The US spun up a shock-and-awe campaign to sell the world on the splendor of its affordable, abundant consumer conveniences. It started in Marshall Plan-era West Berlin, where in 1950 the US Department of State built a gleaming trade pavilion packed with thousands of everyday products available to the growing suburban middle class across the Atlantic. For the first exhibition, a model tract home was shipped over from Minneapolis. In later shows, actors depicted nuclear families going about their daily lives through product demonstrations: getting dinner on the table in a jiffy with a microwave, throwing laundry into an electric washer and dryer, sitting down with the kids to watch some TV.

Great read on a front a lot of people don't think about.

Cheap Consumer Goods Are the American Dream, Actually
Trump’s tariffs upend a nearly century-old bargain between politicians and US consumers.
BloombergAmanda Mull