Britain During The Inter-war Years

Authors Avatar
Britain During The Inter-war Years

After the First World War Britain suffered economically. This was due to its material export sales being reduced as trade was severely disrupted in the war years encouraging customers to shop elsewhere for their goods such as Japan and other countries who took advantage of Britain's uncertainty and added taxes to their imports. Britain was also in debt by one million pounds owed to other countries, which did not help the situation.

The first major slump began around 1921 when over two million people were unemployed this was partly due to many men being injured in the war over one and a half million men from the United Kingdom alone were permanently weakened by wounds or the effects of gas. Also Britain saw a large reduction in their traditional exports such as coal, iron or steel which resulted in many jobs being forfeited. The coal industry was being left behind by oil, electricity and gas, these could be obtained cheaper or even for free from other countries like Poland where labour was cheaper and Germany who were still in debt for the reparations of the First World War.
Join now!


Suprisingly though Britain recovered quicker and more so than many of the other countries such as America, France and Belgium, it is argued that this was powered by residential construction and the newer developing industries against rearmament for the Second World War. In the depressed areas of Britain Scotland, Lancashire Northern Ireland and South Wales unemployment and poverty were common and part of everyday life. Most of these areas were working class where its inhabitants will have been employed in the dwindling industries such as shipping and textiles and at that time there was no alternative work available. ...

This is a preview of the whole essay