many of us didn't know about "Powell Memo" until it got some attention pretty recently

when began to look for REASONS as to what we were going through. Then...it got the attention. Who knows what's being "pushed/passed through these days that will Bite us in the Ass Decades Later. I shudder to think.

[KoKo]

33. You mean the 80's... Oh that was a time! n/t

[Skittles]

77. that was the 80's

70's were more rad

[MADem]

78. No, that was the eighties. No shoulder pads--or epaulettes--in the seventies. No "messy" or

geri-curled hair, either. Long hair, sure. The "Farrah Fawcett" was big back then. The massive afro owned the road, too. Facial hair ruled--mutton chop sideburns, cheesy moustaches, etc. If your hair was straight (or could be made to look straight), the center part was appropriate no matter what your gender.

The seventies was disco, lots of polyester, platform shoes, three piece suits, flared trousers, massively uncomfortable collars, etc.

Interesting look back in time! http://pongogirl2.hubpages.com/hub/1970s-Fashion

http://missrosen.wordpress.com/tag/the-seventies/

[HiPointDem]

96. 80s. 70s = granny skirts and ethnic things, hippie-light look

[MannyGoldstein]

29. You mean when a middle class family could live on a single median salary?

Yeah, that was the pits! Although, actually... hmm...

[KoKo]

32. There was "Something" about that...at THAT TIME...it was what it was..

But, it would change and there were good things about the change for Women..and some costs...as with everything. It's trade offs to move forward...but, we leave other things behind.

[Recursion]

80. And when only a white family could be middle class

Yeah, that actually was kind of the pits.

White prosperity was based on suppression of minority labor.

[Purplehazed]

68. Disco! nt

[aristocles]

8. When I was 10

Last edited Sat May 18, 2013, 06:30 PM - Edit history (1)

I would ride my bike to the movie theater, about 1 mile from home, park it outside the theater, buy a ticket for 50 cents, a box of Milk Duds for 25 cents, watch a 2.5 hour Saturday matinee, including 2 or 3 Warner Brothers cartoons. When I got out from the show, my bike was still there. I rode home. No hassles.

Our neighborhood was in an Eastern suburb of Cleveland. Most of the fathers were WWII vets. There plunbers, doctors, lawyers, even players from the Browns and Indians, all on the same block. One car, a sedan, per family. Most moms were stay at home. Walked to parochial school. Had lunch at home every day.

[marybourg]

9. Everything I've read so far on this thread

seems just about right to me. I'll just add, re being safe in one's own community: I was allowed to ride city buses alone, in the Bronx, as soon as I could climb the high entry step - about 9 years of age - and travel anywhere in the City on the subway (elevated where I lived) from about age 12. This was in the early 50's

[tech3149]

23. I'll agree with you on that

For most of us we were safe in our community. In fact it was that sense of community that kept most of us safe. I was born in the early 50's I grew up in a more rural setting but from the time I lived in Jersey and shared life experiences with people who might have grown up with you, the situation wasn't much different.
All the kids in the neighborhood played together, ate at each others house. If we got in trouble for doing something stupid, it wasn't unusual for the neighbors to make you suffer even if your parents didn't. All the neighbors knew each other and we would lend, borrow, or just plain help each other out expecting nothing in return. We weren't any better than people can be today, we just felt connected.
Why has it changed? I see quite a few reasons but one of the first is media and marketing. With all the media resources pumped at us we can easily isolate ourselves from our neighbors. Economic factors are also critical. Once those "good jobs" aren't really there any more, you do what you have to do to get by. Working more hours or two jobs and you don't have the time or energy to maintain that sense of connection with your neighbors, or maybe you just give up and go where you can get a decent job.
So say you give up and just follow the jobs, not all of us are outgoing and gregarious and don't just pick up where we left off in a new neighborhood, might be you know you're going to have to pack up in a year or so to find that next job.
I think part of the force of the transition was a reaction to the 60's. Did you ever hear of the Powell memorandum? Powell was a corporate slime attorney who saw the freedom and justice movement of the 60's as a direct challenge to the power structures of the country. He laid out a complete blueprint of how to counter counter it and advised all business leaders to follow his plan because it "was a war for their very survival!" That was like 1971. If you follow the creation of conservative think tanks, the assault on public education, restructuring and defunding higher education, and all the other points presented that basically challenge the idea of public good and democratic function, it's pretty much followed the outline to a tee.

Sorry for the long response but this is a great thread and one that really gets my dander up.

[raccoon]

25. Great post. Never heard of Powell memorandum but I'll look into it. nt

[tech3149]

47. Thanks, again sorry it was so long but it is important

You also need to check into the Koch family history, these guys are beyond dangerous. Pretty much any search on the Powell memorandum will lead to the original as well as good synopsis for the short attention span. What puzzles me is how it wasn't revealed until like 15 years later. I guess the corporate elite have pretty tight lips when their interests are on the line.
The Alternet story is a long read but is good in depth history from the most reliable source Harry Kochs own paper.

