This question immediately occurred to me on looking at this graph: is NHS spending now what it would have been if the annual rise had been constant at the dotted line since 1949? twitter.com/_Jimbo76/statu…
no alt text on the graph in that quoted tweet, so: a chart showing average annual rise in government spending above inflation, 1949-2019. Five rectangles spanning 1949-1979, 1979-1997, 1997-201, 2010-2015, 2015-2019, and a dotted line just under 4%. (1/2)
Dotted line labelled "average 1949-2019". The first two blocks are slightly under the dotted line; 1997-2010 is considerably higher; the final two blocks are considerably lower