The Timeless Investor Show The Most Consequential Illness in Modern History
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Mar 13, 2026 A look at how the 1918 pandemic reshaped geopolitics, from wartime information suppression to the naming myth. Discussion of the pandemic's deadly W-shaped mortality pattern and why many healthy young adults died. Examination of Woodrow Wilson's illness at Versailles and its ripple effects through reparations, Weimar hyperinflation, and the rise of extremism. Exploration of 1920s economic booms, bubbles, and the investing lesson about suppressed information.
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Reparations To Hyperinflation And Lost Savings
- The Treaty of Versailles imposed reparations (~132 billion gold marks) that Germany couldn't pay, triggering Weimar hyperinflation by 1923.
- At peak prices doubled every four days; middle-class savings were wiped out and trust in institutions collapsed.
Economic Trauma Created Political Extremism
- Economic trauma and humiliation from Versailles and hyperinflation eroded faith in liberal democracy and helped create conditions for extremist politics.
- A generation's losses opened space for radicals, exemplified by a failed Austrian painter finding a mass audience.
Labor Scarcity Inverted Market Power
- The flu killed many working-age adults, creating sudden labor scarcity that boosted workers' bargaining power and raised wages in the early 1920s.
- This labor inversion was temporary but shaped early postwar economic dynamics.
