Technology in the 1920s

Calvin Coolidge favored government policies that would keep taxes down and business profits up, and gave businesses more available credit in order to expand

Goal: keep government interference in business to a minimum & allow private enterprise to flourish

Most of the 1920s, Coolidge’s administration placed high tariffs on foreign imports

Reduce income taxes meant people had more money to spend

Laissez-faire: a policy or attitude of letting things run their course; without interference • Invisible Hand• Introduced by Adam Smith

In 1927, 15,077,033 Model T Ford’s rolled off the assembly line

Model A’s now came in two different colors “Arabian Sand” and “Niagara Blue”

Automobiles were becoming the backbone of the American economy

Automobiles changed the American landscape• Paved roads were constructed

Like Route 66, which went from Chicago to California

• Houses had a garage or carport and driveway

• Construction of gas stations, repair shops, public garages, motels, tourist camps and shopping centers started for the mobile population

First automatic traffic signal in Detroit The Holland Tunnel, first underwater

tunnel designed for motor vehicles opened in 1927, NYC to Jersey City, NJ

The Woodbridge Cloverleaf, first cloverleaf intersection was built in New Jersey in 1929

Liberated the isolated rural family• Travel to city for shopping & entertainment

Families could vacation in new faraway places

Increased the mobility of society

Urban Sprawl: the unplanned and uncontrolled spreading of cities into surrounding cities

Workers could live miles from their jobs

Cars became a status symbol

Began as a mail carrying service for the U.S. Post office

Established as a peacetime means of transportation

Pan American Airways (founded 1927) inaugurated the first transatlantic passenger flights

America owned about 40% of world’s wealth

Average annual income rose about 35%

People found it easy to spend their extra income and then some

Electricity transformed the nation Factories used electric to run

machines Development of alternating electrical

current made it possible to distribute electricity over longer distances• No longer restricted to central cities • Number of electrified households grew

More homes had electric irons Well-to-do families had electric

refrigerators, cooking ranges, and toasters

These appliances made the lives of housewives easier • Freed them for other community and leisure

activities

Average factory worker was producing 50 % more at the end of the decade

Wasn’t the economy & the stock market reaching new heights?

The industry provided a solution to the problem of luring consumers to purchase the large number of goods produced each year….easy credit

Installment Plan: an arrangement in which a purchaser pays over an extended time, without having to put down much money at the time of purchase

Banks provided the money at low interest rates

Some saw installment plans as a sign of fundamental weaknesses of a prosperous economy

New goods flooded the market Hired psychologies to study how to

appeal to people’s desire for youthfulness, beauty, health, and wealth

Brand names became familiar from coast to coast

Luxury items were now necessities

Power of advertising were applied elsewhere

Businesspeople formed service organizations such as Rotary, Kiwanis, and the Lions• Sang songs, raised money for charities, and

boosted the image of the businessman