AMERICA AFTER WWII 2
America after WWII
Introduction
Albeit victorious, the end of the World War II found the United States in a desolate state
in many avenues. Almost 30% of Americans lived in abject poverty, homes in the rural areas
lacked fundamental amenities and half of rural homes were not connected to the electric grid.
There were no shopping malls, immigration had been reduced and the colored were mostly
residing in the South under extreme segregation (Borstelmann, 2001). Re-assimilation of soldiers
was the only good nears at the time having been made easier by the Servicemen's Readjustment
Act of 1944 (P.L. 78-346, 58 Stat. 284m) which had been executed on June 22, 1944. Under the
GI Bill, over 2.2 Million veterans received formal education with over 5.6 Million others getting
vocational training. This improved the livelihood of the returning veterans and made them less of
a burden to their families and communities as opposed to those of World War I.
Among the first changes that took place was the rural urban migration as well as many
rural people working in the cities. However, a new desire for privacy emerged as each family
unit desired to live separately. The rural workers commuting to the city triggered the creation of
better highways out of town and this enabled people living short distance from town, where there
was enough room for the erection of a private residence build on its own compound, a hedge and
a backyard and still manage to commute to their places of work. Historian Kenneth Jackson,
author of The Crabgrass Frontier characterized the suburban as the residence of the affluent
middle class who would rather not be near to their places of work but on their own land and in
the middle of their own yard (Wiese, 2009). The period immediately after the World War II
created the biggest suburban boom in US history that may not be matched in future days.
The growth of the automobile industry contributed greatly to the growth of the suburb,
and when the automobile industry was released from the high production of military vehicles, it
found a great demand for motor vehicles and within 5 year of the end of the World War II,
Twenty One Million Vehicles had been produced. With the satisfaction of the market in volume
