In 1913 Clydeside alone built one third of the worlds ships. Most of these were for our own consumption. After war we need less ships because we have less trade. At the same time the Americans and the Japanese start building their own ships. A lot of these countries are now going to buy their own rather than British. We were a little bit shortsighted - building just basic cargo ships.Other european countries start building their own oil tankers. Social consequences - the Jarrow march.
Coal mining .
2 problems -.
(1) Exports collapse.
(2) Home demand collapses because of more efficient use of coal - electric power means less use of .
coal.
Reasons why we are less competitive include the fact that we are still digging coal out manually and there are a lot of small mines.
In America and Germany they develop machinery to cut the coal and also to convey they coal mechanically.We produce coal cheaper this way and you need much less labour.
You have unemployment in an industry where trade unionism is very strong , so strong that two thirds` of all days lost to strikes are in the coal industry. They give a subsidy to coal mining to prevent wage cuts. Stanley Baldwin says he isnt going to pay it any more. Fights an election on that issue and looses it. Once this subsidy is taken off then one third of workers are going to be made redundant. As a result you would lose 400, 000 workers.
Problems from America .
During the war , America took advantage of Britain and Germanys` involvement in the war. America is now largest trading nation aswell as being largest economy. Has a huge export surplus over imports. By the end of the 1930`s it has nearly half of the worlds` industrial output. Dominance of America isn`t caused by the war but is accelerated by it. Debts are less easily recycled because USA doesn`t want a lot of goods from these countries. Countries increasingly indebted to America, many of the loans are short - term loans.