Over the last century, the face of the American has changed in many ways. There has been a great revolution in the personal and professional relationships between women and men. Traditional marriage has been taken apart and put back together to meet changing cultural tides. Faith, once central in day to day life, has become detached from the family’s agenda. And while poverty has been a rollercoaster of economic excesses and downturns, government assistance, and labor issues, many American families face the same age-old challenge of putting food on the table and a roof over their heads.
Over the past century American family culture has experienced many changes. None has been more profound than the change in the roles of the mother and father. There are many reasons for these changes. The growing longevity in all of the people in a family has caused parents and children to spend many more years in each others’ company. This in turn has caused many changes in the ways that the family interacts with each other.
'New' Years Gained by Women Worldwide, 1900-2000
Increased life expectancy at birth
30 years
Increased life expectancy at age 15
15 years
Increased life expectancy at age 45
10 years
Increased life expectancy at age 65
7 years
Male and female roles used to be more similar. In Late 1800’s, early 1900‘s, most people lived agricultural lives. Three-quarters of men were engaged in farm activities, and presumably nearly all of their wives were, too. Their productive activities were joint; they were not equal. Men owned their wives' person in common law and normally owned the land as well. Nevertheless, their daily reality was likely less shaped by these factors than by their own personalities and by the crises large and small that they faced as they worked together to provide for their family and care for their children.
By the 1920s males went to work outside the agricultural aspects, many going into manufacturing. Women took on the housewife, domestic role. The partnership seemed distant memory. Men were providers outside the home and women were home, usually with numerous children. However this change was soon followed by women in the 1950’s when they took to the workforce. Many wives still stayed home but the number of working women quickly doubled. As they have increasingly moved into the work force outside of the home, it has given them financial independence and has altered traditional roles within the family. Men are less essential as bread winners and no longer accepted as dominant figures in the home. They have begun to take on more child-rearing and other domestic household responsibilities previously defined as "women's work." Divorce has become an economically viable alternative for women in unhappy marriages. There also has been a marked decrease in the frequency of mother-child interaction.
American children have increasingly been raised by non-family members in child care centers and schools.
As women began this new endeavor, men were also forced to take on more domestic roles. Household chores and raising of the children were now a shared burden. As these changes occurred, divorce rates went up as well, thus causing the single parent family to take shape. Mothers and fathers now found themselves either having to play both roles in the family or they would have to be considered the “absent” parent.
Late 1900’s was the biggest time for structural change. Mothers were now finding themselves choosing corporate life over motherhood. Many women who do choose to be a mother never decide to get married. It is more acceptable now for men to choose to stay home with their children while the wife goes out of the home to work. Currently statistics say that only about 36% of mothers are home with their children. This is quite the drop since the ea
rly 1900’s when such a thing was unheard of. Economics is the major conflict causing such a difference in the family culture. A two income family is as normal today as an agricultural family was back in the early 1900’s. Clearly the American family, like all families in the Western industrial countries, is now profoundly different from what it had been in the past. It typically is a household with few children, with both parents working, and with mothers producing their children at ever older ages. At the same time, more adults than ever before are living alone or with unmarried companions and more women than ever before are giving birth out of wedlock. These trends have profoundly changed the American family and are unlikely to be reversed any time soon.
