ABSTRACT
The economic effects of the war of 1939-45 were of an altogether different order from those of the war of 1914-18. Unemployment was eliminated, though not until after 1940, and did not re-appear on any scale for over 30 years. Indeed, during the 1940s and for much of the 1950s, the economy was characterised by labour shortage. High lev-els of employment and rising incomes coincided with the need, both at home and abroad, to make good the physical damage of war as well as neglected investment and increased public spending on edu cation and welfare. The result was unprecedented affluence and the apparent conquest of poverty. In such circumstances, weaknesses in Britain’s economic condition went largely unremarked before the 1960s.
