American Demographic Trends without Second World War

I suppose that for the purposes of the discussion, we'll be starting off with the premise that the Second World War never comes to fruition, or at the very least sees little to no American involvement. Now without the economic boom that took off with and continued after the gearing up of war production IOTL, how would TTL's America look in terms of population growth until the end of the century? I'm guessing no baby boom on account of the slower economic recovery, though beyond that, I was hoping you guys might have some more distinct ideas. For instance, what sized population are we looking at by century's end and how fast is it growing?

By the 20th century, I was thinking that most of America's population growth would be driven by internal factors as the quota system for immigration was being firmly adhered to, limiting the impact that large scale immigration would wield. Unfortunately, that largely leaves me looking at economic factors, which is something I'm not as familiar with.

Any ideas?
 
A few random thoughts

So we're butterflying OTL WWII.

IMO the US would be a vastly different place. OTL Great Depression and WWII broke a lot of social molds and assumptions. Women and minorities were allowed to do traditionally white-male jobs, people got into uniform and shuffled around by the millions at an unprecedented scale of collectivism. Social mobility became not just a cultural expectation but the American reality.

IMO racism would be questioned a lot less and more automatically maintained, North and South. People would stay put, not near the regional mixing you saw thanks to WWII and the Depression. Traditional relationships and values would carry a lot more weight with good and bad results.

The post-war baby boom was where the pent-up urges for consumption of people who'd sacrificed for four-five years finally got the feeling it's OK to want your own home, not live with the folks, put up with rationing, etc.

Population growth wouldn't have spiked as much. IMO suburbanization would have been far less of an issue without all the modular construction techniques the Seabees and Army Corps of Engineers practiced across the South Pacific, North Africa, and throughout the US making instant bases appear.

Without hundreds of thousands of guys learning and doing things flat-out,
allowing millions of people to see what can be done if the collective will's there... I don't think Levittowns are as much of an issue until maybe the 1970's.
You had three drivers to suburbanization:
  • As mentioned before, much better construction techniques that allowed cheap mass-production of homes and civic infrastructure brand-new vs retrofitting as you would in built-up cities
  • Less zoning issues starting from scratch as many suburbs did with "business-friendly" zoning boards instead of scrapping with the city machine politicians content to divide the current pie, not expand it.
  • By the 1960's white flight from desegregation and urban crime illustrated how much many wanted to vote with their feet rather than stick to their old neighborhoods and deal with urban hassles.

I'm arguing that without to WWII to spur technical and social innovation,
the US would be a much more conservative, complacent, less dynamic society poorer in many ways vs OTL.
We'd still believe in technology, pluck, and so forth, but nowhere the gee-whiz progressivism that ruled from say, 1933 to 1970's Era of Emergent Limits.

IDK how conservative the US Zeitgeist'd be, but the socially experimental attitudes after WWII wouldn't encounter near the tolerance of OTL.
Change would happen to correct social injustices but nowhere near the urgency folks felt after WWII after confronting Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan or having an ideological competitor like the Soviets forcing society to identify and confront its flaws. I.e. the South finally adopts the Civil Rights Acts in the 1990's or early oughts.:eek::eek:
 
I think you'd have fewer Jews, since I remember an account of whole New York neighborhoods where the people had death-camp tattoos on their arms. I would imagine those were immigrant Holocaust survivors, since the Gestapo never made it to the Lower East Side.
 
I think you'd have fewer Jews, since I remember an account of whole New York neighborhoods where the people had death-camp tattoos on their arms. I would imagine those were immigrant Holocaust survivors, since the Gestapo never made it to the Lower East Side.

Disagree there, Jewish emigration from Poland and the Soviet Union was ongoing throughout the inter-war period and would in all certainty continue due to pervasive anti-Semitism and poverty. Like in OTL it will be split between the US, Israel and Western Europe, with no Holocaust I suspect you don't get the 45-48 flood of camp survivors but instead a steady flow probably continuing to the present meaning a larger US Jewish community in the present day, probably overtaking OTL some time in the late 50's/early 60's.
 

Hnau

Banned
I'd have to agree with Arachnid on the subject of Jewish emigration, but, it really matters how exactly WWII was butterflied and developments in Europe.

Even without the Second World War, the civil rights movement is inevitable. And I don't think blacks will wait until the 1990s to start race riots and protest marches.
 
I'd have to agree with Arachnid on the subject of Jewish emigration, but, it really matters how exactly WWII was butterflied and developments in Europe.

Even without the Second World War, the civil rights movement is inevitable. And I don't think blacks will wait until the 1990s to start race riots and protest marches.

I think you underestimate the violence and hatred involved in the civil rights movement. King was far from the only person shot during the period. Without the Cold War and the legacy of WW2, would a US president order troops into Little Rock? Would Mormons feel ashamed enough to decide blacks were spiritually equal? I have my doubts.

I can't imagine a unanimous Brown v. Board of Ed., if it was even brought, without WW2.
 
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