Marriage throughout the years has changed and conformed to the times, but for th
e most part marriage has stayed the same. People who were married in the early part of the 20th century were very young, most being in their mid to upper teens. Some children could get married as early as 12 to 14 with their parents’ consent. When the 1900’s started, marriage was very traditional, but they wanted something new like a diamond on their gold wedding band, yet still keeping something traditional like an engagement ring. The parents of the bride also wanted the man to be financially stable in order to take care of their daughter. This led to the groom paying for most of the wedding, but if both the families did not have a lot of money they would have the marriage at either the bride or grooms house. Also, a new idea was a honeymoon for the new couple if they could afford to go on one. The 1920’s was a very prosperous time and a lot of people were doing very well for themselves. This allowed the weddings to be bigger and fancier with more flowers and more family and friends. The biggest change during this time was that the brides now wore dresses that showed their shoulders and legs. When the great depression hit the United States the number of people getting married dropped significantly. The people at that time just did not have the money to get married, or the men knew they could not support a family so they did not want to start one. The way that they looked at marriage was once you were married, you would not get divorced no matter what the circumstances. With World War II, a lot of married women became widowers because of their husbands being killed in battle. After World War II was over a lot of the soldiers that came back settled down and got married. In the 1960’s, the view of marriage started to change to, "I'm not committed to you but I am having a great time with you sexually and romantically. I like how you make me feel right now. But who knows what I'll feel tomorrow? So let's not make any kind of commitment to each other but just enjoy this moment” (The Future of Marriage). In other words, if you don’t give me passion and pleasure then I can go and find it somewhere else. Even the newspaper and other forms of media have hinted that this kind of the love is the ideal kind. Then in the 70’s and 80’s there was the gay rights movement.The people that were gay wanted to get married, but their issue was swept under the rug because no one wanted to talk about it. In the early part of the 1990’s the marriage rates dropped to their lowest point in 30 years. Also, in the 1990’s the push for same sex marriage was a big topic and still is today. The gay and lesbian community is still fighting for the right to get married because they feel like they should be given the right to get married if they want to just like any other couple. Marriages today have a slowly declining divorce rate, but there are still a lot of married couples that do not stay married for longer than a few years.
Divorce up until the 1960’s was a subject that was unthinkable to many married couples. They were expected to work out any problems that they had. The women had to listen to the men and only the men could decide if they would get a divorce. Due to this social norm, less than one out of every ten marriages ended in divorce. Through the 1960’s, 70’s, and 80’s the divorce rate has gone up. In 1960 the divorce rate was 9.2 couples for every 1,000 people married, in 1970 it was 14.9 couples for every 1,000 people married, and in 1980 it was 22.6 couples for every 1,000 people married. In the 1990’s a staggering 1 in every 12 marriages ended in divorce. Surprisingly in today’s world 4 out of every 10 marriages will end in divorce. There are many reasons why divorces occur, whether it is from money, or communication, or infidelity. What is still surprising is that most people put a lot of thought into getting married from their financial status to their feelings for the person. Maybe one of the downfalls is that getting a divorce is a lot easier to achieve today than it was in the past. Money is a very big reason that lower income families get divorces. With families that do not have a lot of money, there is always a lot of tension between the husband and wife about all the things that come along with not having enough money. With this lack of money they cannot even afford to go to marriage counseling to see if they can get their problems resolved by a marriage counselor. Another big problem that married couples face is communication. In some relationships both spouses work and have kids making it hard for them to find time for each other, leading them to grow father apart until it is too late to save their marriage. Getting married at a young age is also a leader in why couples get divorced. Most of the time what happens is that the young couple gets pregnant and thinks that the best solution is to get married. However, when they get married the big problems that they encounter are financial strain, stress, poor communication, and taking care of a child all contributing to a probable divorce. One of the biggest reasons for getting a divorce is being unfaithful in a relationship. With women and men working together in the work place the temptation is there for them to be unfaithful, especially if they are having problems with an unhappy marriage.
