Dale Mineshima-Lowe
Social Change, Economic Upheavals: America in the 1970s

Dale Mineshima-Lowe | Social Change, Economic Upheavals: America in the 1970s | 03.12.24

Visuals displayed throughout the presentation.

- Welcome, everyone. I’m Dale Mineshima-Lowe, and we will be looking at 1970s America today. So we’ll be looking at sort of there’s social economic issues that are happening in 1970s America, a little bit of what I call political, but it’s really political, social issues as well. So let me share my screen with you, and we’ll get started. You should be able to see my screen. Great. So as I said, we’re talking about 1970s America and I’m thinking about it on the back of 1960s. So we know 1960s was a huge amount of turbulence in terms of what we’re saying, in terms of what we’re seeing in the country. We know we have the Civil Rights Movement, obviously you have the Kennedy assassination, you have a change in administration, but also LBJ’s Great Society. So a lot of government works, one would argue, in the 1960s, and what we’re seeing in the 1970s connects to that.

So it’s sort of interesting ‘cause a lot of people forget about the 1970s. They go, “Oh, it’s a decade of, hmm, maybe not much.” And actually what we know is there’s things that are happening in the background. There’s definitely things that have started in the 1960s that we see coming to more fruition in the 1970s as well. So a few images here, and we’ll pick up on some of these with others along the way. So just some topics I thought to throw in for today’s session. So I want to talk and start a little bit about population and demographic information 'cause it just gives you a bit of context in terms of where America is at in terms of size, in terms of perhaps age, and development of its economy a bit. And then we’ll pick up on some of the social issues in terms of things that perhaps we’re seeing in the 1960s, but definitely comes more fully in the 1970s.

Women’s rights, gay rights, and then I’ve got a little bit of fun thinking about television, but also sort of if you like movies and cinema that’s coming up as well within that. And there’s a few other fun bits that are thrown in terms of really entertainment of the 1970s that I think is a part of the discussion and the social fabric of what’s happening within American society as well. Now, there’s a little bit of overlap between some of the information I want to share with you in terms of demographics and particularly with the economic aspects of the country and some of the political, social issues that are coming up as well. So we’ll mention a bit about the sort of the change, if you like, and the backlash that we’re starting to see in the 70s on the back of the 1960s. The anti-war movement is still happening and moving forward, but also things like the energy crisis will have an impact, and then environmental movement amongst other things. So just a snapshot of things we’re going to be fielding and looking at today. So in terms of our population and what we’re seeing in America, in the 1970s here.

So the census has taken every decade. And so in the 1970 census, we’ve got about 203.2 million people within the US. Now that kind of contextualises if you think about the last census that was just taken in 2020, we had 329.5 million. And then for some of you I quoted in the 1960s last week, we were looking at a sort of, if you like, rough estimate of 19, or sorry 2021 of 331.9 million. I was looking at new estimates, so an estimate for 2024, so up to say the beginning of March, 2024 by some figures, we’re looking at about 341.2 million people within the United States. Now that’ll be entire population may include, will include immigrants as well as nationals themselves. Now you compare that to say, I’m based in the UK at the moment, and so the population of the UK at the moment in 2024, 68 million. So we’re kind of thinking about how this population has grown. So this is sort of an interesting graphic.

It gives you the estimate, and actually the reality in 2020 is slightly less than the estimates and the projections here by the Census Bureau, but not by much. So as we said, in 1970, 203.2 million people within the US. And so we’re starting to see things moving gradually, but actually in a sense slowing down a bit as well. And some of that we begin to see in terms of population happening in the 1970s. So here I wanted to present you and share with you this graphic. So I thought it just gave us some really nice estimates of population by age. So kind of bracketed here, the 1970 to that 80, so that decade we’re looking at, and we can see a good portion of the population lands between 15 and 64. We have though a growing population of 65 plus within the country during this decade. And then it fluctuates a bit. We had a bit of a bump in the sort of younger than 15 perhaps in the 60s.

And we’re kind of slowly seeing it stabilise, going slightly downwards in the 1970s for that younger generation. And part of that is due to things we’re seeing from the 1960s and 70s for women. So in the 1960s we start to see things like the birth control pill being on market and becoming available, but also women deciding to make changes in terms of what they want of their lives as well, both work and family wise. And we start to see that really come to much more fruition in the 1970s. So someone asked me last week, “Wasn’t the 1960s sort of sexual revolution period?” And it is, but I would say also the 1970s can be considered that in particular for women.

