By 1960, nearly 40 percent of American women had joined the workforce, and married women with school‐age children represented a significant proportion of that number. Women continued to earn considerably less than men for doing the same job, regardless of whether they worked in a factory or office, or in a profession such as teaching or nursing. Are you sure you want to remove #bookConfirmation# The basis of Sahlins’ argument is that hunter-gatherer societies are able to achieve affluence by desiring little and meeting those needs/desires with what is available to them. During and after World War II, for example, the bracero program brought Mexican workers to the United States to work on American farms. Although people were willing to drive or take public transportation to work, they were not willing to go to the city to shop. Despite charges that it was “race music” and contributed to juvenile delinquency, performers such as Bill Haley and the Comets (“Rock Around the Clock”) and, most notably, Elvis Presley made rock 'n' roll a youth music phenomenon. Meanwhile, population growth slowed in cities and decreased in rural areas, and by 1960, nearly 40 percent of all Americans lived in suburbia. “The Original Affluent Society" SummaryIn this article the author asserts that development must be evaluated in different termsthan have been previously established. Much of this consumer spending was done on credit, with bank loans, installment buying, and credit cards (which were introduced in 1950). This theory was first articulated by Marshall Sahlins at a symposium entitled "Man the Hunter" held in … Sheen had a weekly television program called Life is Worth Living, and Graham's crusades were later televised as well. Rock 'n' roll also helped to bring black artists such as Chuck Berry into the entertainment mainstream. Murrow's series, which ran from 1951 to 1958, also brought the plight of migrant farm workers to the attention of Americans. TV Guide became the nation's leading magazine, and food companies introduced frozen meals called TV dinners. The book received praise from critics for tackling conventional thought and offering new solutions to economic problems. Galbraith, who passed away in 2006, was a leading advocate for both democratic socialism and twentieth-century … The 30‐year construction program skewed the nation's transportation policy in favor of cars and trucks and resulted in reduced spending on urban mass transit and railroads. CliffsNotes study guides are written by real teachers and professors, so no matter what you're studying, CliffsNotes can ease your homework headaches and help you score high on exams. Although union membership began to drop late in the decade, organized labor made significant gains. For example, Nixon's “Checkers” speech, which was carried on TV, kept him in the running for vice president in 1952, and the televised Army‐McCarthy hearings proved that the senator from Wisconsin was a dangerous demagogue, a point that was emphasized on Edward R. Murrow's See It Now exposé in 1954. Popular culture. Poverty crossed color lines, affecting whites in rural Appalachia, Mexican‐American migrant farm workers in the Southwest and California, Native Americans on reservations, and inner‐city minorities, including blacks and Puerto Ricans. Millions were deported in 1953–55 when a recession made having jobs available for American citizens essential. Modern Republicanism. The number of women working outside the home increased significantly in the '50s. From Vice President to President: George H.W. The Affluent Society is a 1958 (4th edition revised 1984) book by Harvard economist John Kenneth Galbraith. The book sought to clearly outline the manner in which the post–World War II United States was becoming wealthy in the private sector but remained poor in the public sector, lacking social and physical infrastructure, and perpetuating income disparities. The growth of these “bedroom” communities, where residents lived on the outskirts of town and commuted to work, meant that the automobile became more important than ever before. One of the most notable “roundups” of illegal immigrants occurred in Texas during the summer and fall of 1954 when 80,000 Mexicans were deported in Operation Wetback. Although the most popular television programs were situation comedies (I Love Lucy), game shows (The $64,000 Question), and adult westerns ( Gunsmoke), television in the 1950s was not the “vast wasteland” that critics often claimed. Although the economy grew in the 1950s, not everyone experienced prosperity. Yet when you come to examine it the original affluent society was none other than the hunter's - in which all the people's material wants … It is also credited with popularizing the term "conventional wisdom". Evangelist Billy Graham, Protestant minister Norman Vincent Peale, and Roman Catholic Bishop Fulton J. Sheen emerged as the spokespersons for the revival, and they used the newest mass medium — television — to carry their message to millions of Americans. Consequently, shopping centers became a distinctive feature on the suburban landscape during the decade, and cities' central business districts showed signs of decline. Despite Eisenhower's concern for fiscal responsibility, he was prepared to increase spending to get the country out of the 1953, 1957, and 1958 recessions. The Interstate Highway Act, passed in 1956, authorized the federal government to finance 90 percent of the cost of building the interstate system through a tax on automobiles, parts, and gasoline that went into the Highway Trust Fund. The physical well being of Americans was as good as their economic health. Workers in many industries won settlements that linked wages to cost‐of‐living increases. He contends that poverty is not the lack of materialgoods, but is a relation between people and a social construction and made by man. For middle‐class Americans, the 1950s were a time of prosperity. The Civil Rights Movement, Next Dr. Jonas Salk announced his discovery of a polio vaccine in 1953, and four years later, Dr. Albert Sabin developed a vaccine that could be taken orally. Because poverty was not recognized as a national problem until the 1960s, federal policy in the 1950s often contributed to the situation rather than to help resolve it. and any corresponding bookmarks? Suburban America. This he calls the "Zen road to affluence, which states that human material wants are finite and few, and technical means unchanging but on the whole adequate" (Sahlins, Original). However, the decade was not without its problems. As the number of cars increased, so did the demand for gasoline and better roads. While these changes were subtle reminders of the ideological struggle of the Cold War (Americans believed in God; Communists were atheists), they also reflected the mood of the country. All rights reserved. With a nationwide inoculation program, polio disappeared from the United States. Despite the expansion of Social Security, older Americans often lived in substandard housing with inadequate food and medical care. Previous The Other America. For example, Eisenhower focused on reducing the federal budget, which included cutting farm subsidies, abolishing the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, keeping inflation in check, and promoting private rather than public development of the nation's energy resources.