Summary Of Making A New Deal By Lizabeth Cohen

In Lizabeth Cohen’s book, Making a New Deal, it shows a timeline of the shift that took place in the American people during the Great Depression. Before the Great Depression in 1919 there was a wave of strikes that failed after the Great War. The disappointment from the little gains for the American working class caused the labors to abandon some of their values and look for better ways to organize the Unions. When the Great Depression hit America labors had to come up with new ideas and behaviors to create a stronger Unions. Stronger Unions made it possible for them to have power in national politics and still succeed in their work life. This shift in the working-class Americans helped change social and cultural life in America for the better.

“The Great Depression upset the survival strategies workers had developed during the 1920s and forced new solutions.” (364) Many workers dependent on churches to help them survive the depression could no longer depend on them because the churches and ethnic groups could not support the sheer number of people in need. The elimination of the many Welfare capitalisms programs put in place by companies during the 1920s made laborers looking other to other places to get help. Before many people were ashamed of excepting handouts and charity because they felt embarrassed by it, but soon workers were no longer ashamed of accepting government aid, which leads to a new behavior that helped give rise to the Congress of Industrial Workers and national unionization. “Workers in Chicago and elsewhere in the nation were looking to the federal government as they had never done before.” (285) The CIO organized unskilled labors, which gave a boost to unions. This new dependence on the government brought more people to participate in national and local elections and to want more federal government control. The union workers party that most supported their ideas was the democratic party. Mass culture again brought a new rise of shared common-culture between ethnic groups because of the radio. While ethnic groups were able to fight mass consumption in the 20s, the great depression made it harder in the 30s. When the depression caused many local shops, theaters, and radio stations to go out of business, this caused ethnic groups to come together and to go outside their ethnic group and shop and hang other