[KoKo]

26. "Sense of Community" at that time. Key.

America has changed. We are GLOBAL ...and kids had to leave to make a living from where they grew up all over America. Not all for sure...but as the years went by there was less in our local spaces to make a living so we moved to Silicon Valley, South, Midwest ...depending on our skills. Many could stay in the Northeast which was growing with Banking, Wall Street and for a time IBM...but it started to change and many of us had to go where the JOBS took us...forsaking family and friends...to earn a living.

It was disruptive. And, spread during the years after the 1970's through now times..

This is quick post. I didn't think you were looking to read an Essay..
s

[DesertFlower]

38. that sounds familiar. i was raised in queens

until i was 12 when my parents bought a small house in the burbs. i still spent a lot of time in queens with my grandparents when school was out. i loved riding buses, subways, etc. and i always felt safe. when i was 17 i moved backed with my grandparents -- no decent jobs in the burbs and a lack of transportation. also i was a "city girl".

[niyad]

10. "the fifties sound"

The Fifties Sound
(Kristin Lems)

They say the fifties are comin again!
Get out my bobby socks and run to the gym!
The fifties band has got them out on the floor -
Hey wait! I been through this nightmare before!

Those olden days were not so golden you know
Girls who got in trouble, they had nowhere to go
Couldn't take their lives into their own hands
Spent their time a swoonin over rock n roll bands

In those days colored people knew their place
Didn't try to barge into the human race
But Elvis and the others picked up all their cues
And made a million dollars singing white boy blues

Whoa Whoa - whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa
They're dancing to what oppressed us 20 years ago.

Girls wore thick makeup, boys wore thick grease
If you didn't have a steady, you were never at ease
Swearin' and sex, they were mortal sins -
Why the hell you think we brought the sixties in?

Everybody looked and thought and talked the same
And learned all of the details of the dating game
Boys, they were lettermen or else they were queer
If they were small or shy they lived in constant fear

Think of all the folks who miss the fifties sound
The millionaires whose profits have been going down
For the ku klux klan, those were the good ole' days
And back then, women really knew their place

Administrators missed the days when students obeyed
Didn't meddle in the world the grownups had made
The Pentagon's nostalgic for the days of yore
When every kid would rush to join their latest war!

So all you kids soakin' up the scene
Sorry to break in on your American dream
But we lived through it and it ain't no fun:
No one's gonna take back what we won!

Teen angel, teen angel, rest in pieces!

[russspeakeasy]

12. This old guy thanks you for your post.

[niyad]

13. you are most welcome. I was trying to find a video of it, but couldn't.

[russspeakeasy]

18. If you do find it, please post it...

My wife just read it....she said to say "thanks".

[niyad]

19. she is most welcome. I will keep looking for it.

[KoKo]

28. Yes...that was the Dark Side that Spilled out into the 1960's Revolution...

BUT...for many at that time...it was a more cohesive society...and that is their memory...so don't get into trashing...but, I know exactly what you are talking about...so understand how there was the "other side." Yet...don't forget the side who was living "the American Dream"...because they didn't have those conflicts. Doesn't mean that many of them didn't WAKE UP during the 60's and change, though.

Just trying to say that it was a Golden Age for Some and Terrible for Others...but, that DU is diverse enough that we hopefully can share our different backgrounds without going at each other trying to make some "lifestyles of growing up" something to be trashed as not valid.

Folks, I hope, are trying to answer this thread from their "Own Experience." Not to be trashed for that...I hope.

[niyad]

87. "trashing"? all i did was post a song about what was going on. the OP asked

for our memories, that song reflects mine. and why is "lifestyles of growing up" in quotes in a response to my post, where that phrase does not appear?

[DesertFlower]

40. this "old woman" also thanks you.

[niyad]

88. you are most welcome.

[byeya]

11. FDR was the most powerful man in the USA. Obvious. Even he acknowledged that John L. Lewis was

the second most powerful man. Lewis was head of the UMW and perhaps the head of the CIO too. It shows the sort of power unions commanded from the late 1930s to the red-baiting days of Eisenhower and McCarthy. This was power the working class won by putting their lives on the line(See Wiki for Blair Mountain, WV, information) and the political class was forced to recognize it.

The Cold War, which had it's planning during the late stages of WW2, was aimed at curbing union power and a lot of the attacks on unions and union members came from unionists themselves, primarily AFL trade union leaders. Red unions and red unionists were thrown out of organized labor with a lot of money to do so coming from various government agencies that still exist and are still anti-worker today - especially anti-class-conscious workers.

