ABSTRACT
American had become exhausted by the pace of progressive era reform and particularly with the myriad demands during the nineteen months of direct US involvement in World War I. In this sense, the move toward normalcy began immediately after the armistice was proclaimed in November 1918; and in the following months number of wartime boards were dissolved and regulations lifted. The war had brought unprecedented benefits to the American economy, particularly to the export trade. However, the demands of war, as well as the physical destruction that it brought about, had so disrupted the economies of the leading industrial powers (Great Britain, France, and Germany) that they would continue to struggle through the 1920s. Between 1921 and 1928, per capita GDP of the United States expanded by nearly 30 percent, and by the end of the decade the country was producing nearly 45 percent of the world's manufactured goods.