There have been many changes in religion in the American family from past to present, each civilization has its own idea of what is good and what is true. As families beliefs and religions have changed from era to era, so have society's beliefs and values. The concept of “god” underwent quite a few transformations as religion changed from nature worship to public worship. Later families leaned more towards science, fame, and, money. Each family had its own god; beliefs in these gods, and resembled the belief system of modern-day patriotism in America. You can assume that ancient people also believed in the science of their day associated with such practices as divination with bones, ritual healing, or astrology. http://www.humanismtoday.org/vol13/kurtz.htmlAmerica is a very religious country. Religious institutions and churches are very powerful and influential in today’s social and political life. Americans who are not members of any church or institution established religion are likely to believe in God. About 40% of Americans attend religious services regularly. The family search for a better knowledge or belief. People in America are more likely to believe in religion than other places of the world. Americans who are members of no established religion are likely to believe in God. According to a Gallup opinion survey, nearly all Americans, 98% of them, do, compared to 84% in Switzerland, 73% i
n France and 60% in Sweden. Americans also tend to believe in life after death: 73% compared to 50% in Switzerland and only 38% in Great Britain. About 60% of Americans are members of a church, synagogue or other religious group, though many more identify with various religions because of their birth or upbringing. When the conclusions of philosophy were drafted on the family’s religion, it endowed religion with the regard of philosophy as being the most advanced form of knowledge at that time. http://www.philosophyofreligion.info/cosmological.html Religion has its own system of beliefs. Christians are taught to believe in the virtue of belief. German priest; Martin Luther said that belief alone would bring salvation. One had to believe in Jesus to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. (http://en.proverbia.net/citastema.asp?tematica=443) Belief in unseen things was not enough for intellectuals of the Renaissance. They preferred to believe in what they saw. This led to the attitude which underlies practical science that would say broad truths depended upon compliance to the facts, and beliefs had to be changed with a different observation of facts. Today people believe in the truths of science. Science assures us that true, real answers will be reached in our knowledge of the natural world. The progress in technology of science makes believers out of everyone.The American family today nurtures other kinds of beliefs. During this age, people believe in money. They believe in real things that have real existence and are truly valuable. Possession of money is at the center of many people's lives. The people of today believe in education as a personally good and uplifting experience. People believe that a college education means intellectual proficiency and likely success in a career. Belief becomes a more difficult proposal in a culture based on believing in wealth.
Through all of our nation’s ups and downs, there have always been families who are unable to make ends meet. In the early part of the century, social workers identified many “personal” causes of poverty such as disability, illness, old age, drug and alcohol addiction, and death of a breadwinner. However, they also recognized the socioeconomic conditions that can result in poverty among those who would otherwise be capable of working to make a living. Situations such as economic recession, business failures, geographical economic weaknesses, and changes or interruptions in technology infrastructure were all forces powerful enough to devastate the financial stability of many families. (Patterson 6.) Many believed overpopulation was a key factor to poverty, and credited that to the increased volume of immigration during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. Poverty for an agricultural family often meant the children were put to work as early and as often as possible, thus depriving them of an education. In the 1900s, children of impoverished families were expected to work especially if the family needed the extra income. There were no particular rules being followed with regard to child labor, so many children were expected to contribute to the family’s income as soon as they were old enough to be employable. The growing prosperity that America enjoyed through the turn of the century led some to abandon wisdom of frugality and savings. Economic performance yielded greater disposable income, and many Americans were able to indulge in excesses that their parents or grandparents had never dreamed of. The Great War (later to be known as World War I) further fueled the booming economy, and created countless industrial job opportunities. These relatively high paying jobs for uneducated workers enabled many families to restructure around the father as the head of the household, financially. This often facilitated more consistent and lengthy education for the children. Incidentally, the many lives lost in the war had a side effect back home, leaving many widowed mothers. This was the first time that many women were forced to become the primary breadwinner of their family. But the post-war boom came to an abrupt end with the crash of the stock market in 1929 and the ensuing Great Depression. In the early century there were no government managed welfare programs to protect poverty-stricken families, who had to hope for the grace of private charities distributing whatever they could.
