The Business of America is Business

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The Business of America is Business

• Chap 12
• Sec 3

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Calvin Coolidge--The Chief business of the
American people is business
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The man who builds a factory builds a templethe
man who works there worships there.
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Coolidge and Republican Successor, Herbert
Hoover, favored gov. polices that would keep
taxes down and business profits up.
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Their goal was to keep government interference in
business to a minimum in order to allow
businesses to flourish.
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Coolidge place high tariffs on foreign imports
which helped American manufacturers.
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Reduced income taxes which mean people had more
money in their pockets.
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Wages were rising because new technology.
Technology increase productivity. Helping
businesses and consumers.
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Chemical processes tripled the amount of gasoline
that could be extracted from crude oil.
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Advances in electricity transmission sped
development of larger manufacturing plants.
Plants output rose 60 in the 1920s.
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Henry Fordused the assembly line to
significantly reduce the price of cars. Now most
Americans could afford a carnot just the rich.
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Fords Model T dropped from 850 in 1908 to
290 by 1924.
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Created millions of jobsnot only making cars,
but things related to cars. Rubber, glass,
steel, gasoline/oil industries all grow rapidly.
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Gasoline stations, repair shops, parking garages,
motels, tourist camps, shopping centers, and road
construction all spring up due to automobile.
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Automobile, and the vast construction of paved
roads, helped connect city to city, town to town.
Gave people freedom to go where/when they wanted.
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Cars changed architectureHouse now have
garages/carports/driveways. Later allowed for
Malls and huge stores with surrounded by parking
lots.
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Farmers could go to city for shopping and
entertainment.
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People could vacation in new and faraway places.
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Workers could live miles from jobs.
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Cities spread out eventually leads to suburbs.
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Use of electricity also transformed nation.
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Development of cheap alternating current (a/c)
made it possible to distribute power over long
distances.
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Taking advantage of cheap electricity, companies
started making electrical appliances.
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Refrigerators, stoves, toasters, washing
machines, radios, vacuum cleaners, etc were sold
by millions.
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Not only make life easier, but also created
hundreds of thousands of jobs.
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Thomas Edison founds General Electric (GE)Goal
was to invent a machine that would use
electricity to perform a task usually done by
hand.
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Household appliances helped free up time for
women. Allowed them to work outside the home.
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Businesses needed to find ways to get people to
buy more things as production rose.
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Companies start to advertise. Goalconvince
people the buy something they really dont need.
Turn Wants into Needs.
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Slogans and Brand names invented and become part
of US culture.
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Industry let people buy on credit. Installment
planpeople buy goods over a long period of time
without having to put down much money at time of
purchase.
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Often led to people buying things they really
couldnt afford. People had lots of stuffand
lots of Bills.
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Not all businesses prosperRailroad industries
suffered due to new competition of the Car and
growing Airline industry.
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Farmers suffered as well. Used new machinery and
crop production skyrocketed. Led to
overproduction and extremely low crop prices.