Why Was There an Economic Boom in America in the 1920's

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Why was there an economic boom in the USA in the 1920s? During the 1920s there was a prolonged boom in the American economy. Industrial production doubled, resulting in low unemployment. The economy grew rapidly as sales and wages increased and fortunes were made. Life had never seemed better for the majority of the American people. This boom developed for a number of reasons; The main reason why there was a boom in America in the 1920s was the impact of mass manufacturing & mass production. Before the war, mass manufacturing was almost unheard of - everything was individually made by hand. The American Henry Ford was the first engineer who mass manufactured cars. He was able to cut down the time to build a car from a few weeks to an hour and a half. Mass production and assembly lines involved the making of goods with standardised parts e.g. the same size bolts. This also meant you didn’t need highly skilled workers that had been apprentices for years. The cost was kept low and by 1926 six cars a minute were rolling off the assembly lines to keep up with demand. Another effect of this mass production was high employment; factories needed a lot of labour work. Component industries also benefited as they needed to supply large amounts of rubber, steel, glass and even road - by 1929 four million jobs depended on the car industry. Another important factor was due to the impact of The First World War. The European economies were exhausted by the cost of waging a long war. In comparison, the USA grew rich during the war years. Its late arrival to the war, and the fact that its cities and industries were not bombed or destroyed during the conflict, meant that at the end of the war it was able to capitalise on the perilous state of European industry and dominate their markets. The First World War was very beneficial to America as during this time America’s food
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