In the Great Depression, many families were thrust into poverty and the effects were devastating. Those families with the father working a steady full time job seemed to disappear. Banks and businesses closed down and with that most jobs held by those breadwinners were abolished. Most households were now without that much needed income and at times the woman of the house was expected to find so
mething if possible to generate some money for food. The government had set up relief stations during the Great Depression but the lines were horrendous and some people died just waiting for days in them for any type of allowance just to eat. Children especially suffered from malnutrition because of inadequate diet and unhygienic living conditions, as well as their parents. Schools were feeding most children but even that was not enough because in 1933 school budgets were cut and in some cases schools were shutdown leaving children with no education. Small farming families in the south suffered the worst and the blows dealt by the depression were the most devastating. Some housing went without windows or water at times, and 40 percent of households in 1940 lacked bathtubs and 58 percent central heating. (Patterson.) With families struggling just to have enough to eat, Franklin Delano Roosevelt gave his speech with the idea of the New Deal in 1932 which won him the 1933 election for president. There was finally some hope for the suffering families of the Great Depression. The first phase (1933–34) attempted to provide recovery and relief from the Great Depression through programs of agricultural and business regulation, inflation, price stabilization, and public works. (infoplease.com.) Most notable, the National Recovery Administration which helped combat widespread unemployment. Also the Works Projects Administration helped create jobs for many unemployed families. However several projects were stopped causing many to be out of work once again in 1939. Thanks to the New Deal there was resurgence in job opportunity, primarily blue collar workers and economic revitalization. Since the economy was in a good condition, people could be hired at better wages so a family, father, mother, and two children could be supported but the father’s wages alone. But all this prosperity was soon to end; around the 1960s, the closing of factories created decreased employment opportunities for unskilled workers, so a father with no education could no longer support and family of four.
With the Social Security Act of 1935, it established a national welfare system. It helped single mothers with dependent children get grants monthly. Poverty rates have continued to rise and fall with significant decrease since the Great Depression. However recent rates have risen once again and many speculate that people are starting to abuse the system. There are many more rules and regulations to be accepted for state welfare but now families can be supported no matter what whether deserving or not.
Diversity and independence have always been hallmarks of the American experience. Whether a family of Protestants subsistence farming in the countryside, a single mother working two jobs to pay her bills, divorced parents sharing custody on alternate weekends, or young newlyweds just beginning their lives together, they all have one thing in common: regardless of time and place, all are American families. The fact that there is no one face of America, there is no form to fit, is what makes America so great, what makes its culture so beautifully diverse, and what keeps the rest of the world so constantly captivated with the way we can all be the same while all being so different.
Over the past century American family culture has experienced many changes. None has been more profound than the change in the roles of the mother and father. There are many reasons for these changes. The growing longevity in all of the people in a family has caused parents and children to spend many more years in each others’ company. This in turn has caused many changes in the ways that the family interacts with each other.
'New' Years Gained by Women Worldwide, 1900-2000
Increased life expectancy at birth
30 years
Increased life expectancy at age 15
15 years
Increased life expectancy at age 45
10 years
Increased life expectancy at age 65
7 years
Male and female roles used to be more similar. In Late 1800’s, early 1900‘s, most people lived agricultural lives. Three-quarters of men were engaged in farm activities, and presumably nearly all of their wives were, too. Their productive activities were joint; they were not equal. Men owned their wives' person in common law and normally owned the land as well. Nevertheless, their daily reality was likely less shaped by these factors than by their own personalities and by the crises large and small that they faced as they worked together to provide for their family and care for their children.
By the 1920s males went to work outside the agricultural aspects, many going into manufacturing. Women took on the housewife, domestic role. The partnership seemed distant memory. Men were providers outside the home and women were home, usually with numerous children. However this change was soon followed by women in the 1950’s when they took to the workforce. Many wives still stayed home but the number of working women quickly doubled. As they have increasingly moved into the work force outside of the home, it has given them financial independence and has altered traditional roles within the family. Men are less essential as bread winners and no longer accepted as dominant figures in the home. They have begun to take on more child-rearing and other domestic household responsibilities previously defined as "women's work." Divorce has become an economically viable alternative for women in unhappy marriages. There also has been a marked decrease in the frequency of mother-child interaction.
American children have increasingly been raised by non-family members in child care centers and schools.
