Two Hundred Years of Muddling Through: The surprising story of Britain's economy from boom to bust and back again

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The Malthus theory states that the world is governed by a brutal logic; human wants are infinite but human means were finite. Put simply, to limit starvation and masses of poor people, the best way to restrict population growth. Feeding the poor would only result in more poorer people. In some way it links in with your theory about housing and governments liking to restrict the population growth and therefore in the short run/their premiership taxation costs. Rapid population decline is not what governments want, as like Spain in the 1930, there are not enough people to harvest the corn.

Two Hundred Years of Muddling Through - Hachette UK

This book is an extremely well written, clear and concise summary of British economic and political history covering the period from the period just prior to the Industrial Revolution to 2021. I have to thank the author for explaining to me what the Poor Laws and the Corn Laws of the 19th century were all about. I recall blindingly boring history lessons at school about these issues and as a consequence having little idea what they were about - but now I do. I found this book an entertaining read and informative about political economic issues since industrial revolution times in the UK. How has Britain managed previous periods of economic change? On each occasion, how much has our economic future been shaped by our economic past? And what can today’s policy makers learn from our history as they navigate the decade of economic change to come?The UK is, at the same time, both one of the world’s most successful economies and one of Europe’s laggards. The country contains some of Western Europe’s richest areas such as the south east of England, but also some of its poorest such as the north east or Wales. Looking into the past helps understand why. This is an accessible overview of the last two hundred years of British economic policy-making. I have been looking for a book like this for some years and I was really pleased when I saw that Duncan Weldon was working on such a topic, as his laconic style goes some way towards making this often confusing narrative coherent. In war, do not think that trade did not continue. In 1809-1810 Britain continue to buy grain from France to feed its troops. The money France received helped fund their war, while France also needed clothing from the UK, which helped fund the UK war. French troops where often killed by the British wearing coats made in Northampton and Leeds.

Two Hundred Years of Muddling Through - Hachette UK Two Hundred Years of Muddling Through - Hachette UK

March, J.G. 2005. Parochialism in the evolution of a research community: The case of organization studies. Management and Organization Review 1: 5–22. The book shows how the Industrial Revolution essentially set the UK off on a path which has taken other countries in Europe the best part of c150 years to catch up with and how, more recently, the UK has struggled to work out what economic a coherent economic approach looks like (the Brexit debate is highlighted as typical of this incoherent approach). Geography still dictates trade. During the high years of British imperialism, (1870) only 25% of exports went to the empire, and by 1900 only to 30%. Europe remained the UK’s most important export market. An in-depth historical analysis of British economic policies. As someone who is totally new to the subject, this felt far too detailed and a lot of it went over my head. My eyes glazed over throughout many chunks of this book. However, for such a detailed book, the author mentioned the British Empire maybe twice, and given what a massive impact the Empire had on the British economy, I expected at least a chapter, or even half a chapter dedicated to it. I felt like large chunks of history (1990s to today) were also rushed.A book that tells the story of Britain’s economic history over the past 200 years could hardly be more timely. The country is emerging from the grip of a pandemic that triggered the deepest recession in more than 300 years and the biggest annual increase in public borrowing in peacetime. At the same time businesses are grappling with the fallout from Brexit in the form of significant new barriers to trade, leading to empty shelves and staff shortages. Meanwhile, the government is split between a prime minister who believes that Britain can spend its way to a “roaring twenties” and a chancellor who fears that a heavily indebted government is at risk of an inflationary bust. So where do we go from here? It’s fair to say that Weldon succeeds in answering it with his pacy, vivid canter through the Industrial Revolution, two World Wars, post-war decline and resurgence in the 1980s, right up to the current crisis.