That said, there was prosperity even down to the wage earner. In my family there were longshoremen; IBEW electricians; National Maritime Union(later Seafarers); and Fraternal Order of Police. A worker could provide for his family and send kids to college if they wanted and were qualified.

Tuitions were low, so that had to be changed; unions ran shop floors, so that had to be changed; all workers under a collective bargaining agreement were union members, so that had to be changed with right-to-work.

In the 1960s, most union leaders supported our war against the people of South View Nam; most young people did not. Unions also accepted State Dept money to help workers organize under the auspices of the USA approved model. Union leaders liked being considered insiders although they really weren't - they were useful tools of statecraft.


"In the bleakness of the Eisenhower 50s, you'd hitchhike 1000 miles to see a friend"...Gary Snyder.

[FirstLight]

14. Credit cards...

I am a child of the 70s, so I have a limited view of the whole 50s era. However, my dad worked for the phone co for 35 years and managed to build a little equity for us as a family...and yes, we ate chuck instead of sirloin and didn't GO on vacations.
My dad also did not buy what he didn't need or couldn't afford. If something was needed, we would wait till we had all our ducks in a row before we got it...we only bought used cars, shopped in the bargain basement, etc. frugality was a way of life.

I think the advent of wide credit card usage in the 80s was a significant factor in our economic and social demise. Instant gratification made everyone OVERconsume, and many things changed for the worse after that.

[JDPriestly]

82. Yes. We who were born in the 40s and 50s had parents who grew up during

the Great Depression. Frugality was the key. We had gardens. Mom cooked and baked and didn't dare think about self-fulfillment or career until after her children were grown.

A lot has been said here about the good side of the 1950s through the 1970s.

I agree with much of it. Neighborhoods were safe because mothers were home taking care of all the children, not just their own. There was a sense of community. We walked to and from school.

Our dads had jobs they expected to keep until they retired. Usually they did, or if they didn't they found another one pretty easily. We could live, frugally, on what our dads earned, and they were proud of that.

The traditional family and community were wonderful, but a lot of women felt trapped. In particular, very intelligent women were stifled. So were African-Americans and members of other minorities.

Nothing has been said about the McCarthy era and all the anti-Communist hysteria that went along with the Cold War. In reality, there weren't hardly any Communists, but we heard a lot about them as if they were all over the place. Gradually over time, liberals who were simply good, loving people became fearful about expressing their belief that the government should regulate business and help the poor and that unions should be strong.

Most were not affected much by the Korean War, but my family was. My father as a spiritual leader in the community was faced with comforting the families of those who had fought in WWII and the Korean War and had come back injured either in body or in soul as well as those families whose sons and daughters never returned. The Korean War was very real to me for that reason. I remember how my father would look at the back page of the Sunday newspaper where the pictures of the fallen soldiers were printed. That was a dark reminder of the pain of the families of the fallen

The beginning of the end of unions was passage of the Taft-Hartley Act in the late 1940s.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_Management_Relations_Act_of_1947

Viet Nam changed the economy, as did the gas crisis in 1973-74 and then the second gas crisis during the Carter administration. Too much money and too many lives were wasted in that war. When the war was over, we had to pay for it. Our money declined in terms of buying power. The countries that sold us oil became frustrated and wanted changes that would protect their wealth. Nixon was an insult to the nation, not the least because he extended that futile waste of lives and wealth for no apparent reason at all other than his personal desire to stay in office.

At the time, many Americans did not realize just how detrimental the Viet Nam War was to our society and economy. In fact, we have never fully admitted it.

The important question is what can we learn from the good and the bad that happened during those years. I would say that the most important lesson is that wars are money pits that don't really solve anything.

The Korean War never ended. It is still going on, a disease on the planet lying dormant for the moment but ready to explode in hatred any moment.

Look at Viet Nam. The North Vietnamese Communists won. They were brutal to the people of their country who had been our friends. But -- today many products we buy in our stores are made in Viet Nam. We trade with them. We don't interfere in their country. They don't interfere in ours. Was it worth the killing, the deaths, the injuries, the damage to our economy?

Finally, I lived in the North during my childhood and in the deep South during my teen years. Although I am white, I experienced humiliation and pain from living in a society in which there was so much segregation and racial hatred.

We had an African-American cleaning woman in my high school. I liked to sing and stayed after school to listen to her sing as she did her work. I was careful not to do it in any way that people would notice. I learned so much about music and singing from watching and hearing her. She should have been teaching us instead of cleaning up after us. The apartheid in the South was pointless and disgraceful.