As women began this new endeavor, men were also forced to take on more domestic roles. Household chores and raising of the children were now a shared burden. As these changes occurred, divorce rates went up as well, thus causing the single parent family to take shape. Mothers and fathers now found themselves either having to play both roles in the family or they would have to be considered the “absent” parent.
Late 1900’s was the biggest time for structural change. Mothers were now finding themselves choosing corporate life over motherhood. Many women who do choose to be a mother never decide to get married. It is more acceptable now for men to choose to stay home with their children while the wife goes out of the home to work. Currently statistics say that only about 36% of mothers are home with their children. This is quite the drop since the ea
rly 1900’s when such a thing was unheard of. Economics is the major conflict causing such a difference in the family culture. A two income family is as normal today as an agricultural family was back in the early 1900’s. Clearly the American family, like all families in the Western industrial countries, is now profoundly different from what it had been in the past. It typically is a household with few children, with both parents working, and with mothers producing their children at ever older ages. At the same time, more adults than ever before are living alone or with unmarried companions and more women than ever before are giving birth out of wedlock. These trends have profoundly changed the American family and are unlikely to be reversed any time soon.Marriage throughout the years has changed and conformed to the times, but for th
e most part marriage has stayed the same. People who were married in the early part of the 20th century were very young, most being in their mid to upper teens. Some children could get married as early as 12 to 14 with their parents’ consent. When the 1900’s started, marriage was very traditional, but they wanted something new like a diamond on their gold wedding band, yet still keeping something traditional like an engagement ring. The parents of the bride also wanted the man to be financially stable in order to take care of their daughter. This led to the groom paying for most of the wedding, but if both the families did not have a lot of money they would have the marriage at either the bride or grooms house. Also, a new idea was a honeymoon for the new couple if they could afford to go on one. The 1920’s was a very prosperous time and a lot of people were doing very well for themselves. This allowed the weddings to be bigger and fancier with more flowers and more family and friends. The biggest change during this time was that the brides now wore dresses that showed their shoulders and legs. When the great depression hit the United States the number of people getting married dropped significantly. The people at that time just did not have the money to get married, or the men knew they could not support a family so they did not want to start one. The way that they looked at marriage was once you were married, you would not get divorced no matter what the circumstances. With World War II, a lot of married women became widowers because of their husbands being killed in battle. After World War II was over a lot of the soldiers that came back settled down and got married. In the 1960’s, the view of marriage started to change to, "I'm not committed to you but I am having a great time with you sexually and romantically. I like how you make me feel right now. But who knows what I'll feel tomorrow? So let's not make any kind of commitment to each other but just enjoy this moment” (The Future of Marriage). In other words, if you don’t give me passion and pleasure then I can go and find it somewhere else. Even the newspaper and other forms of media have hinted that this kind of the love is the ideal kind. Then in the 70’s and 80’s there was the gay rights movement.The people that were gay wanted to get married, but their issue was swept under the rug because no one wanted to talk about it. In the early part of the 1990’s the marriage rates dropped to their lowest point in 30 years. Also, in the 1990’s the push for same sex marriage was a big topic and still is today. The gay and lesbian community is still fighting for the right to get married because they feel like they should be given the right to get married if they want to just like any other couple. Marriages today have a slowly declining divorce rate, but there are still a lot of married couples that do not stay married for longer than a few years.Divorce up until the 1960’s was a subject that was unthinkable to many married couples. They were expected to work out any problems that they had. The women had to listen to the men and only the men could decide if they would get a divorce. Due to this social norm, less than one out of every ten marriages ended in divorce. Through the 1960’s, 70’s, and 80’s the divorce rate has gone up. In 1960 the divorce rate was 9.2 couples for every 1,000 people married, in 1970 it was 14.9 couples for every 1,000 people married, and in 1980 it was 22.6 couples for every 1,000 people married. In the 1990’s a staggering 1 in every 12 marriages ended in divorce. Surprisingly in today’s world 4 out of every 10 marriages will end in divorce. There are many reasons why divorces occur, whether it is from money, or communication, or infidelity. What is still surprising is that most people put a lot of thought into getting married from their financial status to their feelings for the person. Maybe one of the downfalls is that getting a divorce is a lot easier to achieve today than it was in the past. Money is a very big reason that lower income families get divorces. With families that do not have a lot of money, there is always a lot of tension between the husband and wife about all the things that come along with not having enough money. With this lack of money they cannot even afford to go to marriage counseling to see if they can get their problems resolved by a marriage counselor. Another big problem that married couples face is communication. In some relationships both spouses work and have kids making it hard for them to find time for each other, leading them to grow father apart until it is too late to save their marriage. Getting married at a young age is also a leader in why couples get divorced. Most of the time what happens is that the young couple gets pregnant and thinks that the best solution is to get married. However, when they get married the big problems that they encounter are financial strain, stress, poor communication, and taking care of a child all contributing to a probable divorce. One of the biggest reasons for getting a divorce is being unfaithful in a relationship. With women and men working together in the work place the temptation is there for them to be unfaithful, especially if they are having problems with an unhappy marriage.
