Chapter 83

When the economy retreated, people’s spending power became a joke. Once income fell, there was no “consumption” in the strict sense anymore. More often, there were only expenses people had no choice but to make in order to stay alive.

But not everything moved downward with the economic index during a recession, sinking without recovery. Birth rates and abortion rates, for instance.

After an economic downturn, people had fewer opportunities for entertainment. Long-term unemployment kept them at home, and certain needs began to grow vigorous amid irritation. Newborns would then become part of a wave, continuously battering families already on the verge of collapse. Some families that had originally planned to have children would also, because of financial hardship, abort children who otherwise would have been born.

A newborn wave and the abortion rate did not conflict with each other. That was also a very interesting point.

Then there was the crime rate, which would rise noticeably. Under the pressure of life, many people had no choice but to take desperate risks and begin engaging in illegal criminal activity to obtain the basics necessary for survival. Some people would even break the law on purpose in hopes of getting into prison for free meals.

In this environment full of pressure and anxiety, the whole society would enter a morbid state. At the same time, wealth would flow upward from the rank and file of society at an accelerated pace.

Ordinary people lacked channels to exchange labor for equivalent compensation. Their money would be squeezed dry bit by bit in the process of sustaining life, and all of that money would flow into the hands of capitalists. Resentment toward the rich began to breed and spread through society.

Whenever the economy declined and society sank into depression, it was carnival season for capitalists.

But there were also some industries that would quietly prosper, and the rise of these industries was, in fact, connected to the shape of society.

For example, discount stores, retail, and certain wholesale markets would become red-hot. People’s consumption had to be planned. They had to calculate carefully how to spend every cent, including the middle class. They could no longer enjoy the pleasures and class distinctions brought by wealth as freely as they had in the past.

This was also one of the few opportunities for the middle class to come into contact with the rank and file of society. They would not drive, because gasoline cost money. They would carry grocery baskets and shop like the ordinary people they often refused to look at properly, pinching pennies.