TY  - BOOK
AU  - Calder, Lendol
TI  - Financing the American dream: a cultural history of consumer credit
SN  - 9780691074559
U1  - 332.70973 
PY  - 1999///
CY  - Princeton
PB  - Princeton University Press
KW  - Consumer credit --United States --History
KW  - Consumption (Economics) --United States --History
N2  - Once there was a golden age of American thrift, when citizens lived sensibly within their means and worked hard to stay out of debt. The growing availability of credit in this century, however, has brought those days to an end--undermining traditional moral virtues such as prudence, diligence, and the delay of gratification while encouraging reckless consumerism. Or so we commonly believe. In this engaging and thought-provoking book, Lendol Calder shows that this conception of the past is in fact a myth. (http://press.princeton.edu/titles/6555.html)
ER  -