family inc. (no coloreds)

Cover of LIFE, January 1962

"After the Second World War, converting back to the peacetime economy meant also reestablishing the dominance of the mostly white men coming home from service. The nuclear family was promoted as the fundamental social and economic unit, tightening gender roles that the wartime economy had loosened.[...] What changed in the Consumers’ Republic was the shift in emphasis from the 'citizen' consumer to the 'purchaser' consumer. The first represented the public interest, the second the marketplace. The first had rights, the second demographics. [...]" — Vince Carducci, (Review of A Consumers’ Republic: The Politics of Mass Consumption in Postwar America by Lizabeth Cohen) PopMatters

From: Chest of Books

"The GI Bill [Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944] in the context of legal discrimination in that era, created segregated, middle class, suburban neighborhoods made up of white families. This benefit catalyzed the process of wealth-building through homeownership for these families. In turn, they could then borrow from their home equity to send a first generation of family members to college, and this generation sequentially gave birth to today’s professional class.
     African Americans and Latino veterans and their families did not have access to these benefits. They remained renters and were confined to segregated neighborhoods with poor infrastructure and lack of access to adequate schooling, health care, and social services." — United Way
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More from Vince Carducci (PopMatters)...
"[...] The perfect metaphor of self-reliance in the Consumers’ Republic was the home fallout shelter, where each family became accountable for its own survival in the event of nuclear holocaust. And not surprisingly, these facilities were most often built in suburban areas by people with middle-class incomes and above, who had the space and money for them."

From: Popular Mechanics, December, 1961