ABSTRACT
Important changes developed in Europe's economic position as a result of the war of 1914—1918. Since it had lost many of its foreign markets, owing to the concentration of effort on the battlefield and the conditions of surrender imposed on the defeated nations, Europe's trading position declined markedly. Before 1914, 25 per cent of all goods produced in Great Britain, and 20 per cent of those produced in Germany, were exported. In some industries, over 50 per cent of the production was sold abroad. After World War I, however, the preoccupation was more with stimulating home consumption of goods which had usually been sold abroad, and with shifting production into the direction of goods of which there was a national shortage.
