1 / 16

The Other Side of American Life

The Other Side of American Life. Poverty Amidst Prosperity. Review of Life in the 1950s/1960s. We discussed prosperity during the 1950s and 1960s and how most Americans were better off than before. Do you believe this was true for all Americans? If yes, why?

fuller
Download Presentation

The Other Side of American Life

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. The Other Side of American Life Poverty Amidst Prosperity

  2. Review of Life in the 1950s/1960s • We discussed prosperity during the 1950s and 1960s and how most Americans were better off than before. Do you believe this was true for all Americans? • If yes, why? • If no, what groups were not part of the “new prosperity”?

  3. Key Vocabulary Ideas Facts of the Times 20% of America lived in poverty during the 1950s Urban Renewal led to crowded housing with plenty of violence Government removed poor once they earned higher income, putting them back into poverty Juvenile delinquency up 45 percent between 1948 and 1953 • Poverty Line: figure the government sets to reflect the minimum income required to support a family • Urban Renewal Programs: replace slums with high-rise buildings for poor residents in an effort to remove poverty • Juvenile Delinquency: Antisocial and/or criminal behavior of young people

  4. African Americans • Moved to cities for better economic opportunity in the past (think about everything we’ve discussed already in class) • Racial discrimination in schools, housing, hiring, etc. kept African-Americans poor and stuck in the cities • Generally averaged only 51% of what white workers earned and often did not receive other benefits

  5. Hispanics • Bracero Program brought over 5 million workers to the US to work on farms and ranches in the Southwest • 350,000 stay in the US permanently but lived in extreme poverty • Worked long hours, received very little pay, housed in small shacks • Largely invisible in society until they organized for greater rights

  6. Native Americans • Poorest ethnic group in America; made up less than 1% of the population • Termination Policy intended to bring Native Americans into the mainstream and ended their classification as a separate legal group • Government attempted to have Native Americans move out of reservations and into cities with horrible results and life expectancy for Native Americans was far lower than other groups within cities

  7. Appalachia • Stretches from New York to Georgia • Unemployment soared and economy moved away from coal (roughly 1.5 million people without work) • Standard of living very low (example: fewer doctors per 1,000 people than anywhere in the US; schools worse than inner-city schools of the time) • High rates of infant mortality and nutritional deficiency

  8. Short Answer/Discussion • Does this idea of “The Other Side of American Life” still exist today? If so, how? • Do these examples disprove the idea of the American Dream?

More Related