He can afford a live-in maid, Charlene, and his son seems to go from one private school to another with little concern for cost. Caulfield is doing very well financially. Holden assures us that all a lawyer does is "make a lot of dough and play golf and play bridge and buy cars and drink Martinis and look like a hot-shot." (Chapter 22) Although his profession is probably more difficult than what his son makes it out to be, Mr.
Holden's family lives in an expensive apartment in an affluent section of New York City. In The Catcher in the Rye, Holden's family, and the families of the boys with whom Holden attends school, appear to have no financial concerns. Those on a fixed income, including many attending schools on the GI Bill, were especially strained. In some areas, food prices doubled within a month. After its elimination, inflation ran rampant. During the war, the emergency Office of Price Administration had kept costs in check. A serious problem, however, was inflation. Literally tens of thousands of service personnel, who otherwise would not have been able to afford it, attended college. The GI Bill of Rights provided educational and other financial opportunities for returning members of the armed forces. The strain was buffered by the GI Bill but exacerbated by inflation. This process took time, and the wait was difficult for many individuals. Others chose to return to traditional roles as housewives, opening more jobs for the returning men.
#SETTING OF THE CATCHER IN THE RYE PROFESSIONAL#
Some chose to continue with professional careers, an important step in the emancipation of women in the twentieth century. Women had contributed significantly to the war effort by filling jobs in industry as well as serving in the armed forces. Workers faced a full-time workweek of forty-eight hours, but that would soon be reduced to a forty-hour week, often with no loss of pay, following an example set by the federal government. Between 19, the years of America's involvement in the war, average individual weekly earnings had increased from $24.20 to $44.39. Roosevelt (thirty-second President of the United States, serving from 1933-1945) combined with the enormous financial boost of World War II to pull the United States out of the nightmare of the Great Depression. The New Deal programs of President Franklin D. The economy had certainly improved since the 1930s. Culturally, the United States was both conservative and liberal but leaning increasingly to the right. The atomic bomb, which many had considered a blessing when it quickly ended the war with Japan, was increasingly seen as a curse. The political scene generally moved toward conservatism near the end of the 1940s and into the 1950s (the time period of the novel), but there were noteworthy exceptions. World War II was over, and the boys had come home, but to what? Financially, life had improved significantly for the average worker since the Great Depression of the 1930s, but inflation presented new problems. Holden Caulfield's America was a nation of contrasts.
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