I'm actually curious about that 1949-61 period. I wasn't under the impression that it was so rosy, with nothing but up and up. 1952 was not a good year, and neither was 1954. There was a recession in 1958, and 1959 wasn't such a hot year either, although an improvement over 1958.
And, I thought the 1960's were pretty much nothing but up, at least through 1965-66, and then we went into that flat ~'66-82 period?
I remember seeing some other chart the other day, that showed this current bull market compared to some historical ones. It mentioned a market from 1975-1987. Which surprises me, because the second fuel crisis hit in 1979, and it didn't take long to go into recession. 1980 wasn't such a hot year, '81-82 were downright miserable, and things didn't start improving until '83.
One thing i'll comment on though, is that since I'm into antique cars and such, my views might be swayed by what was going on with the auto industry at the time. 1950, for example, was a great year. In fact, it might have been a record for US auto production. 1951-52 cooled off, because of the Korean War, but demand bounced back big time for '53. But then '54 was another big pullback. 1955 was another record year for sales. 1956 was slightly lower, but a good year. 1957 was a cooling off year, although Chrysler Corp pulled ahead and gained some market. 1958 saw the market shrink from something like 6M units to 4.2M 1959 saw sales of about 5.5M. 1960 was another improvement, I forget how much, but much of the production by then was thanks to a newfangled concept called the compact car, so I'd imagine the average transaction price of a 1960 car was cheaper than a 1959, because of that mix. After that, car sales went nowhere but up, with 1965 being yet another record, but by 1966, I think things leveled off, although it was still a very high plateau.
As for that recession in the late 1970's? Well, Chrysler had to be bailed out. Ford almost went under as well. The only reason GM made money in 1983 was because of GMAC financing.