You have now a generation of women who have become liberated both in terms of, one could argue, their sexual identities, but also they feel liberated to move forward in terms of things like their career. They want equal rights, and there are a lot of advocates for that within this generation that are trying to push forward, you know, women’s place, not just the home and in society but actually in the workplace as well. So we start to see a lot of those movements that started in the 60s, like the Equal Rights Amendment, and we see organisations like the National Organisation for Women, which was founded in the 60s, pushing further and further and trying to partner with Congress really in the 1970s to make changes that will give women much more protections, much more rights in terms of work and outside of the home. So we start to see that happening here.

Now, this one, I wanted to share with you this demographic. If you let me come out of this and change slides for a second, because this one’s actually a moving one and it’s kind of funky. And I am borrowing it. It’s not mine, so. But I quite liked it so I wanted to share it with you, if I may. It doesn’t have any sound. So literally it’s just showing you this timeline. But I thought it was really interesting in terms of it showing US demographic composition. So males on the side in blue, females on the right, and the decades. And you see sort of, if you like, also within those bands in terms of the different racial groups, at least some of them. They’re not clearly defined if you look at this map here and that little key, partly because in earlier generations of the census you don’t have that same differentiation, that individualization of different racial and ethnic groups that you do today in the census. And so those changes come over time, and with that we start to see then that sort of breakdown in different ways as well. But it’s just quite fascinating when you see that explosion in terms of the 1960s in terms of population and the demographics of it and then how things sort of come in a bit of waves and come down as well.

So the population is always increasing, as you can see in the little counter at the top here. And then our 1970s. And it just goes up to 2020. But we’ve got that 1977 capture so we can kind of see where, as we mentioned, things sort of, the population explodes and then gets bigger obviously as we go through the 50s up to the 60s, and then we see a downward sort of trend as well. And now some historians look at that downward trend that we’ve just seen, and they really start to relate it perhaps to changes in women’s position within society, but also their change in their desirability of what they’re looking for. So one of the things that we’d already noted was that women are looking for, you know, equal access to work, equal access to pay, so equal pay, chances at jobs that were traditionally reserved for men only. And they start to also seek sort of national-wide or nationwide reforms on things like birth control and abortion. And those things start to have an impact then on demographic size and basically who’s having children, who’s waiting to have children.

And so what we begin to see with the 1970s is a market sort of change in attitude of younger women. So a number of younger women, many younger women want to not only go into the workforce, but many of them are also looking to have a and go to university and college. And so we start to see that they’re entering college in the 70s and they’re considering their career pathway, not necessarily college as a means of finding a husband as they did perhaps in the 1950s. And so it’s sort of interesting women entering college in the 70s, looking at their career paths, also has an impact then on marriage age. And so we start to see the median age of marriage rising dramatically as well in particular for those who have a college degree. So they’re waiting later to get married, which means they’re also waiting later to have children. And so we start to see perhaps here in this graph a fall in the fertility rate. One is kind of due to perhaps economic decline, but also one could argue with female education and changes in career paths as well. And so those two things collide, and we see a dramatic fall from its peak rising in the 1950s to the end of the 1950s and then kind of sliding down in the 60s and then further down in the 70s as well. So some really interesting things happening there. Now, going to come out to make sure that you can still see what I am seeing. Great.

Now the other thing that you note here on this particular graph is it’s talking about US fertility rates have fallen during periods of economic decline. Now, it’s sort of one of those really interesting things with the 1970s. So we said women are becoming much more educated, they want to careers and go into work. There is, and we’ll come to this in a moment, there is a bit of an economic downturn obviously in the 1970s which will also push women and wives during this economic downturn into work. So there’s the necessity and need for two incomes across a number of households. Now, it’s kind of interesting because you then start to have this issue with unemployment and one of the arguments is, well, unemployment is becoming exasperated not just because there are tightening of jobs and in terms of the fact that the US has moved more towards services rather than industry and manufacturing goods.

Still does that in the 1970s, but it’s moving towards a service economy as well, which then has an impact and has hit in some ways by a downturn in the economy. But there’s also some that are arguing, well, part of the issue with unemployment, 'cause they’re looking at unemployment in particularly in relation to men, that unemployment is being blamed not just on the downturn of the economy, but also the fact that you have more women and immigrants moving into the economy and the workforce as well that’s putting competition pressures on employment as well. So some of us see it as a good thing and a great thing because things are changing. Others are seeing it as having a negative impact on particular sectors as well of society. And so it’s sort of one of those interesting things that we’re starting to see with, I think, changes in women’s sort of, if you like, perspectives, but also their experiences within American society.

