affluent society

affluent society term coined by John Kenneth Galbraith in The Affluent Society (1958) to describe the United States after World War II. An affluent society, as the term was used ironically by Galbraith, is rich in private resources but poor in public ones because of a misplaced priority on increasing production in the private sector. Galbraith argued that industrial production was being devoted to satisfying trivial consumer needs, in part to maintain employment, and that the United States should shift resources to improve schools, the infrastructure, recreational resources, and social services, providing a better quality of life instead of an ever greater quantity of consumer goods. His critique influenced efforts during the 1960s to improve the quality of public institutions and facilities. The term has lost its original ironic meaning and is now used simply to indicate widespread prosperity.

affluent society a society in which material wealth is widely distributed; often with allusion to the book of that title (1958) by the American economist John Kenneth Galbraith.

Affluent Society, The (1958).In response to World War II, the Cold War, and the global economic preeminence of the United States during the 1940s and 1950s, many intellectuals reassessed the benefits of American democracy and capitalism. John Kenneth Galbraith's The Affluent Society emerged as one of the most influential texts of this genre. A Harvard economist and Democratic party political adviser, the Canadian‐born Galbraith questioned the efficacy of Americans' support for Keynesian economic practices in an age of material abundance. Tax and fiscal policies aimed at promoting constant economic growth had made sense during a time of deprivation (as in the Great Depression of the 1930s), but in the booming postwar years, Galbraith argued, a policy of economic liberalism would ultimately lead to financial and moral instability.

Specifically, Galbraith criticized the United States's focus on economic production. Corporations committed to growth deliberately manufactured consumer demand for products the public neither needed nor wanted. Such a system, Galbraith predicted, would create debt, inflation, and overproduction, and thus ultimately lead to economic depression. He further contended that consumer spending had created a horrible social imbalance. As Americans feverishly invested in cars, televisions, and a multitude of other consumer goods, public services and public resources such as parks and other facilities serving the common good were neglected and impoverished. To redress this imbalance, Galbraith proposed a program to reduce private spending and increase government investment in social programs. Although few followed Galbraith's prescription for change, The Affluent Society represented an important voice of dissent at a time when most intellectuals and policy makers uncritically celebrated American capitalism.
See also Consumer Culture; Depressions, Economic; Economics; Fifties, The; Keynesianism.

Bibliography

Richard H. Pells , The Liberal Mind in a Conservative Age: American Intellectuals in the 1940s and 1950s, 2d ed., 1989.

Jennifer L. Kalish