There have been many changes in religion in the American family from past to present, each civilization has its own idea of what is good and what is true. As families beliefs and religions have changed from era to era, so have society's beliefs and values. The concept of “god” underwent quite a few transformations as religion changed from nature worship to public worship. Later families leaned more towards science, fame, and, money. Each family had its own god; beliefs in these gods, and resembled the belief system of modern-day patriotism in America. You can assume that ancient people also believed in the science of their day associated with such practices as divination with bones, ritual healing, or astrology. http://www.humanismtoday.org/vol13/kurtz.htmlAmerica is a very religious country. Religious institutions and churches are very powerful and influential in today’s social and political life. Americans who are not members of any church or institution established religion are likely to believe in God. About 40% of Americans attend religious services regularly. The family search for a better knowledge or belief. People in America are more likely to believe in religion than other places of the world. Americans who are members of no established religion are likely to believe in God. According to a Gallup opinion survey, nearly all Americans, 98% of them, do, compared to 84% in Switzerland, 73% i
n France and 60% in Sweden. Americans also tend to believe in life after death: 73% compared to 50% in Switzerland and only 38% in Great Britain. About 60% of Americans are members of a church, synagogue or other religious group, though many more identify with various religions because of their birth or upbringing. When the conclusions of philosophy were drafted on the family’s religion, it endowed religion with the regard of philosophy as being the most advanced form of knowledge at that time. http://www.philosophyofreligion.info/cosmological.html Religion has its own system of beliefs. Christians are taught to believe in the virtue of belief. German priest; Martin Luther said that belief alone would bring salvation. One had to believe in Jesus to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. (http://en.proverbia.net/citastema.asp?tematica=443) Belief in unseen things was not enough for intellectuals of the Renaissance. They preferred to believe in what they saw. This led to the attitude which underlies practical science that would say broad truths depended upon compliance to the facts, and beliefs had to be changed with a different observation of facts. Today people believe in the truths of science. Science assures us that true, real answers will be reached in our knowledge of the natural world. The progress in technology of science makes believers out of everyone.The American family today nurtures other kinds of beliefs. During this age, people believe in money. They believe in real things that have real existence and are truly valuable. Possession of money is at the center of many people's lives. The people of today believe in education as a personally good and uplifting experience. People believe that a college education means intellectual proficiency and likely success in a career. Belief becomes a more difficult proposal in a culture based on believing in wealth.Through all of our nation’s ups and downs, there have always been families who are unable to make ends meet. In the early part of the century, social workers identified many “personal” causes of poverty such as disability, illness, old age, drug and alcohol addiction, and death of a breadwinner. However, they also recognized the socioeconomic conditions that can result in poverty among those who would otherwise be capable of working to make a living. Situations such as economic recession, business failures, geographical economic weaknesses, and changes or interruptions in technology infrastructure were all forces powerful enough to devastate the financial stability of many families. (Patterson 6.) Many believed overpopulation was a key factor to poverty, and credited that to the increased volume of immigration during the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. Poverty for an agricultural family often meant the children were put to work as early and as often as possible, thus depriving them of an education. In the 1900s, children of impoverished families were expected to work especially if the family needed the extra income. There were no particular rules being followed with regard to child labor, so many children were expected to contribute to the family’s income as soon as they were old enough to be employable. The growing prosperity that America enjoyed through the turn of the century led some to abandon wisdom of frugality and savings. Economic performance yielded greater