1970s monkey race

72

Chapter 72 London, England

After school started, there was nothing to worry about in the real estate company. Li Zhenzhen was usually free except for school, and she resumed her habit of reading newspapers every morning.

One day, she opened a newspaper and suddenly saw two completely different headlines on the two pages:

"Britain's disease - the executioner who dragged Britain into the grave!"

"Britain is not sick - the sun never sets on the British Empire!"

Li Zhenzhen became interested and immediately read it with great interest.

It turned out that the first article was written by a British economist. In his article, he used a lot of space to explain the current situation of "British disease", and then began to spread the word that "British disease" would lead to the complete decline of Britain.

The second article was written by a British member of Parliament. He denounced the central idea of ​​the first article, saying that the other party was scaremongering and talking nonsense, and that Britain could not decline.

These two completely different articles are both discussing the hottest topic nowadays - "British disease".

In other words, although Britain won the Second World War, it was actually almost a failure. Not only was its vitality severely damaged, but its position as a world hegemon also began to shake.

After the Second World War, Britain's economy and trade were hit hard. With many war debts and the debts from World War I not yet paid off, the British economy began to stagnate.

This state lasted for 30 years and was nicknamed "British disease" by the outside world.

Under such circumstances, Britain's international status naturally plummeted.

On the other hand, the Bretton Woods Conference held in 1944 established an international settlement system centered on the US dollar, that is, the US dollar began to be linked to gold and became the most powerful currency in the world.

From then on, the status of the British pound as an international settlement currency was gradually replaced by the US dollar.

Data shows that after World War II, the exchange rate of the British pound to the US dollar has dropped from 1 to 4.03 to 1 to 2.8, a drop of nearly 30%.

Since 1967, inflation in the UK has reached a very serious level, and the economy is very depressed.

The economist in the newspaper saw this situation and caused inner worries, so he published such an article in an attempt to awaken the British people.

But at present, the majority of British people hold the second view. At the back of the newspaper, there is also a public opinion survey, which shows that most British people still believe that Britain is the most powerful country in the world. They are not willing to believe the prediction that it may decline.

But Li Zhenzhen knew that it was not a prophecy, but was becoming a reality.

In fact, in the 1960s, Britain's international status was no longer as good as before, and it should be said that it ranked behind the United States and the Soviet Union. It's just that the British have always been arrogant and unwilling to accept this result.

As the saying goes, you can never wake up a person who pretends to be asleep.

Li Zhenzhen knew that in order to maintain its status as an international "big brother", Britain not only did not take measures to prevent the economic decline, but continued to make a big show of investing heavily in overseas markets, and finally a serious fiscal deficit broke out.