It is an interesting counter-factual. Would Germany have been able to fight on longer in the Second World War if it had conscripted women labour rather than used slave labour? I imagine German woman labour would have been more efficient as some would have been volunteers. In addition, the Nazi state
felt obliged to feed and house its own nationals in a way that it felt no obligation at all to do for slave labour and even to a poor degree from conscripted male labour from occupied countries. Thus, it would have cost more for the state, but output is likely to have been higher.
All of this overlooks the fact that the use of slave labour of itself was a tenet of Nazism rather than actually being associated with raising production. Indeed Goldhagen makes a convincing case that in particular the use of Jewish 'labour' had nothing to do with output and was simply an additional
form of torture for Jewish prisoners. Thus, we could argue that if the Nazi regime had used women from Germany in place of slave labour it would have differed in a crucial way from what we see historically as 'being' Nazi. Trying to determine the relativity of tyranny is potentially corrupting in
Thank you for your well reasoned response to my joke. I appreciate it.
Like you said the slave labor and conscription of occupied people was a feature of Nazi ideology. The cruelty was the point, so they were never not going to use forced labor.
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There will latin Nazi, and gay Nazi and jewish Nazi(so weird!), and women Nazi.
Every loser wants to be a Nazi! That is the title of the century!
Like you said the slave labor and conscription of occupied people was a feature of Nazi ideology. The cruelty was the point, so they were never not going to use forced labor.