How the 'postwar Britain was broke' story took hold

Where does the claim that Britain was simply 'broke' after the Second World War come from?

Later accounts often used wartime cost to explain away the economic problems and policy choices of the 1960s and 1970s.

The familiar claim that Britain was simply broke after the Second World War is traced to later interpretations of the economic problems of the 1960s and 1970s. Making wartime cost the whole explanation can turn the war into a scapegoat for decisions made by subsequent governments. Destruction, debt, and reconstruction pressure remain real constraints. The debt analogy emphasizes that very large sovereign obligations create interdependence with creditors rather than functioning exactly like household insolvency. The result is a historiographical warning to separate genuine constraints from their later political use.