There were indeed alternatives to austerity that the fede and the government could have pursued at the time. But not only did they not choose to pursue them, but they didn't really, they didn't pursue them because, in fact, it appeared as though there was no alternative. That segemity at work, making a particular concern appear to be a general one. However tragic that this was actually, upon closer inspection, a class conflict that was decided in favor of capital. The idea that things like steel or electrical goods are so central to te economy that their pricing policy was actually a legitimate object of govern intervention, was not at all foreign at theTime.