Fordism describes the process of rationalisation in industrial production. The term derives from the US-American car manufacturer Henry Ford who introduced assembly lines to the car manufacturing process of the 1920s. This started the time of mass consumption with the car beginning to be a mass product. Thus, Fordism is a phase of capitalism, characterised through mass production and mass consumption. This phase is further characterised by the introduction of the welfare state and social security systems as well as the ideal of the nuclear family with a working father and a stay-at-home mother. The assembly line mass production increased the demand for often unskilled labourers. Many countries solved their labour shortage by recruiting foreign labourers. Fordism started to dissolve in the 1970s.