The Great Gatsby

Between each character in The Great Gatsby there are intricate tensions informed by class. So-called “old money” aristocrats like Tom look down upon the perceived gaudiness of “new money” individuals like Gatsby. Industrialization during the Gilded Age (between the 1870s and 1890s) led to massive wealth for people in the Northern and Western USA who grew railroad, oil, coal, steel, or construction companies. Nick’s family pretends that they are “old money,” but their origins trace back to a mid-19th-century hardware store, suggesting they were a tangential part of industrialization. In contrast, families with “old money” inherited their wealth from generations of income brought about by colonial expansion in the USA; relatedly, Tom and Daisy’s house is a “Georgian Colonial mansion” (6), explicitly highlighting this history.

After World War I, there was another economic boom driven by the rise of consumer goods, increased construction, and technological progress. Once again, people who ran these companies gained massive wealth. Thus, characters like Tom (who comes from “old money”) must seek new ways to assert their superiority over equally wealthy men like Gatsby based in something other than money. This is why Tom derides Gatsby’s ostentatiously large mansion, his flashy suits, and his imposing Rolls Royce.

Meanwhile, Gatsby himself internalizes these jibes—after all, even though he has more money than he ever wanted or needed, he continues to pine for Daisy’s elegance and grace. He uses phrases such as “old sport” to imitate those from “old money.” Gatsby himself capitalizes on the demand for alcohol during Prohibition (1920-1933) when it was illegal to produce and sell alcohol. He is embroiled in class-based corruption: His wealth means the law does not threaten him or his enterprise, as seen when a policeman lets him off for speeding because he is friendly with the police commissioner.

The economic boom during the 1920s partially depended on exploiting people for cheap labor, leading to an unprecedented level of socioeconomic inequality. The tensions between “old money” and “new money” are thrown into relief when the characters visit the “valley of ashes,” an industrial wasteland choking on the pollution created by American prosperity. Ashes from factories are dumped in this area, which is a metaphor for the fact that people rise to wealth at the expense of the wellbeing of others. A railroad runs alongside this area, similarly recalling the industrial expansion of the previous decades and highlighting its human and environmental cost. The debates and competitions between two equally rich people have little bearing on the lives of the individuals who in the valley of ashes, like George and Myrtle. Yet George and Myrtle are the ones who suffer most because of Tom and Gatsby’s fight over Daisy. This is a microcosm of how people in low socioeconomic brackets pay the biggest price for the single-minded competition for wealth that defined American capitalism in the 1920s.