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In Britain and America women joined the work force in jobs that the men overseas used to occupy. Families also grew victory gardens, small home vegetable gardens, to supply themselves with food during the war. They did this because the food was limited and they had to use ration stamps to get food. Sugar and coffee were especially hard to get, and gasoline was also rationed, as was silk. Schools and organizations held scrap drives and money collections to help the war effort. Many things were conserved to turn into weapons later, such as fat left over from cooking. This was later used to make explosives such as nitroglycerin. Franklin D. Roosevelt stated that the efforts of civilians at home to support the war through personal sacrifice was as critical to winning the war as the efforts of the soldiers themselves, and that the civilian populace constituted an additional front at home.
In Germany, at least for the first part of the war, there were surprisingly few restrictions on civlian activities. Most goods were freely available.
Civilian populations were heavily involved in war production and subject to propaganda from their governments.