Now, by the end of the 1970s, what we’ll see for the first time is more than half of the women within the population will be having jobs, at least those of working age, I should say, have jobs outside of the home. Unfortunately for them in the 1970s they’re paid still approximately 60% less than men doing the same job. But they’re also able to find employment quickly. And particular jobs in the healthcare and services industry are growing, while factories and unionised jobs are also moving overseas. So there’s a real interesting mix in terms of the types of jobs that are becoming available and how they fit perhaps for some of the women who are moving into careers and looking for work outside of the home as well. Now, one of the last things I wanted to mention in terms of demographics, and we’ll then come back to economics in a moment, but really I pulled out here 1960 and 80 to just give you an idea of what’s happening in the 1970s. So we see, you know, a fairly steady, one could argue, growth in terms of population from decade to decade across this period.

We’re also seeing, you know, sort of growth in terms of the different sort of ethnic racial groups within the population as well. And here you’ve got all these. Now, it’s sort of interesting because some of these previously won’t have shown up in the same way because the census questions will start to ask different demographic questions in terms of race and ethnicity decade on decade as well. So, for instance, today you’ve got this issue, you’ve got this category here, two or more races, it’s blank in the 60s, 70s, and 80s. It starts to come up much more prevalently because it’s adopted by the census much later in future decades. And so we don’t have that data here as well. But it is quite interesting just to see where and how different parts of society are growing within America, I think, during the 1970s and over that decade in particular as well. Now, as I said, I promise thinking about the economy 'cause I think this is a real interesting thing and will have an impact on the political and some of the other social issues that we’re starting to see in America during this decade. I’ve seen a few questions and comments in there. I will get to them at the end of our session as well.

Okay, so thinking about the US economy in the 1970s, I’ve kind of listed four different things here, and they’re interrelated in many ways. So I’m going to start with thinking about oil prices and then move on to thinking about inflation and recession together. And then I’ve got a graphic to share with you in terms of unemployment over that sort of 1970 decade as well 'cause I think that will kind of give us a bit of understanding of what’s happening. So in terms of high oil prices, many of you may or may not know that actually of course there’s a energy crisis that hits in the 1970s, in particular for the United States. The United States supported Israel after a surprise attack by Egypt and Syria in the Yom Kippur War in 1973. That has a bit of an impact obviously, has put an impact on then things like oil supply. Now, oil originations in the Middle East already were not very happy with the US for devaluing the dollar 'cause one of the things that’s related to inflation and recession is Nixon will pull the gold standard, which will then decrease the value of the dollar, but has knock-on effects for others as well, but was doing it in order to try and restart and reboot the US economy, one would argue, and also redress the issue of recession and hopefully inflation at the same time.

It does a bit of both in the short-term, but doesn’t look at the long-term problems perhaps or challenges that are related to why we have inflation and recession within the US during the 70s. But however, the high oil prices obviously due to two particular crises. So as I said, the first one is in 1973. The second one will be the Iranian Revolution in 1979. And without going into a lot of detail on both, what happens around those major events internationally is that it has an impact on oil production. In particular countries within the Middle East will determine that actually as a way of managing their relationship with the US, they’ll create a oil embargo. And so what they begin to do is start to decrease the flow of oil to the US. Now, it’s not that the US doesn’t have its own ability and its own supply. What it lacks at the time in the 1970s really is the excess production capacity, which means it found it really, really difficult then within the industry to bring more oil to the market if needed.

And so they weren’t able to really respond quite rapidly to this sort of issue of oil supply against demand within the US after the embargo by the organisation of petroleum exporting countries, also known as OPECs, during this period. And so that happens, within it, we start to see a real shortage of oil, gasoline, becomes rationed within the US. I’ve got other images later that I’ll share with you about that as well. But on the whole what we’re beginning to see is that actually that embargo ceases US oil imports from these countries within the Arab petroleum exporting region. And that equates to literally a quadrupling of oil prices. So we see oil prices going, and some of you will laugh thinking about oil prices today on the market, but oil prices then in 1973, you could get a barrel of oil for $2.90 before the embargo, after the embargo, $11.65 a barrel, all the way until the beginning of 1974 when the embargo is then cut off and called off I should say as well. So during this period, you see that quadrupling.

