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Post Progressive Era Essay

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Thomas McPhee Mr.Smith USIICP 12/18/15 Post Progressive Era Social Changes The roaring Twenties, a time of prosperity and what I can only assume was peace. And shortly after such a happy time, the stock market, hub of all monetary gain and loss, crashed, leaving only a Great Depression in its wake. No money, no food and crime rate skyrocketing to the point of true mafia ruling in some places. A real shame at the time, where people died, starving, cold, and in bitter anger. Alcohol, the lifeblood of many left flowing only by criminal means, but used to be plentiful and was a source of economic circulation previously. The 1920s were an age of drastic social and political changes. For the first time, more Americans lived in cities than on farms. …show more content…

The decade marked the flourishing of the modern mass-production, mass-consumption economy, which delivered fantastic profits to investors while also raising the living standard of the urban middle- and working-class. For the large minority of Americans who made their livelihoods in agriculture, however, the decade roared only with the agony of prolonged depression.”(http://www.shmoop.com/1920s/economy.html) Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon an extremely successful investment banker himself, lowered the top income tax rate for the wealthiest minority from around 70% to roughly 25% while investors enjoyed one of the greatest bull markets in American history. However, the fantastic wealth accrued by the rich during the decade should not obscure the real gains made by the urban working- and middle-classes. Notwithstanding the near collapse of the labor movement in 1919-1921, wages for urban workers increased by about 20% during the 1920s. “The stock market crash of October 29, 1929 provided a dramatic end to an era of unprecedented, and unprecedentedly lopsided, prosperity. This disaster had been brewing for years. Different historians and economists offer different explanations for the crisis–some blame the increasingly uneven distribution of wealth and purchasing power in the 1920s, while others blame the

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