3 ms·

The 1918 flu pandemic along with the end of World War I, introduced the roaring 20s, a period of economic prosperity, a new cultural idea and in some sense deca

by eunos 6y ago

The 1918 flu pandemic along with the end of World War I, introduced the roaring 20s, a period of economic prosperity, a new cultural idea and in some sense decadence. Will the idea of big spending government also delivers the same outcome? If yes, how do we manage those so that we will not arrive at the great depression of 1929?

bpodgursky 6y ago
Or, the automobile, the industrial revolution, and a booming population through agriculture and medical improvements led to economic prosperity, despite a deadly plague. It's a pretty hard case to make that a disease which disproportionately killed health 20-30 year-olds led to mass prosperity. Given all the advancements which were happening in the early 20th century, I'm inclined to say that prosperity happened in SPITE of WWI and the Spanish Flu. Who knows where we would be, had we avoided two huge human catastrophes.
- jniedrauer 6y ago
  > It's a pretty hard case to make that a disease which disproportionately killed health 20-30 year-olds led to mass prosperity. That's exactly what happened during the black plague. It lead to the end of feudalism. A shortage of labor will absolutely boost the value of labor.
  - whatusername 6y ago
    In modern terms - it might have caused a drop in total GDP - but it achieved growth in GDP per capita. Not sure that's worth the cost of course.
  - Guthur 6y ago
    Which is not what's happening with covid, if anything the opposite, with locked up and made all those young healthy people unemployed causing an increase in available labour
  - shadowprofile77 6y ago
    I think this is questionable logic, the last statement I mean. The Black Death killed nearly half the total population of Europe across all age groups (in some regions and whole cities, it even wiped out 70% or more of their inhabitants. That level of life destruction creates an immense, definitive shortage of labor for the urgent needs of a devastated society. The 1918 pandemic killed tens of millions, but proportionally, this was a comparatively miniscule fraction of the world population and of the working population in the industrialized world of 1919 onward. Certainly not enough to heavily affect labor supply or cause massive changes in how working populations relate to their employers
    - EliRivers 6y ago
      I understand there's a pretty solid consensus that it did. In some places, serfdom effectively ended. But we don't have to guess. We can just look it up and find that people who know a lot more about it than us have come to those conclusions.
      - shadowprofile77 6y ago
        I think you misunderstood my previous comment. I don't at all question that the Black Death ended serfdom, or at least weakened it severely after so many dead. As I stated, I was questioning the application of this same chain of events and logic to the 1918 pandemic, for the population proportion reasons I already mentioned above.
megous 6y ago
What will happen is that people will just get poorer in general, than they would be without all this COVID mess. Where I live we get 10x the gov. budget deficit than the previous year and the government is reducing and eliminating taxes at the same time. So the "taxes" will come in the form of reduced value of money, or taxes in the future. Level of taxation is pretty much equivalent to the level of government spending. There's, no way around it. On top of that, general population's savings are being depleted. So yeah, future is bleak. Anyway, I hope the gov spending will get to sane levels soon. It doesn't help that this is the global phenomenon, so economy/currency is not crashing as much compared to the surrounding countries. But there are still wild swings of ~10% or so compared to USD or EUR.
- forgingahead 6y ago
  Anyway, I hope the gov spending will get to sane levels soon. Honest question, what mechanisms do you think will make this happen? Or is it more of a general hope-it-happens? In my experience, getting anyone to spend less after they are used to spending a lot (be it a government, a company, a business unit, or even just your kids) simply doesn't happen, barring a fundamental change in circumstances whereby the alternate of continuing to spend a lot results in immediate ruin.
- 908B64B197 6y ago
  > But there are still wild swings of ~10% or so compared to USD or EUR. Time so switch to a better currency!
IronRanger 6y ago
This might have been the case if the original Imperial College reports of several million deaths in the US and UK were accurate, highly concentrated among the aged which would have lead to large savings on healthcare and pension costs, as well as freeing up of large amounts of real estate for younger generations. However in reality the deathtoll from COVID is scarcely distinguishable from regular influenza seasons. Only 0.06% of Sweden's population succumbed to COVID and their annual deaths are shaping up to be the same as prior years, for example. Similar situation in Germany.
bawolff 6y ago
> Will the idea of big spending government also delivers the same outcome? I don't know if that is the right lesson to learn. The great depression was largely caused by a stock market crash related to lack of regulation, and a drought (hello climate change). It was largely solved by big government wartime spending.

