In August 1945, 12 million troops, two-thirds of all men between the ages of eighteen and thirty-four, were in uniform. One year later, 9 million had returned to the United States. Some wanted to continue their education, most wanted jobs, and all sought to reunite with their families. They came home to a changed world. The Great Depression was over, but industries still needed to shift to peacetime production before consumers could enjoy the fruits of the new prosperity. In the meantime, consumers faced shortages and high prices. Indeed, there was no guarantee that, with the booming war industries dismantled, the depression would not return.
World War II had also exerted pressures on traditional family life. During the war, millions of women had left their homes and worked jobs that their husbands, sons, and boyfriends had vacated. Most of the 150,000 women who served in the military received their discharge, and like their male counterparts they hoped to obtain employment. Many other women who had tasted the benefits of wartime employment also wanted to keep working and were reluctant to give up their positions to men.
The war disrupted other aspects of family life as well. During the war, husbands and wives had spent long periods of time apart, resulting in marital tensions and an increased divorce rate. The relaxation of parental authority during the war led to a rise in juvenile delinquency, which added to the anxieties of adults. In 1948 the noted psychiatrist William C. Menninger observed, “While we alarm ourselves with talk of . . . atom bombs, we are complacently watching the disintegration of our family life.” Some observers worried that the very existence of the traditional American family was in jeopardy. These fears proved unfounded, as the baby boom of the postwar decades would dramatically demonstrate.