Austerity began as patriotic wartime sacrifice framed as self-denial

Evidence

Blackett took the mission to heart, and between 1916 and 1917 he traveled across Britain and the United States to zealously lecture audiences on how to “deny themselves comforts and luxuries” (Blackett 1918a, 16). In a public speech in New York City he spelled out the spirit of sacrifi ce that would become the basis of austerity: “Produce more, consume less, waste nothing … it does not matter whether or what you are paid for your services: spend your money and yourself in the service of your country” (ibid., 70). — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, 897

Categorization

• DEFINE: Roots the modern concept of austerity directly in a wartime savings slogan: produce more, consume less, waste nothing.
• ADDENDUM: Connects to the sacrifice theme in ‘On Sacrifice: The Real Kind, with Corpses’ — here sacrifice is demanded not ritual but economic, extracted from citizens in service of the state.
• XREF: connects to: Austerity originated after World War I as a counteroffensive against working-class unrest — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order: How Economists…, 28; Austerity frames national crisis as requiring patriotic individual sacrifice in frugality and labor — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order: How Economists…, 803; Austerity’s architects aimed to convert wartime sacrifice into a permanent universal norm — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order: How Economists…, 898 (+3 more)