Government and Business

Laissez-faire.

In contrast to both the preceding and the succeeding decades, the 1920s were a period of little growth in federal or state regulation; instead, laissez-faire was the rule of the day. Except in regard to railroads, public utilities, radio broadcasting, and air carriers, regulation was at a low ebb. Warren G. Harding, in his desire to return to "normalcy," had little interest in regulation, and Coolidge felt much the same way. Although the antitrust laws were still in place, the so-called "rule of reason" had rendered them of little use. There were no minimum-wage requirements on the federal level, no unemployment compensation, no National Labor Relations Act, no Environmental Protection Act, no Occupational Safety and Health Administration, no consumer protection laws, no Fair Employment Act, no Social Security Act, no Employment Act, and no federal programs for employment training. Taxes were generally low. Some...

[The entire page is 922 words long]

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