59 Dano
I just want to make friends!
There are lots of things that researchers have speculated as the reason(s) for the increase. Some of them you mentioned, another big one is that women were able to leave the workforce and spend more time raising a family after a 16 year period when they had to work (to survive during the depression and to keep the economy afloat during the war). There are other theories as well but the consensus is that it's a combination of them centered around families having the means to have mom stay home.I would think the introduction of penicillin contributed to this.
Before penicillin, people died horrible deaths from very simple, minor injuries and illnesses.
Also, we had an industrial war machine that suddenly had nothing to do except make consumer products. Add to that vast, natural resources to plunder. And that all created lotsa' good paying, blue collar jobs.
Perhaps optimism played a part as well.
None of them said anything remotely similar to bacha's insanity.