Great Society

political program launched by Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson in 1964–65

The Great Society was a set of programs proposed or enacted in the United States by President Lyndon B. Johnson. Two main goals of the Great Society were to end poverty and to end racial discrimination. New major spending programs that dealt with education, medical care, urban problems, and transportation were started during this period. The Great Society was like the New Deal domestic plan of Franklin D. Roosevelt, but had very different programs.

Unlike the New Deal, the Great Society focused more on people rather than the economy. Medicaid and Medicare were implemented to help poor Americans. President Lyndon B. Johnson’s Great Society was the largest expansion of spending programs since the Great Depression. Many of the programs that exist can be attributed to the passage of the Great Society.