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Social Issues In The Gilded Age

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The Gilded Age was an era of unprecedented industrial, economic, and technological, growth in the private sector of the United States. However, behind this façade of prosperity remained several societal issues that vexed the United States for several decades. Primarily, economic inequality, political corruption, unbridled Laissez Faire capitalism, racism, lack of women’s rights, and stagnant labor conditions defined this era of avarice and corruption. Moreover, this corrupt and amoral system only benefited a very small part of the country. Consequently, these social issues in conjunction with a weak and corrupt government established the foundations of the social tensions and turmoil of the 1890s. The predominant issue of the Gilded Age,
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New Spirits: Americans in the Gilded Age, 1865-1905 written by Rebecca Edwards provides readers with many different individual accounts to illustrate the transformative time of America during the Gilded Age. The work shows the cultural, social, political and economical elements of the age that aided in forming the America we have today. Edwards’s purpose in writing New Spirits is to offer readers new insights on the era by eliminating predetermined stereotypes one may have established before reading the work. Edwards wants readers to put aside their prior knowledge to understand just what it was like to live in the Gilded Age by providing readers with the consequences and achievements of people during the time.

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Wealth, poverty, technology, decadence, the Gilded Age was a time of change and uprooting of past systems, schools of thought, and standards. It was a time of both hope and doubt for the majority of the population and brought many to be empty handed or exceedingly wealthy. The dynamic between rich and poor was shifting to a gap of wealth never before seen in the young country. The gilded age’s built up wealth disparity faded away over time. Yet today it seems that a resurgence of these features is rearing its ugly head again.

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