Thrift and Thriving in America

Thrift is a powerful and evolving moral ideal, disposition, and practice that has indelibly marked the character of American life since its earliest days. Its surprisingly multifaceted character opens a number of expansive vistas for analysis, not only in the American past, but also in its present. Thrift remains, if perhaps in unexpected and counter-intuitive ways, intensely relevant to the complex issues of contemporary moral and economic life.Thrift and Thriving in America is a collection of groundbreaking essays from leading scholars on the seminal importance of thrift to American culture and history. From a rich diversity of disciplinary perspectives, the volume shows that far from the narrow and attenuated rendering of thrift as a synonym of saving and scrimping, thrift possess an astonishing capaciousness and dynamism, and that the idiom of thrift has, in one form or another, served as the primary language for articulating the normative dimensions of economic life throughout much of American history. The essays put thrift in a more expansive light, revealing its compelling etymology-its sense of "thriving." This deeper meaning has always operated as the subtext of thrift and at times has even been invoked to critique its more restricted notions. So understood, thrift moves beyond the instrumentalities of "more or less" and begs the question: what does it mean and take to thrive?Thoroughly examining how Americans have answered this question, Thrift and Thriving in America provides fascinating insight into evolving meanings of material wellbeing, and of the good life and the good society more generally, and will serve as a perennial resource on a notion that has and will continue to shape and define American life.

Chapter 1Introduction: The Question of Thrift, James Davison Hunter and Joshua J. YatesPart I: The Emergence of Thrift in Early America, 1630-1880Chapter 2The Controversial Virtue of Thrift in the Early American Republic, Daniel Walker HoweChapter 3The Prehistory of American Thrift, Deirdre McCloskeyChapter 4Saving Grace and Moral Striving: Thrift in Puritan Theology, James Calvin Davis and Charles MathewesChapter 5Thrift and Prosperity, Stephen InnesChapter 6Moderation in the First Era of Popular Consumption, Joyce ApplebyChapter 7Spreading the Gospel of Self-Denial: Thrift and Association in Antebellum America, Kathleen D. McCarthyChapter 8African Americans, Slavery, and Thrift from the Revolution to the Civil War, Patrick RaelPart II: The Modernization of Thrift: Years of Transition and Transformation, 1880-1950Chapter 9The Modernization of Thrift, T. J. Jackson LearsChapter 10Thrift and Moral Formation, James Davison HunterChapter 11The Virtue of Consumption: Challenging Thrift in an Age of Transition, Lawrence B. GlickmanChapter 12Thrift and Advertising, Jennifer ScanlonChapter 13Hard Payments: Consumer Credit and Thrift, Lendol CalderChapter 14Mass Philanthropy as Public Thrift for an Age of Consumption, Olivier ZunzChapter 15Immigrants and Thrift, David M. ReimersChapter 16Saving for Democracy: Thrift, Sacrifice, and the World War II Bond Campaigns, Kiku AdattoPart III: Thriving After Thrift? Prosperity & Crisis since 1950Chapter 17Why Do Americans Save So Little and Does It Matter?, Robert H. FrankChapter 18The Rise and Fall of "Collective Thrift": Social Insurance, Economic Planning, and the Decline of Modern American Liberalism, Steven FraserChapter 19Middle-Class Respectability in 21st Century America: Work and Lifestyle in the Professional-Managerial Stratum, Steven Brint and Kristopher ProctorChapter 20Thrift in the Other America, Wilson BrissettChapter 21Thrift and Waste in American History: An Ecological View, J. R. McNeill and George VrtisChapter 22Disputing Abundance: The Antiglobalization Protest Movement and Our Changing Natural Imaginary, Joshua J. YatesChapter 23Conclusion: Thrift & Thriving: Toward a Moral Framework for Economic Life, Joshua J. Yates and James Davison Hunter