| POST WORLD WAR II UNITED STATES What happens when the war is over? Back to over-production & unemployment? New (worse) depression? There are two alternatives to renewed depression: abandon the market system completely (�communism�), or massive government intervention in the market -- �Socialism� ("mixed economies") Post World War II socialist programs and the two basic conditions of depression: Social security, workers compensation, unemployment insurance, labor unions, minimum wage laws. Child labor laws, universal education and public support for higher education, public welfare programs. Government regulation and growing bureaucracy, cold war military spending. Remove people from work force while raising overall wages (so workers can buy products). Side effect: stimulates growth of the service sector -- based on workers� disposable income from higher wages! So, socialist modifications --- > �middle class� (workers) prosperity and modernization sustained by growing service sector (creates jobs) and prosperous capitalists too (can now sell their goods). The Catch -- all of this is based on high tax levels! One of several serious long term problems. ANOTHER SIDE EFFECT: A WHOLE NEW CLASS SYSTEM 1% Capitalist Class (own most wealth - live off of income from capital) 10% Business/Prof Class (service & management workers - high salary + full benefits) 30% Stable Working Class (union & bureaucracy workers - medium wages + good benefits) 40% Unstable Working Class (non-union, unprotected workers - low wages, few benefits) 20% The Poor (unemployed, under-employed, the �underclass�) Since the 1970s, growth and split of service sector (split between growth in �good jobs� and �McJobs�). - The service sector is small in agricultural society (servants of the dominant class) - The service sector grows with industrialization (sales, accounting, legal work, management, etc.) but eventually reaches a point (1920�s) where growth slows down (a sort of �saturation point�) - The service sector grows rapidly with socialist modifications (after WW II), at first government, business and professional workers (�union scale� salaries) but later gradually becomes low-paid service work (McJobs). This is the split in the service sector. There are many results of this split that generate new �social problems�: - Declining wages + double wage-earner families, strained tax bases, general decline of the economy - Changes in identities (few �follow in parents footsteps� -- narcissism/hyper-individuation) - �Middle class� stability and work ethic decline (less upward mobility, no end goal for work ethic) - Changes in institutions (schools, religion, politics, etc.). |