If I seem fanatical or angry at times on DU, I hope you will all understand. I owe some of my impatience with injustice to my parents' strong social and moral values and the lessons of WWII, but I also much of it to that cleaning lady whose talent and kindness were never recognized by the world and whose voice changed my life, to the sight of the little shotgun houses in which African-Americans crammed their families and to the Jim Crow signs that limited not just the lives of African-Americans but also those of us white folks.

The 40s through the 70s were a time of social change. The earlier years were simpler and easier, but, as a society, we had to grow up, and those were the years in which we did it.

Many in our society reacted to the social changes by rejecting change and turning to conservatism. More and more people are realizing that conservatism doesn't work, that we can't go back to what we remember as the good times in the past. The conservative movement has imposed a false memory on many of us. It has caused us to focus only on the good in the past and forget the bad things that moved us to change.

Obama's slogan about moving forward is a good one. We do need to keep moving forward.

I would like to see more of a sense of community, more economic fairness and more trust in democracy. Those were the good aspects of that time. But I would not want to return to Jim Crow or any of the stereotypes and limitations on groups in our society like women, gays and lesbians, and people of color.

[RainDog]

15. FDR's presidency

I wasn't alive then, but the legislation that brought us social security, the various work project programs that put people back to work and gave them skills to survive, the national projects - things like the TVA that brought electricity to rural parts of the nation, and, later, Eisenhower's Interstate Highway Program, a federal govt. project that made it possible to move people, goods and information from one place to another - those were all instrumental.

fwiw - FDR insisted that African-Americans would be included in WPA programs, even tho southern whites objected to this.

Europe was devastated after WWII, as was Japan. The U.S. didn't have the competition from those nations that now exists. Those nations rebuilt with social safety net programs in place to retrain people when jobs were lost, with educational standards higher than those in the U.S, with a focus on the common good to elevate all... something that is anathema to conservatives.

The refusal by conservatives to move forward, in the 1970s, with new energy policy, as envisioned by Carter, has set the U.S. back in terms of innovation.

Reagan's mantra that the govt. is the problem helped to give racists a cover, and the long-standing drive by Reagan and his pals to undo the New Deal continues to this day...and Democrats play along with this at the expense of the entire nation's well being.

Outsourcing of jobs to other nations has created a new global "governing" entity - the multinational corporation. They are responsible to no one but share holders - they have no provision for the common good.

Among those are military contractors, whose goal is to be necessary to stay in business. The revolving door from such corporations to the govt. has turned the conservatives away from their view of limited interference in other nations' business. We have military bases all over the world, and when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail...

Innovations that are not about multi-national corporate growth, however, cannot get a hearing in the U.S. because those same CEOs, etc. fund elections - and the govt, apparently, is now a servant of the rich, just as it was before FDR tried to avert class war by bringing some justice to American economic life.

[HiPointDem]

21. "if it really was such a great time, what were the late 60s/early 70s massive social movements for?"

it was for making things better, which included ending the war, racism & poverty. and it was a very hopeful moment in history, unlike today.

i don't understand the point of the question.

1950s 'gender roles' were a rebound product of ww2, and imo discussion of them today is really stereotyped according to an agenda-driven narrative.

[DesertFlower]

43. i didn't like the 50s.

the mid 60s to mid 70s were a great time for me. i married in '60 -- had a child in '61 -- a few months before my 20th birthday. we divorced in early '67 and i sowed my wild oats. fortunately i had family who took care of my son when i worked and partied. i met my second husband 8/70. he had been with IBM for a year. he worked his way up from computer operator to systems engineer. we struggled in the beginning but finally realized the american dream. he passed a year ago, but i'm collecting his pension and got his 401k. i hadn't worked for 23 years because of health problems, but we did okay. there was a time back in new york where we did spend too much money. we realized our error and changed it. by the time we moved to phoenix we had saved enough money to put 20% down on a really nice house.

when hubby passed he had been with IBM for almost 43 years and we were together for almost 42.

[bananas]

66. IBM was known for being loyal to it's employees

It would pay for training so they could advance their careers, would take care of them even through serious illness, etc.

[DesertFlower]

70. hubby had one year of college. IBM gave

him the rest of the training. unfortunately they don't do that anymore. they've changed like so many other big corporations have.

[mick063]

24. Huge difference

Journalistic integrity tops the list. Citizens were armed with independent verification. No twenty four hour news cycle to create hysteria with unverified accounts. No FOX.
No Limbaugh.

Then there is the aspect of legislatures actually writing their own legislation instead of rubber stamping ALEC's model bills.

Given time, I would need to write a book to adequately answer the OP.

Believe me. This country bears no resemblence to what it once was. We are closer to fascism then you might believe.

[KoKo]

37. YES...that was a huge difference...although the "Godfather Movies" show the dark

side of what was coming. And as a kid I had to deal with all that talk about Joe McCarthy and there were people in our community who thought he was correct about "A Communist Under our Beds." Then there was the Polio Scare...where all of us thought we were going to come down with it because there was a new case everyday and the magazines had pictures of kids in Iron Lungs and parents worried day and night that their kids would "get it."

