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Period: to
Economic Events
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Inland Trade
among the colonies also expanded by leaps and bounds, fostering both economic interactions and increased intercommunication among colonists. -
U.S. immigration peaks: 1907.
Immigration tops out in 1907, when more than 1 million European immigrants pass through New York's Ellis Island. -
The Great Crash: Oct. 24-29, 1929.
The final break begins in earnest on Black Thursday, Oct. 24, with New York Stock Exchange stocks plummeting on a record 12.9 million shares.Saturday and a 9.3 million-share selloff on Monday, setting the stage for a crescendo of panic selling on Black Tuesday, Oct. 29. NYSE volume hits 16.4 million shares, and the collapse leaves the Dow Jones Industrial Average down 39.6% from its Sept. 3 high. By the July 1932 bottom, in the depths of the Great Depression, the Dow is off 89% from its high. -
The Depression-era securities laws: 1932-34.
The law is intended to prevent banks from speculating with their depositors' money, but it would eventually be considered a barrier to the one-stop financial shopping malls that companies like Citigroup are panting to provide. Congress would swear to change it every term then get preoccupied with more important things, like impeachment. -
The first commercial television broadcast: April 20, 1939..
The response would surpass even Sarnoff's greatest expectations. While World War II would slow the adoption of television, within a decade 7 million sets would be in use in the U.S., and by 1960, the box would be a part of nearly every American home. Broadcast television would become a $40 billion industry, -
Coca-Cola becomes a global brand: World War II.
Coca-Cola President Robert Woodruff decides he'd like to sell the world a Coke and starts with the U.S. armed services for a plug nickel a bottle. World conquest and a succession of schmaltzy commercial jingles swiftly follow. -
The baby boom begins: 1946.
Randy GIs return from WWII, and nine months later the navel-gazing generation begins. The boomers would impose their (questionable) taste upon all walks of life, from Schwinn bikes in the '50s, to love beads in the '60s, all the way to Internet stocks and SUVs today. -
Eisenhower signs the act creating NASA: July 29, 1958
So President Dwight Eisenhower inks the National Aeronautics and Space Act, creating the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Over the next 40 years the U.S. space program would put a man on the moon and contribute to advances in computer science, weather research, communications technology and lots of other good stuff. Total cost: a mere $14 billion annually (and far too many photo ops for John Glenn). -
Kroc buys McDonald's: 1961.
Kroc sees an expanded McDonald's as a great way to sell more of his mixers, and when the Brothers McD. wonder who's going to handle all these new restaurant openings, he offers his services. He buys them out in 1961, for $2.7 million, which ranks right up there with the sweet deal the Dutch scored for Manhattan, and kicks off an massive expansion.He's certainly among the most notable successes, paving the way for businesses from Domino's to Century 21. -
The first Wal-Mart opens: 1962
Ben Franklin variety store proprietor Sam Walton feels the heat from discount merchandisers, so he creates one of his own. Walton opens Wal-Mart Discount City in Rogers, Ark., in 1962. That same year, S.S. Kresge Co. launches Kmart, F.W. Woolworth starts Woolco and Dayton Hudson begins its Target chain. That sound you hear is the U.S. becoming a service economy. -
. Equal pay for equal work: June 10, 1963.
the job market for women isn't too great; they earn just 59 cents for every dollar earned by men. But the new legislation reverses the practice of paying women less than men for the same job, simply because of their gender. By the first quarter of 1998, women would be earning more than 76 cents for every male dollar -- not perfect, but an improvement -
The Civil Rights Act: 1964.
among its other antibias provisions, this landmark legislation (proposed by Lyndon Johnson as a tribute to the slain JFK) outlaws race- and gender-based employment discrimination at any business with more than 25 employees. It also establishes the Equal Employment Opportunities Commission to review complaints, giving the federal government a new role in the hiring and firing process. -
Wall Street's fixed commissions end: May 1, 1975.
the end of fixed commissions brings about Charles Schwab, the giant of discounting, which by 1998 would record $2.74 billion in revenue and $348 million in net income and a market cap in 1999 of about $46 billion, more than Merrill Lynch. And don't forget the online brokers, which will make everyone who touches a computer rich beyond his or her wildest dreams. -
The Black Monday crash: Oct. 19, 1987.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average drops 508 points, a stunning 22.6%, on "Black Monday," raising fears that the U.S. economy is headed for a severe recession, or even a depression. -
AOL goes to flat-rate pricing: Oct. 29, 1996.
America Online's move away from rates based on the amount of time spent online to pay-one-price charging is a crucial step toward the now-dominant view of the Internet as an advertising-driven mass medium.