Bob,
On 06/07/2014 12:49, Robert F. Begani wrote:
In actual fact, British lost WW1 and WW2 because they were
> financially exhausted after 1945 and did not recover fully until the 1980's.
I think a better way of putting it is that we won both wars (although not as
much on our own as we sometimes like to portray it), but we also lost the wars
because as a result of WW1 a whole generation of men of working age from all
stratas of society had been lost. As a result we were already weakened going
into WW2. The UK was of course largely dependent on a far-flung Empire. The war
at sea strained our ability to exploit our resources to best advantage
> The economic assistance the USA provided the British was with war and war
> machines. For all practical purposes, it stopped after the war.
True.
In
> addition, the country turned to Labor. The Social policies of the new
> government required enormous amounts of money and none to repair the war
> torn industries and infrastructure of the country.
I don't think that it is right to conflate the two. After WW1 there was the
promise of "a land fit for heroes" after a "War to end all War"...that didn't
materialise. After WW2 There was a perceived need among the populace to take
steps to ensure a fairer and juster society and a desire for a complete change
that brought Labour to power, for right or wrong. Hence the implementation of
things like the National Health Service, The Education Act and so on...
Actually that was not unique to this country. You must also compare the feelings
in France and other countries where there was a similar attitude. Ultimately
this lead to the creation of the Coal and Steel Union whigh later became the
European Community, but that is another story except to say that its point was
to make Germany so bound to the rest of Europe that it would be impossible for
her if she were to go to war with her neighbours again.
.... When we discussed what
> happened and that I was surprised the phone system was so antiquated, he
> reminded me that they did, in fact, lose the war.
There was a huge amount of money poured into housing and rebuilding factories,
but we were bust. What we didn't do adequately was to put money into the
railways and to manufacturing. In addition the UK's markets (in effect the
Empire plus to a limited degree the rest of Europe and the US - in that order)
were changing as a result of the war and we had a very hard trying to handle
that and civil wars and revolutions within the empire.
With regard to phones... Proper modern phone exchanges didn't really start to be
implemented here until System X in the 80s. We are still substantially behind
other countries in investment in broadband bandwidth because govt adopted a
strategy in the 80s that would turn out to be unresponsive to technological
change, a fact that could have been forseen at the time and forestalled.
>
> The USA Marshall Plan invested billions of dollars in Europe, but, very
> little in Britain.
To be precise it was offered, but Churchill turned the offer down. Partly I
think pride, partly a lack of understanding of the real cost of the war and
partly possibly the terms offered.
So the economies of the northern Europe benefited from
> the Marshal Plan expanded greatly in the period after the war ....
It is called the Economic Miracle of the 60's and 70's.
In particular the French had "les trentes glorieuses" the thirty years of growth
which lasted from approximately 1950 - 1980.
>
> In Southern Europe, there was also an economic upswing due to the fact that
> 10's of thousands of Italian, Southern French, Spanish and Portuguese and
> others flooded into Germany and northern Europe to work in the factories.
> They sent money home to be invested in rebuilding the infrastructure of
> their countries by buying fixing up houses and buying locally their needs.
> The trickle-down theory of economics.
We as an island race were never that mobile in Europe historically and thought
that we could work at home, rebuild the economic strength of the Empire, even as
the Commonwealth, and return to our previous glories. It didn't happen, not
least because technologies and markets changed. Bear in mind that we were still
a major force in innovation in areas such as aviation throughout the 50s and
with Concord(e) into the 80s and beyond.
BMC was in the same boat as so many other car manufacturers, suffering from poor
management, poor resources and raw materials and a small market. Ultimately it
would suffer too from social discontent as things began to improve, albeit only
for some areas of society (think Swinging Sixties etc).
As for France that recoverd gradually with sustained growth, Italy is still
dysfunctional, disorganised and lacking in a sense of identity. The economic
winner, thus far at least, is Germany but even there half of it suffered under
Communist occupation. for forty years after the war.
We can always discuss this off-line if you like!
Peter
--
===========================================================
Dr Peter Dzwig
_______________________________________________
Archive: http://www.team.net/archive
Healeys@autox.team.net
http://autox.team.net/mailman/listinfo/healeys
|