ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book describes how colonial leaders recruited white wives, white indentured servants, and black female slaves to the New World once they realized that commercial profits and economic development depended on the creation of families, a permanent labor force, and stable communities. It examines how the rise of a market economy, which separated home and market production, fostered the decline of the colonial family ethic and paved the way for a new one more suited to the times. The book brings us into the twentieth century and analyzes the emergence of the Mothers' Pension program and Protective Labor Laws. The family ethic appears to be under assault once again. The book also traces the various impacts of the family ethic in the Social Security retirement program from 1935 to 1980.
