ABSTRACT
Y EAR by year accounts of the course of British businessactivity in the interwar period present, at first sight, adiscouraging story. As before, there were irregular alternations of expansion and contraction, but whereas the recessions were sharp and deep, the spells of expansion were prone to interruption and halted far below their potential peaks. There were three major cycles during the period. The great burst of activity which began very soon after the armistice of 1918, when customers were restoring their depleted stocks, reached its height in 1920 and was followed by an equally rapid plunge into depression, which went exceptionally deep. Recovery began some time in 1922 and did not reach its maximum' until 1929, but was repeatedly checked. Industrial activity declined in the early months of 1925 and the general strike and protracted coal strike of 1926 brought another reversal, followed by a brief stimulus to make up some of the arrears in 1927. Late in 1929 activity turned down again and the depression rapidly grew worse; never, in all probability, had there been a wider fluctuation within so short a time. The bottom of the depression was touched at the beginning of 1933 and a fairly steady upward movement followed until 1937. The recession which began later that year was rather sharp but not comparable in severity with those of 1920 and 1929 and it was halted in 1939 by the needs of war.1
