Editing History of Europe (section)

===Economic recovery===
{{Main|Marshall Plan|European Economic Community}}
[[File:Marshall Plan.png|thumb|upright=1.5|Marshall Plan dollar amounts]]
The United States gave away about $20&nbsp;billion in [[Marshall Plan]] grants and other funding to Western Europe, 1945 to 1951. Historian Michael J. Hogan argues that American aid was critical in stabilizing the economy and politics of Western Europe. It brought in modern management that dramatically increased productivity, and encouraged cooperation between labor and management, and among states. Local Communist parties were opposed, and they lost prestige and influence and a role in government. In strategic terms, says Hogan, the Marshall Plan strengthened the West against the possibility of a communist invasion or political takeover.<ref>Michael J. Hogan, ''The Marshall Plan: America, Britain and the Reconstruction of Western Europe, 1947–1952'' (1989) pp. 26–28, 430–43.</ref> However, the Marshall Plan's role in the rapid recovery has been debated. Most reject the idea that it only miraculously revived Europe, since the evidence shows that a general recovery was already under way. Economic historians Bradford De Long and [[Barry Eichengreen]] conclude:
:It was not large enough to have significantly accelerated recovery by financing investment, aiding the reconstruction of damaged infrastructure, or easing commodity bottlenecks. We argue, however, that the Marshall Plan did play a major role in setting the stage for post-World War II Western Europe's rapid growth. The conditions attached to Marshall Plan aid pushed European political economy in a direction that left its post World War II "[[Mixed economy|mixed economies]]" with more "market" and less "controls" in the mix.<ref>{{cite book|first1=J. Bradford|last1=DeLong|first2=Barry|last2=Eichengreen|chapter=The Marshall Plan: History's Most Successful Structural Adjustment Program|title=Postwar Economic Reconstruction and Lessons for the East Today|editor-first=Rudiger|editor-last=Dornbusch|editor2-first=Wilhelm|editor2-last=Nolling|editor3-first=Richard|editor3-last=Layard|publisher=MIT Press|year=1993|pages=189–230|isbn=978-0-262-04136-2|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kGCfmmlGtPEC&pg=PA189|access-date=21 March 2018|archive-date=15 April 2023|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230415065100/https://books.google.com/books?id=kGCfmmlGtPEC&pg=PA189|url-status=live}}</ref>

The Soviet Union concentrated on its own recovery. It seized and transferred most of Germany's industrial plants and it exacted [[World War II reparations|war reparations]] from East Germany, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria. It used trading arrangements deliberately designed to favor the Soviet Union. Moscow controlled the Communist parties that ruled the satellite states. Historian Mark Kramer concludes:
:The net outflow of resources from eastern Europe to the Soviet Union was approximately $15 billion to $20 billion in the first decade after World War II, an amount roughly equal to the total aid provided by the United States to western Europe under the Marshall Plan.<ref>Mark Kramer, "The Soviet Bloc and the Cold War in Europe," {{cite book|editor=Klaus Larresm|title=A Companion to Europe Since 1945|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=EyNcCwAAQBAJ&pg=PT174|year=2014|publisher=Wiley|page=79|isbn=978-1-118-89024-0}}</ref>

Looking at the half century after the war historian [[Walter Laqueur|Walter Lacquer]] concluded:
:"The postwar generations of European elites aimed to create more democratic societies. They wanted to reduce the extremes of wealth and poverty and provide essential social services in a way that prewar generations had not. They had had quite enough of unrest and conflict. For decades many Continental societies had more or less achieved these aims and had every reason to be proud of their progress. Europe was quiet and civilized. Europe's success was based on recent painful experience: the horrors of two world wars; the lessons of dictatorship; the experiences of fascism and communism. Above all, it was based on a feeling of European identity and common values – or so it appeared at the time."<ref>Walter Laqueur, "The Slow Death of Europe", ''The National Interest'' [http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/why-the-euro-the-least-europes-worries-5767 16 August 2011 online] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110926084231/http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/why-the-euro-the-least-europes-worries-5767 |date=26 September 2011 }}</ref>

The post-war period witnessed a significant rise in the standard of living of the Western European working class.<ref name="google2">{{cite book|title=Is There Still a West?: The Future of the Atlantic Alliance|author1=Hay, W.A.|author2=Sicherman, H.|date=2007|publisher=University of Missouri Press, Queen Elizabeth also had a major breakdown causing her to die cause of the stress overload.|isbn=978-0-8262-6549-4|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VwDQ3jAGMX0C|page=107|access-date=18 May 2015}}</ref>

Western Europe's industrial nations in the 1970s were hit by a [[1973–1975 recession|global economic crisis]]. Causes included obsolescent heavy industry, sudden high energy prices which caused sharp inflation, inefficient nationalized railways and heavy industries, lagging [[Computer Technology|computer technology]], high [[government deficit]]s and growing unrest led by militant [[Trade union|labour unions]]. Germany and Sweden sought to create a social consensus behind a gradual restructuring. Germany's efforts proved highly successful. In Britain under the [[premiership of Margaret Thatcher]], the solution was shock therapy, high interest rates, austerity, and selling off inefficient corporations as well as the public housing. One result was escalating social tensions in Britain. Thatcher eventually defeated her opponents and radically changed the [[Economy of the United Kingdom|British economy]], but controversy persisted.<ref>David Priestland, "Margaret Thatcher?" ''BBC History Magazine'' 1 May 2013</ref>