I remember the stories a friend (now long gone) told me of when he was a 20-something kid during the Depression. He use to hitch on trains from place to place trying to pick up any odd job & figuring that anywhere had to be better than where he was. He was constantly hungry. - - He got back home before Xmas one year, and was pleased that his family was actually able to give him a gift that year. A single orange. - - He said that when he bit into it, that piece of fruit was the most wonderful thing he could imagine. He fought in the Pacific during WW2 in the Navy. A lot of recruits were pretty thin from having gone through the Depression. Of course the "Brother Can You Spare a Diime?" stories from the Great Depression have to do with a deflationary downturn. I wonder how things might be in a Weimer Germany hyper-inflationary setting - "Brother Can You Spare a Wheelbarrow- - - full of Greenbacks?" - - -