ABSTRACT
A problem which presented itself in 1920, when the temporary stimuli of the war and of the subsequent price boom had passed away, was whether the local industries would be likely to retain the new relative position that they had assumed one to another since 1914. Before embarking on this task, however, it is important to point out that, of all the great industrial areas, Birmingham and District suffered least during the post-war period. The figures for particular towns within the area, however, show a considerable variation in the unemployment rate from place to place, and this would seem to indicate that there is less mobility of labour within the district than has been popularly supposed. The Black Country, during the post-war depression even more than in pre-war years, has assumed all the aspects of an ancient, but decayed, iron and steel centre.
