I’ve been subscribed to The Atlantic, an American magazine, for a couple of years now and it occured to me I’ve never dipped my toes in their archive yet. Out of curiosity I wondered what articles the magazine had written about Belgium in the past. I came across this article named “The Miracle of Belgium” from June 1949 talking about life in Belgium post-WWII. I knew Belgium wasn’t hurt as bad like its neighbors during the conflict (which is why we received relatively few financial aid from the Marshall Plan) but, according to the artice and an American perspective, Belgium seemed like a paradise on the European continent.
I’ve added two illustrations from the article. These are some excerpts I found interesting and fun:
>By all the rules Belgium should be as busted as Berchtesgaden. The nearly flat little wedge of a nation is one of the most densely populated in Europe. It has twice as many people as Switzerland and a third less land. The Swiss specialize in Alps and peace. If the Belgians have missed a war since Julius Caesar they can’t offhand remember it. Yet right now, while the mark of battle is still plain on most of Europe, it’s a question which of these two countries is the more prosperous.
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>A foreigner who has spent as much as an hour in Belgium acquires a look of puzzled — and indelible — amazement. Near neighbors — French, British, and Dutch — are filled not only with envy but with a very practical curiosity. If they can learn the answer, they grimly intend to take it home with them. Even Americans fresh from the opulence of a land three thousand miles from the nearest bomb crater wag their heads and cluck their tongues with wonder.
​
>Unemployment is close to the rockbottom proportion most experts believe is everywhere inevitable. Traffic glitters with new Buicks, Chryslers, Fords, Chevrolets, Austins, and even Cadillacs.
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>Oddly, the war helped. Belgium emerged from that gigantic fracas as the only country in the world owed by the United States under Lend-Lease.
​
>In Belgium the social security tax is 25 per cent. Every regularly employed Belgian pays 8 per cent of his earnings into a social security fund. Every employer must match it — and handsomely top it -with the staggering figure of 17 per cent of each employee’s wages!
​
>There are some catches, of course. Taxes are high. Inevitably, prices are high. An American dollar goes hardly fart her than in Chicago or New York. Visitors from the rest of Europe, after a few meals of the kind they had begun to think exisled only in dreams, hurry home with their pockets empty.
​
>Without Marshall Plan help it would be all but impossible for the neighbors to buy the goods they so badly need and which Belgium must sell.
Would people be interested in a similar post every now and then? At first glance, there are some extra interesting old articles about Belgium in The Atlantic’s archive.
Post-war Belgium had one of the fastest recoveries in all of Europe, thanks to the fact that most of our industry was relatively intact. However, we quickly lost this edge in the fifties when other Western European nations experienced massive economic growth, especially West Germany with its Wirtschaftswunder.
In the fifties, Belgium was still relying in large part on traditional heavy industry and mining, such as coal, steel and glass, especially in Wallonia. This large industry was a boon for us when other nations had to rebuild and we could export a lot to them, but then later, we didn’t immediately catch up with new industries (petrochemicals, electronics etc.) and we kind of stagnated.
Then later, in the sixties, Flemish GDP per capita reached Wallonia’s level and then kept on growing rapidly, whereas Wallonia had very measly GDP growth. Flanders benefited a lot from international investment (e.g. petrochemicals in the Port of Antwerp) at that time, thanks to its good location (at the coast & at the heart of Western Europe), well-educated workforce, relatively low wages, non-antagonistic trade unions (compared to Wallonia).
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I’ve been subscribed to The Atlantic, an American magazine, for a couple of years now and it occured to me I’ve never dipped my toes in their archive yet. Out of curiosity I wondered what articles the magazine had written about Belgium in the past. I came across this article named “The Miracle of Belgium” from June 1949 talking about life in Belgium post-WWII. I knew Belgium wasn’t hurt as bad like its neighbors during the conflict (which is why we received relatively few financial aid from the Marshall Plan) but, according to the artice and an American perspective, Belgium seemed like a paradise on the European continent.
I’ve added two illustrations from the article. These are some excerpts I found interesting and fun:
>By all the rules Belgium should be as busted as Berchtesgaden. The nearly flat little wedge of a nation is one of the most densely populated in Europe. It has twice as many people as Switzerland and a third less land. The Swiss specialize in Alps and peace. If the Belgians have missed a war since Julius Caesar they can’t offhand remember it. Yet right now, while the mark of battle is still plain on most of Europe, it’s a question which of these two countries is the more prosperous.
​
>A foreigner who has spent as much as an hour in Belgium acquires a look of puzzled — and indelible — amazement. Near neighbors — French, British, and Dutch — are filled not only with envy but with a very practical curiosity. If they can learn the answer, they grimly intend to take it home with them. Even Americans fresh from the opulence of a land three thousand miles from the nearest bomb crater wag their heads and cluck their tongues with wonder.
​
>Unemployment is close to the rockbottom proportion most experts believe is everywhere inevitable. Traffic glitters with new Buicks, Chryslers, Fords, Chevrolets, Austins, and even Cadillacs.
​
>Oddly, the war helped. Belgium emerged from that gigantic fracas as the only country in the world owed by the United States under Lend-Lease.
​
>In Belgium the social security tax is 25 per cent. Every regularly employed Belgian pays 8 per cent of his earnings into a social security fund. Every employer must match it — and handsomely top it -with the staggering figure of 17 per cent of each employee’s wages!
​
>There are some catches, of course. Taxes are high. Inevitably, prices are high. An American dollar goes hardly fart her than in Chicago or New York. Visitors from the rest of Europe, after a few meals of the kind they had begun to think exisled only in dreams, hurry home with their pockets empty.
​
>Without Marshall Plan help it would be all but impossible for the neighbors to buy the goods they so badly need and which Belgium must sell.
Would people be interested in a similar post every now and then? At first glance, there are some extra interesting old articles about Belgium in The Atlantic’s archive.
Post-war Belgium had one of the fastest recoveries in all of Europe, thanks to the fact that most of our industry was relatively intact. However, we quickly lost this edge in the fifties when other Western European nations experienced massive economic growth, especially West Germany with its Wirtschaftswunder.
In the fifties, Belgium was still relying in large part on traditional heavy industry and mining, such as coal, steel and glass, especially in Wallonia. This large industry was a boon for us when other nations had to rebuild and we could export a lot to them, but then later, we didn’t immediately catch up with new industries (petrochemicals, electronics etc.) and we kind of stagnated.
Then later, in the sixties, Flemish GDP per capita reached Wallonia’s level and then kept on growing rapidly, whereas Wallonia had very measly GDP growth. Flanders benefited a lot from international investment (e.g. petrochemicals in the Port of Antwerp) at that time, thanks to its good location (at the coast & at the heart of Western Europe), well-educated workforce, relatively low wages, non-antagonistic trade unions (compared to Wallonia).
This is probably the biggest reason why we didn’t have mass inflation and also didn’t need a lot of money from the Marshall plan. https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/nl/drafts/jan-ouvry/75-jaar-geleden-de-gutt-operatie-tegen-de-inflatie-en-de-oorlog/
Very interesting. Post more if you can!