Britain’s 1978-79 winter of discontent matched 1919-20 strike levels.

Evidence

During the country’s socalled winter of discontent— from October 1978 to February 1979— strikes occurred on a scale unseen since the General Strike of 1926. In 1979 alone, 4 million people were withholding labor, a fi gure equaling the combined number of strikers during 1919 and 1920. — Clara E. Mattei, The Capital Order, 1554

Categorization

• XREF: The winter of discontent is the proximate political trigger for Thatcher’s election and the austerity program — the sequencing matters for the book’s causal argument about 1979 as the turning point.