The Climax of Capitalism

How did the United States become the twentieth century's dominant economy? What is special about America and the American way of capitalism, that favoured such a rapid climb to wealth and power? And, as the old postwar certainties begin to crumble, is the climax of American capitalism already over? These are the themes addressed in this engrossing book, which gives a chronological, analytical account of the American economy from the late nineteenth century to the end of the Reagan era and beyond.

(Pearson)

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Part 1 Sources of American power: from primary producer to industrial giant; the Civil War and its significance; the industrialization process; rise of the corporation; business management; Taylorism; industrial achievement; social mobility; the United States in the world. Part 2 Trends in the twenties: the United States - world power; the prosperity decade; the automotive revolution; consumer durables; a booming economy; underconsumption; limits of welfare capitalism; the weaknesses of the labour movement; the organization of business; anti-trust laws; combination and monopoly; corporate business; business ideology; small and medium sized firms; traditional forms of business; geographical distribution of industry; manufacturing industry - the power house; Taylorism and Fordism in the twenties; working class conditions; Taylorism and the labour process; Fordism and the assembly line; agriculture - the simmering crisis; ideological trends; the banking system - a weak link. Part 3 A decade or crisis - 1929-1939: Black Thursday; the greatest depression; the limits of orthodoxy; the monetarist view; extent of the decline; Hoover's response; Roosevelt takes over; the New Deal; the historial significance of the New Deal; other New Deal measures; labour; social security; the depression summed up. Part 4 The economic impact of the Second World War: war brings full employment; the arms build up; government intervention; war production at its peak; labour in the war; the cost of the war; demobilization and reconstruction; the war economy and the development of American capitalism. Part 5 The post-1945 economy - the fifties boom: the post-war boom; the influence of Keynes; American hegemony and the Bretton Woods system; the cold war; the Marshall plan; prosperity returns; anti union policy; the new American dream; new trends of the fifties; roots of expansion; living standards; military spending. Part 6 Affluence and the Vietnam War - the 1960s: the Kennedy-Johnson boom; Keynesianism triumphant; the Great Society and Vietnam; financing the war; the war on poverty; the dollar weakens; war and inflation; Keynesianism falters. Part 7 Structural changes in American capitalism since 1945: corporate strategy; management techniques - the US model; the affluent society; the regulated market economy; towards a welfare state; the military-industrial complex; agriculture - the regulation of market forces. Part 8 Into troubled waters - the economy in the 1970s: the enigma of stagflation; enter Richard Nixon; towards recession; whip inflation now; the first oil shock; the second oil shock; role of the fed; a new phase; symptoms of change; bail-outs; changes in industry; foreign competition; the MNCS; post-industrial society. (Part Contents)

(Pearson)