by eunos 6y ago

bpodgursky 6y ago

Or, the automobile, the industrial revolution, and a booming population through agriculture and medical improvements led to economic prosperity, despite a deadly plague. It's a pretty hard case to make that a disease which disproportionately killed health 20-30 year-olds led to mass prosperity. Given all the advancements which were happening in the early 20th century, I'm inclined to say that prosperity happened in SPITE of WWI and the Spanish Flu. Who knows where we would be, had we avoided two huge human catastrophes.

jniedrauer 6y ago
> It's a pretty hard case to make that a disease which disproportionately killed health 20-30 year-olds led to mass prosperity. That's exactly what happened during the black plague. It lead to the end of feudalism. A shortage of labor will absolutely boost the value of labor.
- whatusername 6y ago
  In modern terms - it might have caused a drop in total GDP - but it achieved growth in GDP per capita. Not sure that's worth the cost of course.
- Guthur 6y ago
  Which is not what's happening with covid, if anything the opposite, with locked up and made all those young healthy people unemployed causing an increase in available labour
- shadowprofile77 6y ago
  I think this is questionable logic, the last statement I mean. The Black Death killed nearly half the total population of Europe across all age groups (in some regions and whole cities, it even wiped out 70% or more of their inhabitants. That level of life destruction creates an immense, definitive shortage of labor for the urgent needs of a devastated society. The 1918 pandemic killed tens of millions, but proportionally, this was a comparatively miniscule fraction of the world population and of the working population in the industrialized world of 1919 onward. Certainly not enough to heavily affect labor supply or cause massive changes in how working populations relate to their employers
  - EliRivers 6y ago
    I understand there's a pretty solid consensus that it did. In some places, serfdom effectively ended. But we don't have to guess. We can just look it up and find that people who know a lot more about it than us have come to those conclusions.
    - shadowprofile77 6y ago
      I think you misunderstood my previous comment. I don't at all question that the Black Death ended serfdom, or at least weakened it severely after so many dead. As I stated, I was questioning the application of this same chain of events and logic to the 1918 pandemic, for the population proportion reasons I already mentioned above.

megous 6y ago

What will happen is that people will just get poorer in general, than they would be without all this COVID mess. Where I live we get 10x the gov. budget deficit than the previous year and the government is reducing and eliminating taxes at the same time. So the "taxes" will come in the form of reduced value of money, or taxes in the future. Level of taxation is pretty much equivalent to the level of government spending. There's, no way around it. On top of that, general population's savings are being depleted. So yeah, future is bleak. Anyway, I hope the gov spending will get to sane levels soon. It doesn't help that this is the global phenomenon, so economy/currency is not crashing as much compared to the surrounding countries. But there are still wild swings of ~10% or so compared to USD or EUR.

forgingahead 6y ago
Anyway, I hope the gov spending will get to sane levels soon. Honest question, what mechanisms do you think will make this happen? Or is it more of a general hope-it-happens? In my experience, getting anyone to spend less after they are used to spending a lot (be it a government, a company, a business unit, or even just your kids) simply doesn't happen, barring a fundamental change in circumstances whereby the alternate of continuing to spend a lot results in immediate ruin.
908B64B197 6y ago
> But there are still wild swings of ~10% or so compared to USD or EUR. Time so switch to a better currency!

IronRanger 6y ago

This might have been the case if the original Imperial College reports of several million deaths in the US and UK were accurate, highly concentrated among the aged which would have lead to large savings on healthcare and pension costs, as well as freeing up of large amounts of real estate for younger generations. However in reality the deathtoll from COVID is scarcely distinguishable from regular influenza seasons. Only 0.06% of Sweden's population succumbed to COVID and their annual deaths are shaping up to be the same as prior years, for example. Similar situation in Germany.

bawolff 6y ago

> Will the idea of big spending government also delivers the same outcome? I don't know if that is the right lesson to learn. The great depression was largely caused by a stock market crash related to lack of regulation, and a drought (hello climate change). It was largely solved by big government wartime spending.