Bomb Shelters were coming into popularity...also. And, Hollywood Directors and Writers were being censured and not allowed to earn a living if they didn't comply to the standards of McCarthy's Witch/Communist Hunts.

[DesertFlower]

44. i remember that well. i have scoliosis and several doctors

think i might have had a mild case of polio that went undiagnosed. there were bomb shelters everywhere.

[Squinch]

27. Everyone thinks that things were simpler when they were a child. That's at least

partly because they were a child, and weren't dealing with the complications of adult life.

My grandfather, who was born in 1895, always said, "there's no such thing as the good old days. People will remember their childhoods fondly, but in some way each age improves on the one before it."

I suppose if you were a white man, the 40's to the 70's were peachy. Otherwise not so much.

[treestar]

31. If a person thinks it is golden they are probably white, middle class

I recall the family getting a second car. That was big in the early 70s. Mom stayed at home was very common; mine did though she did some part time or temp work. Dad had a job with the same company and promotions and longer vacations the more years he had. I remember him talking about taking his vacation time. It got up to 6 weeks! He retired from the same company.

We walked to school - all schools were close enough. There the students were all white, except one African American family, one or two Asian families and one Jewish family. We went to school with the same people, who lived in our neighborhood. We belonged to the pool swim club in summer, a place we could walk to.

After I left school, the area had busing for school desegregation. The state was found guilty of de facto segregation.

We thought we were not wealthy, because we knew of other people who had more. Now I look back on it, we were very lucky indeed. We had braces, dancing lessons, etc. The public schools were good. We were sent to college, which was not unduly expensive, though I had student loans, but they were low interest and in the end only $2500 for college that I had to pay off.

[Ilsa]

35. Bank holding companies were intrastate, not

Interstate. So, deposits gathered in one state were generally put to work in the form of loans in that state, not sent to a central banking center like NYC to be put to work.

Decentralized banking also meant more people minding smaller stores. A bank failure wasn't so catastrophic that the head of the Eurozone's finance was chewing out the head of our Fed or Treasury Sec.

#2: media and news were not owned by corporate interests. They were more independent.

[ruffburr]

36. My 2 cents-

Started working in 65' while still in school, My take on what has changed is a bit different than most, People for the most part cared about one another, 90% of stores were mom and pop places,People talked to each other face to face and for the most part got along, Neighbors talked
and got together BBQ or whatever, Cocktails at 5 (in my day that meant and still does a reefer and drink) The factory jobs were union and paid enough to buy a little home and send your kids to school, medical was a benefit of work supplied by the employer,(I say go universal medical now a days) And the blue collar had respect that a craftsman deserves, Most pols were not so greedy as to screw the people over for their agenda and actually cared about the country and its people, Alas only a memory now. "so come on people now smile on your brother everybody get together now and love one another, right now",so Stand away from your cell phone and go talk to someone that you don't know face to face,Maybe it will help.

[KoKo]

39. People seemed MUCH MORE sociable in that era. Even up through the mid-80's.

Now...we are segmented on Religious, Non-Religious Lines and Lifestyles and having Children, choosing Not To and Lifestyle, Divorce, Partners, Drinking, Smoking or Not...Athletic activity, Food Choice (Vegan, Non or Something inbetween) which makes it hard to have "Gatherings" when you try to cook for so many different lifestyles, allergies or food preferences.

It's really hard these days to find "mixed groups" that can coexist let alone that you can cook for and that won't find something wrong with the food, your lifestyle, house or who you are..if you aren't fitting into a category

[ruffburr]

42. Oh well guess we shouldn't even try-

There will always be "those" people they can join in or not , as far as people sitting in judgment of others lifestyle etc. All i can say is when i see them walk on water I might consider their opinion.

[KoKo]

46. Oh...it can work...but, I think folks these days like to be with their own...

and there's nothing wrong with that. It's just we are so much more segmented than we used to be. But, our environment and what we eat and our lifestyle sexually sort of makes that a given...that we would all be so different that we are more comfortable with folks who understand us...than needing to feel we have to get along with something else that we feel doesn't work for us. It's just evolving. It's what it is.

[ruffburr]

49. I'm good with that-

So lets get busy evolving as people, After all we are all the same species

[KoKo]

62. Well here's another way to look at it, though...

Fact is ...there are some differences that don't go over well these days in communal gatherings.

