ABSTRACT
At the end of World War II concerns dealing with reconversion to a peacetime economy, shortages, the termination of price controls, and lingering fears of a return of the Great Depression combined to make economics the dominant problem. The essential point to note in Smith's account is that the rise and fall of concerns on this larger agenda correspond more or less sensitively to the appearance of those developments on the national or world political scene. The small group who did not mention economics as either a personal or a national concern were clearly not postmaterialists, at least not as conceived by Inglehart. Compared to the others, they were somewhat more conservative. The liberal-conservative categories appear to be those preferred by the highly educated. The NORC study shows a slight change within the Democratic ranks, a slight growth of the pure Independents, and no change for the Republicans. The Survey Research Center (SRC) series shows no significant change anywhere.