It has a dramatic impact on daily life of Americans, but also don’t forget, lack of oil will have a real impact as well on manufacturing and industrialization in industry within America. So there’s a real desire to up market or up speed internal production capacity within the US, but it’s not able to do so at that rapid rate. And so we find then it creates problems in terms of production, but also in terms then of other things that are happening within the US at the same time. 'Cause while we have the, you know, sort of high prices of oil, that also creates a sort of, if you like, inflationary rate on many, many things going across the spectrum within the US. So between 1973 and 1975, we see that America has essentially a recession.

And now to be fair, through the early 1970s, there is a sort of, if you like, a economic stagnation that’s being felt across much of the western world, partly because of the overall sort of post World War II economic expansion kind of starts to slow down in terms of that. The other problem you have in America in that early 1970s is also the fact that you have high unemployment along with high inflation. And these things, you know, existed simultaneously, which, one would argue, started in many cases, we started to see some of these signs in the late 1960s in the US. In particular, one of the interesting signs that with hindsight people look at when they’re looking at the economy of the 1970s is the fact that you have unemployment rising quite dramatically between 1968 and 1970. So it rose by about 33%. And while that was happening, you also start to see consumer price index, so the cost of goods and services going up by about 11%. And so with those two things, towards the end of the 1960s perhaps, those things, but also then exasperated by the high oil prices, it’s not really surprising that we see then inflation and recession, but also what will be termed as, you know, stagflation.

So you have a stagnating economy that is not growing, it’s actually going down, you have high inflation, but you also have high unemployment rates. And this is something that hadn’t been really experienced in the US before. So it sort of stunned a lot of economists who were saying, “Well, normally, if you have, you know, high inflation, then you might have unemployment.” But actually if you have low unemployment, then actually that would bring the cost of goods down because more things would be available. So everything, it sort of should have a knock-on effect, and they weren’t seeing that in the early 1970s. So as a result of the sort of stagflation, what we see is rather than having wages fall, prices fall, or wages increases and then prices increases, what we’re seeing is basically American purchasing power becoming sort of less and worth less, but also it becomes increasingly more expensive for America to export goods outside. And so it becomes less advantageous on the international world market. And so that then has an impact.

And actually in the early 1970s, the US experiences its first unfavourable international trade balance basically since 1893. So you’re talking about nearly a century, but not quite in terms of that. Now why, why are we seeing these things happening in terms of, you know, high costs, high inflation, high unemployment? Now, one of the knock-on effects in terms of, or one of the impacts or reasons for the massive sort of, if you like, economic issues that we’re seeing is some people look at it and they say, “Well, the cost of the Vietnam War and the expansion of many of the social programmes that were occurring in the 1960s at home have had this negative impact on the economy and its growth partly because it’s also not come in time or not impaired with tax increases.” So one would argue if you’re going to spend more both in terms of war and foreign policy, but also in terms of your social programmes, there should be an equal amount of tax increases in order to offset and to pay for those costs.

That doesn’t happen, and so you then increase your costs, but you’re not taking in anymore, and that’s where we start to see things occurring. There is, as we mentioned previously, the US and American jobs were moving more into the service sector, and so this had lower wages, perhaps fewer benefits than manufacturing jobs. And so you had this issue then of, you know, sort of things changing, but also when services are not needed, having the employment rates quite sort of, if you like, dipping, but also then peaking as well. So I pulled this one from sort of just using the US Bureau of Labour Statistics, but it’s quite interesting. So you’ve got here, you know, in terms of percentages, just about three and a half percent in terms of unemployment rate at around 1970. And then you see a sort of peak in 71, it drops a bit down in 74 to just under five, maybe just over 4.5%, and then really skyrockets, one would argue, to 9%, and sort of mid 1970s, mid 1975, and then starts to drop again, but then we start to see a rise again going towards and after 1980.

So it’s a really interesting way to think about what’s happening within the US. We kind of overlap this unemployment rate with things like the increase of women coming into the workforce, but also on top of that, the sort of, if you like, the increases of cost of living within the US as well. And they all kind of mix together to, I think, form a really interesting equation of what we’re seeing. And so what we’re seeing is social change within the US, but also social change partly sort of having an impact on economics, and the economics also pushing some of the social change that we will see as well. Now, in terms of things like women’s rights and what we’re seeing in the society, here I find this really quite fascinating. So we talked about women’s rights kind of coming through the sexual revolution of the 1960s, and we begin to see them really, I think, it’s really take hold in the 1970s. So I put here just a few images because I thought they were quite telling about things that are happening across the board in the 1970s. So this image up here is of, some of you might recognise her, Billie Jean King, tennis player.