disposable income, and many Americans were able to indulge in excesses that their parents or grandparents had never dreamed of. The Great War (later to be known as World War I) further fueled the booming economy, and created countless industrial job opportunities. These relatively high paying jobs for uneducated workers enabled many families to restructure around the father as the head of the household, financially. This often facilitated more consistent and lengthy education for the children. Incidentally, the many lives lost in the war had a side effect back home, leaving many widowed mothers. This was the first time that many women were forced to become the primary breadwinner of their family. But the post-war boom came to an abrupt end with the crash of the stock market in 1929 and the ensuing Great Depression. In the early century there were no government managed welfare programs to protect poverty-stricken families, who had to hope for the grace of private charities distributing whatever they could.
In the Great Depression, many families were thrust into poverty and the effects were devastating. Those families with the father working a steady full time job seemed to disappear. Banks and businesses closed down and with that most jobs held by those breadwinners were abolished. Most households were now without that much needed income and at times the woman of the house was expected to find so
mething if possible to generate some money for food. The government had set up relief stations during the Great Depression but the lines were horrendous and some people died just waiting for days in them for any type of allowance just to eat. Children especially suffered from malnutrition because of inadequate diet and unhygienic living conditions, as well as their parents. Schools were feeding most children but even that was not enough because in 1933 school budgets were cut and in some cases schools were shutdown leaving children with no education. Small farming families in the south suffered the worst and the blows dealt by the depression were the most devastating. Some housing went without windows or water at times, and 40 percent of households in 1940 lacked bathtubs and 58 percent central heating. (Patterson.) With families struggling just to have enough to eat, Franklin Delano Roosevelt gave his speech with the idea of the New Deal in 1932 which won him the 1933 election for president. There was finally some hope for the suffering families of the Great Depression. The first phase (1933–34) attempted to provide recovery and relief from the Great Depression through programs of agricultural and business regulation, inflation, price stabilization, and public works. (infoplease.com.) Most notable, the National Recovery Administration which helped combat widespread unemployment. Also the Works Projects Administration helped create jobs for many unemployed families. However several projects were stopped causing many to be out of work once again in 1939. Thanks to the New Deal there was resurgence in job opportunity, primarily blue collar workers and economic revitalization. Since the economy was in a good condition, people could be hired at better wages so a family, father, mother, and two children could be supported but the father’s wages alone. But all this prosperity was soon to end; around the 1960s, the closing of factories created decreased employment opportunities for unskilled workers, so a father with no education could no longer support and family of four.With the Social Security Act of 1935, it established a national welfare system. It helped single mothers with dependent children get grants monthly. Poverty rates have continued to rise and fall with significant decrease since the Great Depression. However recent rates have risen once again and many speculate that people are starting to abuse the system. There are many more rules and regulations to be accepted for state welfare but now families can be supported no matter what whether deserving or not.
Diversity and independence have always been hallmarks of the American experience. Whether a family of Protestants subsistence farming in the countryside, a single mother working two jobs to pay her bills, divorced parents sharing custody on alternate weekends, or young newlyweds just beginning their lives together, they all have one thing in common: regardless of time and place, all are American families. The fact that there is no one face of America, there is no form to fit, is what makes America so great, what makes its culture so beautifully diverse, and what keeps the rest of the world so constantly captivated with the way we can all be the same while all being so different.
Patterson, James. America's Struggle Against Poverty:1900-1994, Harvard Press 1994
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