{"product_id":"franklins-thrift-the-lost-history-of-an-american-virtue-9781599471488","title":"Franklin's Thrift: The Lost History of an","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e Americans today often think of thrift as a negative value—a miserly hoarding of resources and a denial of pleasure. Even more telling, many Americans don’t even think of thrift at all anymore. \u003ci\u003eFranklin’s Thrift\u003c\/i\u003e challenges this state of mind by recovering the rich history of thrift as a quintessentially American virtue. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e The contributors to this volume trace how the idea and practice of thrift have been a vital part of the American vision of economic freedom and social abundance. For Benjamin Franklin, who personified and promoted the idea, thrift meant working productively, consuming wisely, saving proportionally, and giving generously. Franklin’s thrift became the cornerstone of a new kind of secular faith in the ordinary person’s capacity to shape his lot and fortune in life. Later chapters document how thrift moved into new domains in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It became the animating idea behind social movements to promote children’s school savings, create mutual savings banks and credit unions for working men and women, establish a federal savings bond program, and galvanize the nation to conserve resources during two world wars. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Historians, enthusiasts of Americana or traditional American virtues, and anyone interested in resolving our society’s current financial woes will find much to treasure in this diverse collection, with topics ranging from the inspirational lessons we can learn from the film \u003ci\u003eIt’s a Wonderful Life\u003c\/i\u003e to a history of the roles played by mutual savings banks, credit unions, and thrift stores in America’s national thrift movement. It also includes actual policy recommendations for our present situation. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTable of Contents\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e Introduction \/ ix\u003cbr\u003e David Blankenhorn, Barbara Dafoe Whitehead, and Sorcha Brophy-Warren \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Part One: Franklin’s Thrift: The Creation of an American Value \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 1. Franklin’s Way to Wealth \/ 3\u003cbr\u003e Barbara Dafoe Whitehead \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Part Two: Thrift after Franklin: Institutions and Movements \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 2. U.S. Mutual Savings Banks and the “Savings Bank Idea”: The Virtue of Thrift as an Institutional Value \/ 29\u003cbr\u003e Sorcha Brophy-Warren \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 3. Thrift for a New Century: Public Discussions about Thrift in the 1910s and 1920s \/ 57\u003cbr\u003e Sara Butler Nardo \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 4. A Century of Thrift Shops \/ 97\u003cbr\u003e Alison Humes \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 5. I n Savings We Trust: Credit Unions and Thrift \/ 127\u003cbr\u003e Clifford N. Rosenthal \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Part Three: For a New Thrift: Meeting the Twenty-First Century Challenge \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 6. Confronting the American Debt Culture \/ 145\u003cbr\u003e Barbara Dafoe Whitehead \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 7. Crafting Policies to Encourage Thrift in Contemporary America \/ 165 \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Alex Roberts \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e 8. Private Enterprise’s Role in Increasing Savings \/ 187\u003cbr\u003e Ronald T. Wilcox \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Conclusion \/ 207\u003cbr\u003e David Blankenhorn, Barbara Dafoe Whitehead, and Sorcha Brophy-Warren \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Notes \/ 211 \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Contributors \/ 243 \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e Index \/ 247 \u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Templeton Foundation Press,U.S.","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51041581662551,"sku":"9781599471488","price":23.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9781599471488.jpg?v=1750950878","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/franklins-thrift-the-lost-history-of-an-american-virtue-9781599471488","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}