Here come old flat top
He come groovin' up slowly
He got jew jew eyeballs
He want holy rollers
He got hair down to his knees
Got to be a joker
He just do what he please

He wear no shoeshine
He got toe jam football
He got monkey finger
He shoot Coca Cola
He say I know you, you know me
One thing I can tell you is
You got to be free
Come together, right now
Over me

He bag production
He got walrus gumboot
He got Ono sideboard
He one spinal cracker
He got feet down below his knees
Hold you in his armchair
You can feel his disease
Come together, right now
Over me

He roller coaster
He got early warning
He got muddy water
He one Mojo filter
He say one and one and one is three
Got to be good looking
'cause he's so hard to see
Come together right now
Over me

Come together, yeah
Come together, yeah
Come together, yeah
Come together, yeah
Come together, yeah
Come together, yeah
Come together, yeah
Come together, yeah
Come together, yeah
Come together, yeah

[Junkdrawer]

41. The Sword Of Damocles changed everything....

What's too painful to remember, we simply choose to forget.

[KoKo]

48. The Gladys Knight Version of "The Way We Were" is visually incredible..and the voice

For those who never heard Glady's Knight's version...here:

[Junkdrawer]

51. Love the song....

Of course I'm referring to:

The Bomb ---

The Cold War ---

McCarthyism ---

The Military Industrial Complex ---

The Cuban Missile Crisis ---

The Assasination of JFK ---

VietNam ---

A Permanent US World Empire ---

And on and on...

[KoKo]

53. Yes...I picked up the lyric/verse from "The Way We Were"..

"What's too painful to remember, we simply choose to forget."

And your list...What a List of what some of us went through...ehhh..

So ..."What's too painful to remember....but, we really can't forget...can we?

[Junkdrawer]

57. How does that go? If women remembered the pain of childbirth....

No one would have more than one child and the human population would exponentially extinguish itself.

Forgetting extreme pain is built into our DNA.

[KoKo]

60. Yes...it's worth trying to be hopeful...weed the sad out from the laughter

as the song says. There is still much laughter out there if we look for it...and try to push back the sad.

It's a good thing to remind ourselves of...one would think.

[nadinbrzezinski]

45. Unions

We invested in education

We regulated.

We invested in infrastructure.

We were not afraid of our shadows.

And it was, especially in the 1950s closer to Social democracy than Plutonomy.

We really don't have now capitalism, and that was regulated in many ways.

[KoKo]

50. I don't really know much of anything we can quantify of what we have these days...

it's all so messed up.

Maybe someone has something to sort it out. It's probably a hopeful time for invention of something new...just as other times invented new times.

It's a transition. We have to deal with it...work it through. Best I can come up with about it all these days.

[nadinbrzezinski]

52. Sooner or later we will face social unrest

Revolution I don't know, but unrest we will.

This is not just the US either...but something is coming, not nice.

Globalization is not just economic. I think we are seeing the first stages of the end of the nation state...but time will tell.

Me, locally we also see local government boards invested in the total control of info, like congress and the WH. It's an ethos, a cancer even.

Yup, I am all cheerful these days.

[KoKo]

55. There's much more "local" action starting. Not stuff that get's posted much on

DU or KOS so much. But, people rising up doing local action. It's not OWS...it's something different. It's special interest groups amongst the people with common interests who come together over a Local Cause... Different from what we've seen before. Maybe in some ways closer to some of the early actions by the NAACP before they broke through in the late 60's to become a more national movement.

Something is coming..agree Nadin. I'm not "cheerful about it" but whatever comes we have to hope that's it's better than the last 20 years for moving us forward to a more equitable state of being. If that's why you are cheerful..then agree. But, already having lived through the last CHANGE...wasn't looking forward to have to go through it again...because we had so hoped we had fixed much of what was wrong...and then to see it all dismantled doesn't help some of us get over that hump to recharge. But...we will and there is HELP on the WAY with so many young who are waking up as many of us had to do...all those years ago.

[nadinbrzezinski]

56. I know, that is what locally OWS moved, evolved into

I come across them regularly.

Also locals are not taking pols on face value.

I think it's resistance to this new corporate dystopic order. We at times post about it, een write about it in local press...

It will be a fight.

[demosincebirth]

61. You are right...Unions. Also, regulation= middle class.

[JI7]

58. there was a turn against social programs when it started to benefit minorities

as minorities gained more rights .

[WinkyDink]

65. Is this for your dissertation? Good God, there are library STACKS devoted to these questions.

[CBHagman]

67. It's too broad a subject to do justice to, but...

...I can't resist responding.

I was a kid during the '60s and wasn't particularly savvy about the news but to this day I can hear the voice of the reporter on the news broadcast the morning after JFK was assassinated. The day he was buried every TV set in the neighborhood was tuned to the funeral.

It's dangerous to generalize about national attitudes, optimism vs. pessimism and the like. My grandparents lived through the First World War and the flu pandemic that followed it, and brought up their children during the Great Depression. I frankly remember as much of fatalism and fear of change as the American can-do spirit, flag-waving, and the like.

