Affluent Society Social/Domestic Policy

Rising living standards - Evidence of Affluence

• Real wages increased - 1951 = 8.30 → 18.70

• Home ownership rose due to cheap mortgages

• Car ownership and consumer goods more widespread

• Unemployment remained low, never > 500,000 for most of the period

• 300,000 new houses/yr.

Rising living standards - Impacts

• Created a growing middle class

• Aspirational working class

• Consumer culture dominated

• Golden Age of social mobility (according to many historians

Welfare State and NHS

Conservatives accepted the core of Labours 1945 reforms: NHS, National Insurance, Pensions
NHS spending increased - new treatments (antibiotics, surgery)
Some prescription charges reintroduced (Dental and Spectacle under Churchill)

Welfare State and NHS - Social Security

Expansions of benefits system helped families and elderly
Post war consensus meant little party division on Welfare in this period

Education - Key Developments

Tripartite System continued - Grammar, Technical, and Secondary Modern (Based on the 11+ exams)
Critics argued it entranced class divisions

Butler Education Act (1944) legacy continued with free secondary education

Education - Changes

Comprehensive Schools emerged in some Labour-run Councils
More children stayed in school longer and went into higher education

Women in Society - Mixed Progress

Many women returned to domestic roles after WW2

Married women faced pressures to stay at home: most left jobs after marriage or childbirth

By 1960 - 35% of women were in paid employment

Women in Society - Gender Roles

Advertisement and Media reinforced traditional gender roles - Housewife Ideal.

Some early signs of change:

More women in clerical and retail work
Access to labour saving appliances (Washing Machine) - reduced domestic burden

Class and Social Mobility - TV and the Arts

Rise of Kitchen Sink Dramas and Gritty Realism in literature and tv

Highlighted social inequality and youth frustration

Class and Social Mobility - Still a Class-Based Society

Accents, School, and Connections still determined opportunities

Welfare State and Economic Boom opened doors to Social Mobility
Grammar Schools offered opportunities to working class children

Youth Culture and Social Change

Higher wages and more leisure time = distinct youth culture

Teddy Boys - 1950s
Mods v Rockers - 1960s

Music - Elvis Presley , Cliff Richard, The Beatles
Fashion - Mini Skirt, Suits
Rebellion
All defined the 1950s and early 1960s youth

Immigration and Race Relations - Windrush Generation

Began in 1948 as the beginning of post war immigration (mainly from the empire/commonwealth)

By the late 1950s, growing numbers were arriving from the Caribbean, India, and Pakistan

Immigration and Race Relations - Government Response

Commonwealth Immigration Act (1962)

Restricted immigration from countries apart of the New Commonwealth (independence post-WW2)

Immigration and Race Relations - 1958 Notting Hill Riots

29th August - 5th September

White violence against black communities in London

Created tension between whites, African-Caribbean, and Police communities
Concern about integration and housing shortages

Immigration and Race Relations - Covert Racism

Where people refused the Black Community but weren’t ‘clearly racist’ towards them

E.g. “try round the corner”

Immigration and Race Relations - Nottingham Gangs

August 1958, Nottingham gangs of white youths went on what they called “N-Word” hunts after pub brawls and targeted Black People who may have done nothing

Racially Motivated and shouted slurs at those they targeted