She was a former number one tennis player, as well women’s player. And then with her you have Bobby Riggs who was also a former number one tennis player. Now, they played a nationally televised tennis match in September of 1973, partly because Riggs basically put out an all challenge to all female tennis players early in the year saying no woman could beat him. And King took up his challenge and she actually beat him in three straight sets, 6-4, 6-3, 6-3 for those of you that play tennis, and claimed a $100,000 prize for it in terms of that. And so we start to see, you know, women sort of challenging what, you know, and answering back to what was seen as a status quo. And so I thought that was quite interesting in terms of the Battle of the Sexes. And then you also start to see some other things that are, I think, having an impact and changing.

So here in the image on the top right we have in 1976, Barbara Walters, who she’s seen here with Barbra Streisand. But Barbara Walters becomes the first woman to co-anchor a major network evening newscast. She also signs a $1 million annual contract, making her the highest paid journalist at that time as well. And so, you know, you begin to see that women are moving into, not just into the workplace, but actually taking quite prominent roles and leading the sort of, if you like, the field as well. I’ve got here from 1974, so jumping a bit backwards, Beverly Johnson becomes the first African American model to appear on the cover of US Vogue magazine. And again, it’s about, you know, sort of, if you like, not just women, but also that women of colour are also moving forward, African American women, you know, sort of making history in that sense becoming the cover model for Vogue.

And then I would ask for guesses about this one, but then I know I’d have to go through all of the chat, and we can do that later, that image at the bottom of the surgeons and the doctors. So what we’re looking at here is in 1978, Louise Brown becomes the first, the world’s first test-tube baby born. And it’s sort of Dr. Robert Edwards along with Patrick Steptoe on the right who pioneered the process of in vitro fertilisation. And that sort of, if you like, then allows for changes in the way in which women consider fertility and conceiving as well. And so it is really, if you like, part of that sexual revolution, that movement forward that we started to see from the 1960s into the 1970s, along with things like Roe versus Wade, the US Supreme Court’s decision in 1973, which has, you know, sort of, if you like, moved back slightly from where it had positioned itself, the Supreme Court had positioned itself in 73. So we’ve seen that change over the last year.

But the Supreme Court in 73 ruled 7-2 that unduly restrictive state regulations on abortion was unconstitutional, sort of paving the way for, if you like, women to, you know, make a choice. So it’s about sort of, if you like, freedom of choice, one would argue, as well in terms of one’s body and deciding on, you know, pregnancy or abortion, if that were the case. And it’s really, it also, though the court ruling also stipulated and put some frameworks into place as well. So during the first trimester pregnancy, for instance, the court ruled the state could not intervene in a person’s decision to have an abortion under normal circumstances. However, in the second trimester, state could regulate abortion procedures to protect the health of pregnant persons, but it, again, could not prohibit abortions altogether under the sort of, if you like, the passing of Roe versus Wade. And so we begin to see changes perhaps in the way in which women have more say, but also it changes their attitudes towards, oops, where they’re moving towards as well in terms of society.

Now, a few other things I wanted to just highlight with this one. So in terms of the gay rights movement, we started to see it happen and started to see it taking shape in the sort of latter half of the 1960s. In particular, when we think about things like the, excuse me, the Stonewall riots, so the Stonewall Inn riots within New York in an sort of Greenwich Village. Really the riots there have an impact. The riots lasted for a couple days. And actually the… Sorry. Christopher Street Liberation Day in 1970 is to mark the one year anniversary of the Stonewall riots that took place in New York, and it’s like considered to be America’s first gay pride parade. And we start to see from then on that it’ll spread through dozens of new sort of states, but also across dozens of countries around the world as well where we begin to see movement and change of legislation as well towards gays and lesbians within the US. Now, on the other hand, this image here of Harvey Milk.

So those of you who don’t know Harvey Milk, he became a member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and was the first openly sort of gay, but also pro-gay rights platform was what he ran on as well. And he becomes the first openly gay man elected to a political office in California. Now, unfortunately what happens is during a particular rally, Milk, along with… Oh, excuse me. Along with the then mayor of San Francisco, George Moscone, were both assassinated in 1978 by someone who was a disgruntled former city supervisor, but also cast one of these so votes against Milk’s bill to sort of make changes.

