After the Second World War, the United States offered massive financial assistance to Western European nations in the form of the Marshall Plan to rebuild themselves and to extend U.S. economic and political influence. The Soviet Union did the same for Eastern Europe with the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (COMECON). Western Europe saw considerable economic growth, thanks to both the Marshall Plan and initiatives aimed at European integration, starting with the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community by France, West Germany, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg in 1951 and the European Community in 1957-58. As a matter of fact, the Anglo-Americans spoke of the 'Golden Age' and French of 'thirty glorious years' ("les trente glorieuses") continued economic growth. For the United States, the postwar economic expansion was a continuation of what had occurred during the War. But for Western Europe and Japan, the primary economic goal was to return to prewar levels of productivity and prosperity, and many managed to close the gap with the United States in productivity per work hour and GDP per capita. Full employment was reached on both sides of the Atlantic by the 1960s. In Western Europe, the average unemployment figure stood at 1.5% at that time. The automobile, already a common sight in North America, became so in Western Europe, and to a lesser extent, Eastern Europe and Latin America. Many items previously deemed luxurious, such as the private washing machine, the refrigerator, and the telephone, entered mass production for the average consumer. It was possible for the average person to live like the upper-class in the previous generation. Technological advances made before, during, and after the War, such as plastics, the television, the magnetic tape, the transistor, the integrated circuit, and the laser, played a key role in the tremendous improvements in the standards of living for the average citizen in the developed world. Prosperity was taken for granted; this was a period of optimism. Indeed, for many young people who came of age after 1945, the interwar experience of mass unemployment and stable or falling prices were things confined to the history books. Full employment and inflation were the norm.