Can Coalition hitch its wagon to the post-pandemic boom?

World of Politics with Harry McGee

It’s one of those things that happens after prolonged and seismic events – like wars or pandemics – when the end triggers an understandable celebration, ahead of readjustment and some chaos … all followed by a relatively prolonged period of growth.

In America after World War 2 it was spectacular and lasted for three decades, helped by the advent of the Cold War and the creation of that terrible Dr Strangelove phrase – the military industrial complex.

Britain had been devastated by the war and many families returning to cities after being abroad fighting, or having been evacuated to the country, found they had no homes.

But within a relatively short period, rebuilding was underway in a massive way, giving rise to marked increases in consumer spending and a long uninterrupted period of growth.

Its debt was enormous after the war but as the economy grew – on the back of Keynesian ideas – it did not become the burden that some predicted it would.

The nearest analogous event to this pandemic is the one that happened almost a century ago, the Spanish Flu between 1918 and 1920.

Economies – especially that of the US – bounced back strongly with the US experiencing a decade of growth and the so-called Roaring Twenties.

The bounce was not attributable solely to the flu but to the end of World War 1 also. As the decade wore on growth increasingly became a bubble that was pricked in 1929.

So what can we expect during 2022? With society fully reopened there is no doubt that Ireland (and most of Europe) will experience a consumer boom.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App

Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.

Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.

Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite  HERE.

Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.