And he sponsored a bill banning discrimination in public accommodations, housing, and employment on the basis of sexual orientation. And it was heavily supported, but there were obviously dissenters, and unfortunately, for Harvey Milk, but also the mayor at the time, they were then, you know, sort of obviously assassinated by this person who disagreed with the politics and disagreed with the sponsored bill that had been put forward. So it felt like a slight step back for the gay community, but also it recognised, I think, and started to recognise that change was happening, not just in San Francisco, but in a number of other places around the US.

As I said, some fun. And the 1970s gives us some real interesting and what we’d now look at is sort of great entertainment, but really fun. So starting at the top, yes, it’s the “Jaws.” So it becomes, in the 1970s and the mid 1970s in particular, so “Jaws” comes out in the summer of 1975, but what it does do is, so it becomes a big hit for Spielberg, it’s his first major movie, but it also sets up the idea that summer is the season for Hollywood’s biggest and highest grossing movies. And so we see thereafter that actually a number of really big blockbusters come out during the summer. I think about last summer you had “Oppenheimer” and you had “Barbie,” so you had Barbenheimer. I know some really strange things happening there. But it becomes a part of the, if you like, the social fabric and culture within American particular, but then kind of carries on as well. So “Jaws” is sort of seen as that sort of movement forward in terms of thinking about summer as being the place and the time where people will come out for some major movies.

So you’ve got that in terms of movies, in terms of television, and some of you may recognise, and sort of this is part of the first episode from or one of the episodes from “Saturday Night Live.” Now, “Saturday Night Live” debuts in the autumn of 1975. Lots of young and upcoming comics, comedians will become a part of “Saturday Night Live,” and it’s a bit of a tradition now as well where many up and coming comics will join the cast of “Saturday Night Live” and then move into sort of, if you like, delivering comedy on stage singularly or move into even movies as well. Now, “Saturday Night Live” is still running, so, you know, 75, we’re in 24, so just shy of its 50th anniversary as well on television. But bringing a lot of, not just comedy, but satire, one would argue, as well with it. Now, 1970s is also the birth of “Star Wars.” 1977, we see, you know, George Lucas bringing “Star Wars” to our cinema screens. We get introduced to the world of Luke Skywalker and Chewbacca, R2-D2, as well as Darth Vader. And it starts the saga of “Star Wars” that as a franchise is still one of the most lucrative and popular film series today. We start to even see spinoffs on many of the, you know, sort of pave for view channels as well coming from this original idea, and it’s small budget during the time as well, one would argue, in comparison to movie budgets today.

Now, other fun things we’re seeing in the 1970s. I’m going to speed up a little bit. So we have here Apple. Apple Computers start to revolutionise. This is an image, yes. One of the co-founders, Steve Jobs pictured here, develops the Apple Computer company in 1976. And from there, along with Bill Gates, Microsoft, which was founded in 75, they really helped to ignite the digital age that we currently live in. So these are the four founders and the big screens and big machines, along with really big floppies, some of you remember as well during that period. Atari also becomes something of a home gaming. So we think today about Xbox and we think of some of the other game systems, Atari’s one of the first to kind of launch, if you like, in 1977, bringing the world of video games from the arcades into people’s homes as well. And so by 1979, over a million of the units were sold globally as well. So it really does then, you know, start to set that stage for what we live in today one would argue as well.

And then lastly here, 1971, not Disneyland, but Disney World. So this is a crowd in Orlando waiting for Disney, well, Disney’s World Main Street to open in October, 1971. The park in Orlando costs an estimate 400 million at the time to build, now attracts around 25 million visitors annually. When Disney World opened in 1971, hold your seats, price of admission was $3.50. Single ticket now is over $100 for anyone over the age of 10 years out as well. So I know there’s obviously the readjustment for inflation, but cost of tickets have risen quite dramatically with obviously also a lot more attractions being built into these things as well. The 1970s, it’s also a time of celebration for America. It is the bicentennial anniversary of the Declaration of Independence in 76. So here just the black and white photo of a major fireworks display in New York and New York Harbour around the Statue of Liberty for the bicentennial.

And I know I’m at a quarter of an hour or two finishing, and you have questions and comments. I promise, a really quick thing. There’s a few things I did want to share with you that I think helps to contextualise what America’s going through in the 70s as well, and this is one of them, is thinking about the conservative backlash. So we can think about the 1960s as perhaps being much more liberally driven in terms of racial politics and also in terms of social policy. And what we see in the 1970s is almost that backlash that follows. So we see a new right and conservative backlash that develops in the 1970s. There’s a new conservative populism in particular amongst the working class and middle class of white Americans who are trying to embrace sort of, if you like, a reassertion of change and reversion back in some ways to other ideas.

