The rise and fall of American growth: the U.S. standard of living since the Civil War

Introduction: the ascent and descent of growth

Part I. 1870-1940

The great inventions create a revolution inside and outside the home. The starting point: life and work in 1870

What they ate and wore and where they bought it

The American home: from dark and isolated to bright and networked

Motors overtake horses and rail: inventions and incremental improvements

From telegraph to talkies: information, communication, and entertainment

Nasty, brutish, and short: illness and early death

Working conditions on the job and at home

Taking and mitigating risks: consumer credit, insurance, and the government

Entr'acte. The midcentury shift from revolution to evolution

Part II. 1940-2015

The Golden Age and the early warnings of slower growth. Fast food, synthetic fibers, and split-level subdivisions: the slowing transformation of food, clothing, and housing

See the USA in your Chevrolet or from a plane flying high above

Entertainment and communications from Milton Berle to the iPhone

Computers and the internet from the mainframe to Facebook

Antibiotics, CT scans, and the evolution of health and medicine

Work, youth, and retirement at home and on the job

Entr'acte. Toward an understanding of slower growth

Part III. The sources of faster and slower growth. The great leap forward from the 1920s to the 1950s: what set of miracles created it?

Innovation: can the future match the great inventions of the past?

Inequality and the other headwinds: long-run American economic growth slows to a crawl

Postscript: America's growth achievement and the path ahead.