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World War II affected American society by
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The World War II era was important because it transformed American culture. While the men were fighting overseas, the women were working in factories and offices. Before the war, many women were housewives and were discouraged from getting a job. Families were separated, and many of the babies born during the war never knew their fathers. Meat, butter, milk, and cigarettes could only be purchased with coupons issued by the government, and many were responsible for growing their own vegetables. No cars were made during the war because factories devoted all their resources to making parts for tanks, planes and ships. As the demand for labor increased, many Americans had to leave their homes and move to the coastal areas where the defense plants
American women in World War II brought significant changes which although people expectation that life would go back to normal they modify their lifestyle making women free of society pressure and norms, because the war changed the traditional way to see a woman and their roles leading to a new society where women were allowed to study and work in the same way than men. Creating a legacy with the principles of today’s society.
During the war, women played a vital role in the workforce because all of the men had to go fight overseas and left their jobs. This forced women to work in factories and volunteer for war time measures.
After the end of World War II, the United States went through many changes. Most of the changes were for the better, but some had an adverse effect on certain population centers. Many programs, agencies and policies were created to transform American society and government.
American Society on the Change during the Post-World War Years. After World War II, Americans experienced a time of rapid social change. American soldiers were discharged and returned home from the battlefields, hoping to find work and to get on with their lives. Marriage rates increased dramatically after the war.
After the war, the American people made the change from "old" ways to "new" ways. Many factors, such as new technology, fundamentalism, new looks and church led to tension between the old and the new. The 1920s were a time of conflicting viewpoints between traditional behaviors and new and changing attitudes.
World War II opened a new chapter in the lives of Depression-weary Americans. The United States of America had an unusual importance in the war, it had been spared the physical destruction that had taken place throughout the world. Americans on the home front did not see the fighting and brutality as other countries experienced it. However, the events and changes on the home front due to the World War transformed America. One of the greatest conversions was that of the American woman. Women around the country were transformed from the average house wife into a person with a voice and most importantly a purpose.
The American home front during World War II is recalled warmly in popular memory and cultural myth as a time of unprecedented national unity, years in which Americans stuck together in common cause. World War II brought many new ideas and changes to American life. Even though World War II brought no physical destruction to the United States mainland, it did affect American society. Every aspect of American life was altered by U.S. involvement in the war including demographics, the labor force, economics and cultural trends. During the Great Depression, the American birth rate had fallen to an all-time low due to delayed marriages and parenthood.
When American officially entered World War II in 1941 changes occurred for many people. The draft was enacted forcing men to do their duty and fight for their country. Women were asked to hold down the home front in many ways, ranging from rationing, volunteering, saving bacon grease and making the most of their commodities they currently had. There was also a hard push for women to take war production jobs outside the home. Before the depression, just a few years before the war, it was not uncommon for a woman to work for wages, but as the depression set in, married women were at risk of losing their jobs. Numerous women were fired or asked to resign in order to make room for a man who had lost his job. Many citizens felt it was unfair for a family to have two wage earners when some families had none. (Kessler-Harris) Previously, the average workforce of women was young and single. However, when the war started, couples were married at a younger age, putting the typical worker in short supply. This led to a rapid increase in older married women going to work outside the home. “During the depression, 80 percent of Americans objected to wives working outside the home, by 1942, only 13 percent still objected.” (May) By the end of the war, 25 percent of married women were employed. (May) Although women had worked outside the home prior to World War II, their entrance into the war production labor force created change in the typical gender roles and provided an exciting and yet difficult time for many women who were gaining their independence.
The start of the war era came on the heels of a decade when women had seemingly taken a step backward in social and economic progress. The depression of the 1930's had devastated the American economy. Women, especially married women, had bore the largest share of the burden. To help male workers get back on the job, national leaders called for married women in two-income families to give up their jobs. Several states had passed laws barring women from holding state jobs.
World War II changed the world as a whole, but in this essay I am going to talk about how it changed America. After the war, many groups and organizations were created. The United Nations was born on October 24, 1945. This was a group meant to keep peace between nations. Tensions were still high between the United States and the Soviet Union after the war. Nevertheless, things were booming like never before here in our home country. With equal rights for women and African Americans, economic growth, and anti- war organizations became pro- war after Pearl Harbor. These are the ways I am going to discuss to you how World War Two changed our great country.
The 1940s provided a drastic change in women’s employment rates and society’s view of women. With the end of the Depression and the United States’ entrance into World War II, the number of jobs available to women significantly increased. As men were being drafted into military service, the United States needed more workers to fill the jobs left vacant by men going to war. Women entered the workforce during World War II due to the economic need of the country. The use of Patriotic rhetoric in government propaganda initiated and encouraged women to change their role in society.
During America’s involvement in World War Two, which spanned from 1941 until 1945, many men went off to fight overseas. This left a gap in the defense plants that built wartime materials, such as tanks and other machines for battle. As a result, women began to enter the workforce at astonishing rates, filling the roles left behind by the men. As stated by Cynthia Harrison, “By March of [1944], almost one-third of all women over the age of fourteen were in the labor force, and the numbers of women in industry had increased almost 500 percent. For the first time in history, women were in the exact same place as their male counterparts had been, even working the same jobs. The women were not dependent upon men, as the men were overseas and far from influence upon their wives.
World War II had a large effect on America, on how we were regarded in the world, on how our culture would grow and develop, and on how our citizens would develop and settle the land on their return. It brought people together for a while that were later torn apart, and changed the way Americans looked at higher education. Perhaps most importantly, it brought America to the world and served it up to them as something that could grow and become part of their culture, call it the Coca-Colonization of the world (Marling).
World War II was the most significant period in the 20th century. The armies of the Second World War were usually large organizations. The formation of which was made possible by the total war efforts of the combatant nations. Holding unceasing front lines in Europe, particularly in the Soviet Union, required the mobilization of hundreds of divisions in addition to other elements by both sides. (Wilson, 2002)
A lot of families had to leave from becoming a traditional family to a single parent family because their love one has died in the war. I was also around the time when women fought for rights. In addition, the great movement for African Americans from the south to the north to work in the factories because a lot of men were killed at war and they needed people to replace the white factory workers. People had to adjust to work environments due to women working due to the lack of men that did not return from the war. And those that did returned from the war wanted their jobs back and that there were women working in their workplace. Women where so use to making factory money now versus making $15 dollars a week being a maid and a housekeeper compared to making $40 a week working in the factory. Women had to leave the factories, but they did not leave happy so they started a women’s right movement.