I remember huge families, milk delivery, knife-grinders. Fast food was a rarity, a treat, not something we relied on every day.

I remember women justifying paying a woman less for doing the same job as a man.

Attention spans were an entirely different phenomenon. TV shows had opening credits and theme songs, movies might have overtures and intermissions, and even if everyone didn't behave well in public, you were expected to shut up and watch the movie, the TV show, whatever. Our church had a so-called crying room from which parents could follow the Mass and attend to their fussy babies.

What is now public broadcasting was then known as educational television.

Censorship was fairly strict, at least on TV, though the Production Code was no longer in effect in the movies.

I do remember 42nd Street in its sleazy incarnation, and reading of lurid crimes in The New York Daily News.

And forget marriage equality. In my grandparents' era, even marrying outside your faith was a major act of rebellion.

As for other topics, I'd suggest spending some quality time with selected parts parts of The American Experience -- e.g., the episodes on the Freedom Riders, the Stonewall riots, and so forth.

[url]http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/stonewall/[/url]

[url]http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/freedomriders/[/url]

[url]http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/zoot/[/url]

[madrchsod]

69. unions and politicians who gave a shit about america

1975-6 was the beginning of the end of the america dream

[alcibiades_mystery]

71. In every historical account save those concocted by capitalist douchebags, this era is called

"the postwar settlement."

That is, it was an era during which capital and labor settled on a way of doing things. Needless to say, the capitalists reneged on the settlement and launched us into neoliberalism. Because they hated the postwar settlement. But to call this period the "golde age of capitalism" is douchebagggery in the extreme. One may just as well call it the golden age of socialism.

[byeya]

89. I was going to post something similar but you've said it better. Basically it was a time when

capitalists were strictly regulated; unions were strong but under McCarthy attack; people could afford a decent life; and, the basic infrastructure was either publically owned or strictly regulated.

Carter was among the first to dismantle the regulatory system when he signed off on closing the ICC, which has proven to be a mistake.

[RobinA]

72. This Was The Time

of my grandfathers. They both worked for utilities. They made middle class wages and could afford a nice life to raise their families. Neither had college, one didn't have a high school diploma. The country was growing, there was work helping it grow. One grandfather was a telephone lineman. He helped wire the Philadelphia suburbs. The other was an engineer. He helped build a lot of major electric company projects in eastern PA. They retired with a decent pension and enjoyed good retirements.

[JHB]

73. Let's look at how the tax brackets were arranged in that period...

A post of mine from a few weeks back:

Most discussion of tax history mentions the top marginal rates of the past (91% in the 50s, 70% in the 60s and 70s, 50% through most of Reagan's presidency, etc.)

I like to highlight a different aspect: leaving aside what the rates were, where did they kick in? We live in times where people argue "are couples who make $250K 'rich'?" "Should we raise taxes on people who make over $250K? Over $500K?"

Where did these sorts of things lie in the past?

Using the inflation adjusted historical tax bracket tables from The Tax Foundation for married couples filing jointly, let's break it down a little and find out the equivalents in 2012 dollars:

1945:
Total number of brackets: 24
# of brackets affecting income over $250K: 14
# of brackets affecting income over $500K: 9
Top bracket affects income over: $2,551,044

1955:
Total number of brackets: 24
# of brackets affecting income over $250K: 16
# of brackets affecting income over $500K: 11
Top bracket affects income over: $3,426,776

1965:
Total number of brackets: 25
# of brackets affecting income over $250K: 13
# of brackets affecting income over $500K: 8
Top bracket affects income over: $1,457,740

1975:
Total number of brackets: 25
# of brackets affecting income over $250K: 9
# of brackets affecting income over $500K: 5
Top bracket affects income over: $853,509

1985:
Total number of brackets: 15
# of brackets affecting income over $250K: 1
# of brackets affecting income over $500K: 0
Top bracket affects income over: $360,650

1995:
Total number of brackets: 5
# of brackets affecting income over $250K: 1
# of brackets affecting income over $500K: 0
Top bracket affects income over: $386,423

2005:
Total number of brackets: 6
# of brackets affecting income over $250K: 1
# of brackets affecting income over $500K: 0
Top bracket affects income over: $383,773

2013:
Total number of brackets: 7
# of brackets affecting income over $250K: 2
# of brackets affecting income over $500K: 0
Top bracket affects income over: $440,876

Special Bonus Gipper edition numbers:
1988:
Total number of brackets: 2 (No, not a typo. Two brackets)
# of brackets affecting income over $250K: 0
# of brackets affecting income over $500K: 0
Top bracket affects income over: $57,738
(There was a reason why Poppy Bush had to go back on his 'Read My Lips' line. And every RWNJ wants to go back to this, or lower...)

