How did American capitalism work before Ronald Reagan?

We analyse the functioning of American capitalism in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, before the shift to "neo-liberal" capitalism. The key question is: did the supply-side policies introduced from 1980 address the structural weaknesses of previous capitalism? These could include growth, technological progress, low employmen t, insufficient investment and innovation. The aim of supply-side policies was to correct these weaknesses by lowering the tax burden, deregulating the labour market, increasing corporate profitability, and initially promoting competition. But were these weaknesses present, and was it worth squeezing wages, reducing social welfare, and increasing inequality to correct them? We see that after 1980, investment and research efforts and the employment rate have increased compared to the 1950-1979 period in the United States. But we also see that productivity gains as well as potential growth have been lower after 1980, which casts doubt on the effectiveness of “neo-liberal” policies.