Well, if people stop producing things it usually means that they can't. The current situation would have to be hopeless (continual bad weather for growing food, economy down the toilet etc). It could also mean that overseas supply is more plentiful and/or far cheaper than locally made goods and so the country has to (temporarily?) move to being an Importer instead of an Exporter. Obviously this will widen the socio-economic gap even further, and that's not good. In this day and age, the govt will likely just print more money and pretend that inflation isn't happening and tell people to go and buy the imported stuff with their govt cheques...and we all know that only works for so long... The other end of the stick is that they knuckle down and make people 'work for the dole' and effectively force poorer people into slave labour. Neither situation is good.