They’re tired of being what they call the silent majority and they’re tired of the hippies and the protestors that they’ve seen, but also they’re really tired of big government in particular. And they think that big government has sort of caused this reaction and then allowed for more activism and protests to occur. And that’s also created, you know, sort of turbulence in terms of racial and ethnicity wars within society. And so those need to be set aside and almost a reset needs to happen within American society to bring it back to somewhere, you know, sort of, if you like, middle, but closer to the conservative side of the traction as well. Now, some of this we can say is rooted in the suburban Sun Belts, and Sun Belt meaning sort of the southern in particular, thinking of places like Florida as well.

There’s a real desire to move back to what they constitute as traditional social values. So perhaps thinking about it, going back or attempting to return back to the ideals of the 1950s and that post World War period in terms of social values and roles. And here are thinking, they’re talking really about gender roles as well and really allowing for free market values to take a hold, which we begin to really start to see towards the end in the 70s, but really going into the 80s when we think about people like Reagan and Reaganomics. We’ve already talked about the energy crisis. And I guess the last one when we are thinking about these movements that I wanted to mention this evening was the environmental movement. We have the very beginnings of it with legislation on water pollution and air pollution in the 60s and the late 60s. But what we begin to see is it becoming a more activist movement, galvanising people with the first Earth Day in the US in 1970.

And we see more things occurring in terms of the Clean Air Act and the Clean Water Act as well. So we begin to see much more solidification of legislation that’s trying to really push and get people to think about the environment. And this is, don’t forget, on the backdrop of some of the things that are being highlighted in terms of pesticides in our agriculture and going into our water systems within the US. And so we’re starting to see a real desire for making changes in the very early stages, one would argue, of the environmental movement globally as well. Thinking about that sort of global movement in terms of what we’re seeing. The other last thing was thinking about nuclear. So when we think about environment, we’re thinking about movements away from things like pesticides, protection of water and air, but also then people start to think about what’s happening in other sectors in terms of energy.

Now, towards the end of the 1970s, we see the worst nuclear accident in US history taking place in Pennsylvania. Large amounts of reactor coolant and radioactive gases from this Three Mile Island power plant get released into the environment. So you have hundreds of thousands of people being evacuated from their homes within a 20 mile radius of the plant. And the accident really brings widespread attention to things like nuclear reactor safety. Large protests then occur against, you know, sort of, if you like, from, I should say, from anti-nuclear groups to kind of make changes, not just to nuclear energy plants, but also thinking about whether nuclear is the best way forward for the US in terms of its energy in the future as well. So the accident has a real huge impact on the sort of, if you like, nuclear as part of its energy and sort of ability within the US in particular during the 70s when we think about nuclear versus at the end of this decade and the discussions at the beginning of the decade about oil and oil capacities, production capacities of the US as well. So it throws up a lot of questions about energy reliance and energy self-reliance within the US, one would argue, in the 1970s.

Now, I’ve talked your ears off, and I know there’s a few questions and comments in the the chat, so thank you very much. And I will see what I can do with some of them as well.

Q&A and Comments

I’m just reading through them, so give me a moment. So there’s someone who mentioned an argument against immigration is that those people will take jobs from Americans.

Q: Isn’t it more likely that new immigrants take lower paying jobs and do not take away from those born in America? A: Now, it’s sort of interesting 'cause I think throughout American’s history, one could argue there has always been this sort of fear and worry about immigrants for different reasons, whether it’s about religion, whether it’s about employment, whether it’s about accommodation and competition in some way. And I think in terms of that, some of that can be true in particular areas, but we can equally see that in other areas it’s not true in terms of that competition as well. So I think it’s much more prevalent to think about it in particular say cities and particular locales rather than kind of generalising it. But I think there is this perception that immigrants will come and take jobs, but also there’s also this impression that many immigrants will take the lower paying jobs as well, that it’s not taken away from American citizens. I think there’s a bit of a mixture in terms of that both in the 1970s, but actually, one could argue, even today in thinking about that employment and immigration question mark because it’s one that has constantly been vented around I think politically, but also when we look at it statistically, there are some support for it, but also a lot of support against some of the perceptions and the assumptions that are made. So thank you for that question. Interesting. Okay.

