...That brief depression after WWII was followed by a rather significant period of prosperity once everybody was back home, building homes, going to school on the GI Bill, and getting on with their lives. Generally speaking, the most expensive way to procure a good/service is to have the government do it during a time of war unless there are price controls involved...
The fact that the manufacturing economies of France, Belgium, Netherlands, Norway, Luxembourg, Germany, Austria, Italy, China, Japan, the Philippines, Indonesia, and French Indochina were in complete disarray, and the UK was broke, had one heck of a lot to do with our post-WWII manufacturing prosperity. And, don't forget, we also had the Korean war and the military-industrial complex pumping in dollars to the war economy sector, too.