Post-Napoleonic depression

The post-Napoleonic depression refers to a post-war economic depression experienced by European countries following the end of the Napoleonic wars.

In England, an agricultural depression led to the passage of the Corn Laws (which were to polarize British politics for the next three decades), and placed great strain on the system of poor relief inherited from Elizabethan times.

In Scotland, the depression ended in 1822.

Samuel Jackson of Pennsylvania theorised that the Panic of 1819 and resulting depression in the United States were caused by the post-Napoleonic depression, holding that the end of the Napoleonic wars had led to the collapse of export markets and resulting underconsumption.