The Effects of the Baby Boom

     In the years that followed the end of World War 2, large numbers of United States soldiers returned to their homes. The highest marriage rate ever was recorded when 118 of every one thousand single American women was reportedly married "in 1946 as millions of soldiers left the armed services and embarked on married life" (http://www.pbs.org/fmc/book/4family1.htm). This created a jump in birth rates that we now call the "baby boom." "The baby boom, which lasted from 1946 to 1964, added 76 million babies to the U.S. population" (http://www.pbs.org/fmc/book/1population1.htm).
     This explosion of American population came at a time of relative prosperity. The country's financial situation was not perfect, "But despite recession, pockets of poverty, and uneven income distribution, prosperity in the 1950s was real and widespread" (Boyer, 117). Indeed, "For most Americans the 1950s were a decade of unprecedented prosperity, economic growth, (and) high employment" (Griffith, 121).
     These factors lead to financial freedom and confidence for American families. This, combined with the explosion of population, led to a change in the American culture. The root of most of these changes was found in suburbia. "Home construction boomed as millions of Americans purchased suburban tract houses" (Boyer, 117). The suburban population in the United States grew by 16 million between 1950 and 1960. (Boyer, 121) And, due to the positive economic situation, "Many such buyers, newcomers to the middle class, spent freely on new household goods" (Boyer, 117).
     The product of the baby boom, "baby boomers," were children and teenagers as this suburban growth was blooming. These young people looked at the world much differently than their parents had. Life magazine wrote in 1959 that, "What Depression-bred parents parents may still think of as luxuries are looked on as necessities by their offspring. Today teen-agers surround themselves with a fantastic array of garish and often expensive baubles and amusements" (Life, Major Problems, 122).
     Hand in hand with this consumerism came a tide of conformity. "Postwar America appears in stereotype as the age of conformity - smug, materialistic, complacent, a soulless era peopled by organization men and their (house)wives. But this portrait of conformity exits only because Americans created it" (Bailey, Major Problems, 137). It appeared that this conformity had changed the idea of the American dream. Instead of trying to do something spectacular, Americans now tried to do what everyone else was doing. The baby boomers showed this even in their dating practices. Their parents had used a complicated system of rating and dating. A large part of this was the desire to be seen in social situations with as many different members of the opposite sex as possible. Getting stuck with any one person for any amount of time would limit one's ability to find a better candidate for coupling. But, the baby boomers made practice of "going steady." This took the concept of competition out of dating; it added security as a staple of social interactions. To older generations, "going steady, with its extreme rejection of competition in favor of temporary security, represented all the faults of the new generation" (Bailey, Major Problems, 141). They said that this rejection of risk and work would ruin the prosperity and security of the United States in the post war world. (Baily, Major Problems, 138).
      This conformity did, however cause a "decline of class and regional differences in clothing and recreation" (Marchand, Major Problems, 144). Church membership also grew in these postwar years, but "What could one make of an enthusiasm for faith in which 86 percent of all Americans declared the Bible to be the word of God, yet 53 percent could not name a single one of the four Gospels?" (Marchand, Major Problems, 150).
     For baby boomers, "Popular culture provided the fantasies, evasions, material artifacts, and vicarious experiences through which Americans tried to recapture a sense of dominion" (Marchand, Major Problems, 156). But, they were all getting these fantasies from the same conformed sources. "The 'America' portrayed in 1950s mass culture masked the full reality: The nation was not all white, few teenagers fit the bland and docile stereotype of the TV sitcoms, white collar workers did not dominate the labor force as completely as they did the media, and not all women spent their days happily in the kitchen" (Boyer, 125). But, that is what was projected by the mass media and increased advertising, and the culture created its ideas based on these prototypes.

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WORKS CITED

"A Young $10 Billion Power: the US Teen-Age Consumer Has Become a Major Factor in the Nation's Economy." Life. August 31, 1959. Major Problems.

Bailey, Beth. "Rebels Without a Cause? Teenagers in the 1950s" Major Problems.

Boyer, Paul. Promises to Keep: The United States Since World War II. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1999.

Griffith, Robert and Baker, Paula. Major Problmes in American History Since 1945. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2001.

http://www.pbs.org/fmc/book/1population1.htm

http://www.pbs.org/fmc/book/4family1.htm

Marchand, Roland. "Visions of Classlessness" Major Problems.