What Happened to Europe's Economy After the Black Death

Joe Weisenthal (0:11)

Hello, and welcome to another episode of the Odd Lots Podcast. I'm Joe Weisenthal.

Tracy Alloway (0:17)

And I'm Tracy Alloway.

Joe Weisenthal (0:19)

The virus situation in the US is extremely bad right now, but I feel hopeful that this, we're on the last wave, thanks to the vaccine, that the light, there is some light at the end of the tunnel.

Tracy Alloway (0:35)

Yeah, so we're recording this in mid-December, and I think the US caseload keeps going up. It keeps going up in other places as well. So I think Europe, Germany, just posted its highest caseload on record.

In Hong Kong, we have a fourth wave as well. I guess with winter setting in in many parts of the world, temperature obviously has an impact, and we're seeing cases, and also sadly, deaths go up as well.

Joe Weisenthal (1:02)

Can I say something though? You might, I have something to say, which is, I read all these stories about Hong Kong is under a new wave, or Hong Kong is under lockdown.

But I gotta say, it does not seem anything like the same scale here. And when I look at, say, your Instagram photos, not that you're out partying, but it does not seem as bad by any stretch, even close. It seems like your definition of a wave is not our definition of a wave.

Tracy Alloway (1:30)

Yeah, our definition of a wave, and this is our biggest ever wave, it's about 100 new cases per day. So really a fraction of what you're seeing in other countries.

And our lockdowns are kind of weird and different because for instance, you're allowed to eat in a restaurant, but they all close at 6 p.m. and it's only two people per table. So you can go out, and of course you can still, this is what I quite like about Hong Kong, you can still get drinks and just drink them outside after 6 p.m. And because the weather is quite mild here, it's fairly enjoyable to do that, but you're still supposed to do it in groups of a maximum of two people.

Joe Weisenthal (2:10)

So there's literally nothing like our waves. And people are still doing boat parties, right?

Tracy Alloway (2:16)

Well, they crack down on those. So they set up a hotline.

They set up a hotline so that people could report if they spotted someone holding a, they're called junk parties here, if people decide to hold a junk party because they can't hold a party in a restaurant or a bar, they hire a boat, they go out to sea, and everyone drinks and swims and sunbathes. Now there's a hotline so you can report that behavior. You're not supposed to do it.

Joe Weisenthal (2:41)

All right.

All right, anyway, this is a big digression, but I just wanted to get this off my chest that when people are like, oh, Hong Kong, isn't it, it's worst wave yet. That is like, it's nothing.

Tracy Alloway (2:50)

Hey, look, it's all relative.

Joe Weisenthal (2:52)

I know, yeah, that's my point.

It's relative to us. It's nothing. Anyway, so that of course raises questions. If the end of the coronavirus crisis, COVID, is in sight, that of course raises questions about what the post-crisis world, the post-COVID world looks like.

Tracy Alloway (3:12)

Right, and I think this is something that we've touched on in a few episodes now, but one of the big questions is exactly what it means for the labor market, whether we start to see maybe wages pick up again, maybe we start to see workers demand other benefits, like work from home, because they've all been so used to it over the past 12 months or so. Big discussion point.

Joe Weisenthal (3:37)

Right, so there have been some articles that I've seen from time to time talking about a past pandemic in which it was much worse than this one. And at the end of the Black Death in the mid-1300s, there was actually a pretty big spike in wages because there was a labor shortage.

This is not anywhere near as sort of deadly.

It's extremely bad, but it's not Black Death pandemic levels. So we're probably not going to get some massive labor shortage. But even still, I'm sort of curious about this time, because none of these things ever had a totally satisfying, because on the one hand, yes, I understand, there was a labor shortage, but on the other hand, you think there'd be this sort of like big broad impairment to the economy. So it's not totally clear to me why wages went up. So even though I doubt it's that applicable to now, I am still very curious to understand what really happened when that four-year pandemic came to an end.