The Jazz Age is remembered as a time when people were ridiculously rich, loved to party, and went against what was thought to be acceptable. After World War I there was a brief Achilles' Heel in the economy as the country was trying to readjust as veterans returned to everyday life. Around 1921, however, the current Secretary of Commerce and future president, Herbert Hoover, convinced major industrial leaders to increase wages and production to get the economy out of this crisis. This proved effective because by 1922 the economy was booming. Almost everyone during this time seemed to have money to spend and one of the reasons was a new method of purchasing items called installment purchasing. Installment purchasing is where you don't have to pay up front for an item, so you instead make payments on the item with interest. The stock market was doing great during this time, offering astonishing returns to less than 1% of the people who invested in it. Since there were less than 1% of people investing in the stock market, it really only benefited the rich, which is why it was a great time to be rich. The rich kept getting richer. It was also a great time to be part of the American middle class. During the 1920s, urban workers' wages were increased by nearly 20 percent. It was common for middle-class Americans to own cars, washing machines, radios, and a few other conveniences that made their lives a little easier. The middle class in this period was able to own much more than in previous decades. With all the money people had, it seemed to create a common theme of men and women going to parties and spending large amounts of money. This period was commonly called... middle of paper... ....still popular today. Hemmingway was thought to be the leading literary figure of his decade. People of this time appreciated this literature because they could identify with the distrust of what their moral guidelines were, and they also felt the need to go against conformism and materialism. All great things must come to an end and that is exactly how one might describe wealth during the “jazz age”. In 1929 the stock market crashed, losing billions of dollars in assets. The collapse directly affected only 1% of those who had invested, but it caused cuts in industrial production that snuffed out the once-booming economy for the entire country. The "Jazz Age" was now over and the "Great Depression" had begun and this was a drastic change for the people of that time, almost everyone destroyed themselves and adapting to their new lifestyle was difficult.