ALL income tax progressivity for very high incomes was eliminated under Reagan, and has stayed that way ever since.

[moondust]

74. Unity.

Politically, I think there was a lot of national unity during the war effort and after the war that contributed to the post-war golden years. That slowly dissipated due to Vietnam and politicians like Nixon and Reagan using the Southern Strategy, opposition to the Civil Rights Act, etc., to stir up bigotry in their quest for votes. Reagan went after the two unifying things that offered working people some protection, power, and hope: government and unions. Deregulation, corporatization, financialization, profiteering, and offshoring took off. Greed was now "good." Inequality began to grow. Kenneth Starr's scandal mongering as well as Newt and Tom Delay all intensified the hyper-partisanship through the Clinton years. Bush was an unmitigated disaster. And here we are.

Did I miss anything?

[DebJ]

75. Employees were considered and treated as 'people' instead of human capital

until St Ronnie came along. Seriously. I felt appreciated, and listened to,
and was fairly well compensated for a lower skill job.

In 1982, my clerical staff was paid between $7.50 and $12 an hour, for
simple functions that now are all computerized. Benefits were free.
Generous retirement plan where for every $1 of stock you bought,
the company chipped in $1, and the stock split like 10 times in 5 years.

But what I miss most of all, it is the utter lack of respect for employees, for their contributions,
and valuing their humanity. Basic decency, respect, compassion.

[Recursion]

79. Great times if you were a straight white male

Personally I think a "prosperity" based on economic discrimination against women and minorities isn't really something to work for.

[defacto7]

83. God I love you guys!

[olddots]

85. Get naked

look at your clothes , see any labels that say made in U.S.A. ----your TV was made in America and a friends dad fixed it when it broke your parent's car if they had one was made in America ,there were local banks and local stores ,Mc Donalds were fewer than diners .

You never saw a Rolls Royce or a homeless family unless you searched . It was a different country in a different world America was the
country that lead the world in manufacturing ,science and progress .There was racism , sexism violence and lots of poverty but there was
a dream for tomorrow that got lost with credit cards , malls , and the convienience of having it your way , on your terms on your time .

Life was harder but easier which makes no sense .

[many a good man]

90. Less GREED in the pre-Reagan era

Probably the most striking difference between then and now IMO was the point aristocles mentioned earlier. On my suburban block we had doctors, lawyers, businessmen, milk truck drivers, airplane washers, janitors, etc. all living together. Income inequality was much less in those times, at least for the white majority.

Establishment attempts to sweep the darker side of America under the rug did not succeed so many of us continued fighting for greater and greater social and economic justice.

Tax policy, union busting and global labor arbitrage all conspired to widen the income gap. Technology and media also splintered us apart. Magazines catering to niche interests appeared and soon hundreds of television channels led to narrowed focus and less common vision. Greed enabled some to amass large fortunes and the tax system fed the greed of the top 5-10%. Price gouging ensued along with declining wages and outsourcing. If we don't stop runaway greed and carnivorous capitalism we will soon have a serious social upheaval on our hands.

[MisterP]

94. white flight was around since the 20s--but since the Long Hot Summers a far-right bunker mentality

has come into the mainstream (suburbanites are the ones stockpiling against the "hip-hop genocide" about to be committed Any Day Now--also why they're against public transit)
with the New Right we have 1) a national-level vocal religious right, 2) neocons who blamed Vietnam's loss on students and Congressional investigations: these are the Team B folks from 1976, the new Cold Warriors who Bush II picked for Iraq, and 3) industrial capitalism turned to finance capitalism under Reagan (or post-1979 Carter) and all four of his successors: corporate think tanks and their astroturf right-libertarian movements have successfully redefined "freedom" as deregulation while CIA plants claimed that
each of these also throws up frankly diseased Glenn Becks and Alex Joneses to tell us that bike paths are the prologue to emptying the Rockies of human habitation and handing it over to UN oligarchs: these are used to pressure the Establishment's center wing to moving further right ("quick, pass the Heritage Foundation's insurance plan or who knows *what* the Teabaggers rioting in your auditoria will do&quot ; the Jones types throw up chaff, spreading 5 obviously false theories for every honest suspicious event (it's the same MO as Nancy Grace: she thinks *everyone's* guilty)

[SteveG]

97. Unions and Corporate paternalism

During the period you ask about, 1/3rd of all workers were unionized. Those that weren't worked for corporations (like DuPont) which were paternalistic, but who took care of their employees by offering benefits which rivaled those won by unions. Basically employees were valued by their employers - happy employees made the corporations money. They felt wanted and important. Of course that all changed when Reagan was elected. That's when employees went from being seen as assets to being costs.