ABSTRACT
The early post-war real estate boom continued until about 1960 in California. The loss of defense contracts was one of the impediments to continued growth. By then, the nation's economy was also experiencing slow growth, which led to the first deliberate test of Keynesian policy. Californians were also seeing their formerly agricultural state becoming increasingly urban and suburban or developing urban sprawl. California had gained production and employment in the late 1960s through aerospace contracts and other federal government-fueled employment. The National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) of 1969 required that any planned, federally funded project have an Environmental Impact Report that would detail the impact of the project on the community. Commercial banks throughout the 1970s increasingly complained of uneven regulations that seemed to favor the S&Ls, mutual funds, life insurance companies, and investment trusts. Certainly financial institutions were interested in pleasing their customers, but banking traditions were designed to make it easy for the banker to compete for loans.