Q: Someone asked, how do you explain the population, Black population increased by 20 million between 1960 and 1979, but only 10 million between 1970 and 1981? A: One could argue you’re still seeing some of the same perhaps social issues that you would use to explain sort of changes in other demographics of other ethnic groups and racial groups as well. But actually we see an increase in population partly because the way in which, you know, populations are growing. So I would say with the Black American population, there is an increase.

Perhaps we need to delve in deeper to the census data in terms of what you’re saying here between 1970 and 80 where the population increased only by 10 million, 'cause my question would be, well, are they only increasing by 10 million or also are there other factors in terms of how one is identifying oneself on things like the census data? Because once we start to see data becoming much more, the sort of the census becoming much more agile, for lack of a better word, in terms of identification, that actually you will see fluctuations and changes in some of the groupings because people will then re-identify or self-identify in different ways as well. So that might be part of it. It might not explain all of it. It may also be the fact that you have a growing population of Black Americans just like white Americans and female Americans who are becoming educated and that’s changing their ideas and their prospects but also their careers. And so they may be having less children in that same way that we saw with females earlier in general. So that’s that one.

Let’s see. I have not tracked time versus demographics against corporate profits, I have to admit, and against the levels of total executive compensation as well. So apologies for that. Have not looked at that. But something that’s quite interesting I think for us to consider in future. Looking at the last few questions that have come up. Yes, it’s sort of interesting, someone mentioned it was the Federal Chairman Paul Volcker who was largely responsible for breaking the stagflation cycle by dramatically raising interest rates. There’s some really interesting information even from the archives of the American Federal Reserve in terms of the role that the federal government and in particular the federal bank, monetary sort of system, institute played in terms of things like inflation, but also in terms of trying to break that stagflation cycle within the 1970s as well, one, by raising interest rates. And as I said, one of the interesting things that was also done was you had Nixon attempting to, and part of this was for political reasons obviously with elections coming up in the early 1970s as well, was trying to, you know, sort of hold inflationary rates stable. So basically locking prices or prices couldn’t change for certain, you know, goods and services, and at the same time taking the US out of sort of the gold standard which decreased the value of the currency, but also then made things perhaps much more viable in terms of trade overseas as well in terms of exports, as well as imports.

So there’s a number of things I think that are happening that’s quite interesting, and as I said with Nixon’s sort of, if you like, take on it, it had an impact, but it’s a very short-term impact as well. And so then we’re looking at people like the federal chairman to kind of try and figure out, along within several other economists within the country, ways of trying to break that stagflation cycle. It’s sort of interesting to me because we will see recession and inflation cycles yet again in terms of the 80s, and obviously we see a really big drop in, if you like, in terms of economic interest and economic hit in the early 2000s when we think about the 2007 real sort of damaging economic downturn, starts in the US, but also then kind of has an impact globally as well, so to put that in Harvey context. Apologies in terms of that.

Someone mentioned in terms of, you know, sort of gay. Harvey Milk was adamantly gay, yes. He was a brilliant man, and as I said, a real big proponent for, you know, equal rights, not just for the gay community but for many within the community in terms of accommodation and job prospects as well. So thank you for saying that. And the most important entertainment event in 1970, debut of “All in the Family” in 71. Yes, in terms of that I guess you could say, I think there’s a lot of discrepancies in terms, I think, perhaps individual tastes. I think what we see in the 1970s is in particular television changing, but also the way in which society is portrayed in television changing in the 1970s as well on a, you know, sort of only the small screen, for lack of better word, with television, but also on the big screen. And we’re starting to see a lot of changes there as well.

And someone, lastly, home prices and mortgage interest rates really skyrocketed that decade and affected the need for two good incomes. Yes, and in terms of that, and the US was not alone in that. Many people in the UK as well had similar issues where we see that sort of mortgage and, you know, mortgage interest rates skyrocketed into quite high double figures as well in terms of that. So some really, thank you all so much for those comments and those questions as well. But I want to say thank you. I know we’ve reached pretty much the hour now as well.

Thank you all for joining me looking at the 1970s, hopefully some interesting things. Apologies for the ramble quickly at the end as well. Wanted to get through just those last few things that I thought were quite important for thinking about contextualising what we’re seeing in the US in the 1970s, particularly domestically, social, economic issues, but also the impact of some of the political foreign policy issues that are having that sort of, if you like, knock-on effect on domestic policy and vice-versa as well.

So thank you all so much, and I hope you have a great day wherever you are.