We will be heading for a brighter future after Covid-19

This period of structural economic upheaval may cause more good than harm, says Max King – if Britain can take advantage.

Jarrow Crusade marchers, 1936 © Keystone/Getty Images
In times of change, losers are more visible than winners
(Image credit: © Keystone/Getty Images)

One of the more interesting books on my reading list at university was S. B. Saul’s The Myth of the Great Depression. By “Great Depression”, Saul meant not 1929-1933, but 1873-1896, a period of sustained price deflation that caused real hardship in the UK. Positive supply shocks and revolutionary technologies drove down prices. For instance, the opening up of the prairies, the pampas and Australia to farming, combined with falling freight rates by land and sea, lowered the cost of food.

In Black Diamonds, Catherine Bailey points out that in 1870, Britain produced half the world’s coal. But by the mid-1920s, it produced barely a fifth as new producers in Africa, China and India dug coal at one-third of the British cost. The distress among coal miners, agricultural workers and the landed gentry who had built their fortunes on coal and farming was widely evident. Rural areas, such as East Anglia, depopulated and emigration soared. In the economy as a whole, however, nominal wages were at least stable and real (inflation-adjusted) wages rose as prices fell. Output in real terms rose as most of the economy prospered. So why was this period widely thought of as a depression? The distress of the losers was much more visible than the content of the winners and that drove perceptions.

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Max King
Investment Writer

Max has an Economics degree from the University of Cambridge and is a chartered accountant. He worked at Investec Asset Management for 12 years, managing multi-asset funds investing in internally and externally managed funds, including investment trusts. This included a fund of investment trusts which grew to £120m+. Max has managed ten investment trusts (winning many awards) and sat on the boards of three trusts – two directorships are still active.

After 39 years in financial services, including 30 as a professional fund manager, Max took semi-retirement in 2017. Max has been a MoneyWeek columnist since 2016 writing about investment funds and more generally on markets online, plus occasional opinion pieces. He also writes for the Investment Trust Handbook each year and has contributed to The Daily Telegraph and other publications. See here for details of current investments held by Max.