Having reasonably established in the previous post that a bad economy produces bad health what was the reason for the bad economy of the north. The huge discrepancy between the economy in the north of England versus the south goes back to the 1840s and ’50s. In that period huge profits from the cotton spinning and weaving industry were recycled from the rich of the north via the countryside banks to the City banks of London.
Instead of recycling money from the City banks to the countryside banks as required during bad periods and droughts in the years before the 1840s, the City banks started investing money abroad in very large quantities The north of England was increasingly denied the investment required for further development with a two-fold result: (a) Germany and America took over the main thrust of engineering development; (b) the coal, railway and textile industries were severely run down by the time of the First World War and almost totally decrepit afterwards.
Before the start of the industrial revolution the health of the people of the north was undoubtedly as good as those of the south and certainly far better than the health of Londoners whose health was notoriously bad. But it was the profits of industries of the north that paid for preferential advancement of London’s services, including health. that began the asymmetry of today. Health follows the money and not anywhere near the other way round.