Yes, the Spanish flu infected 1/3 of the world and resulted in 50 million deaths. It's possible covid-19 will get there as well but we're not anywhere close to that yet.

The Spanish flu had absolutely massive economic effects that would have undoubtedly led to a massive crisis if it wasn't for a minor event called World War One.

And the places that recovered economically the quickest are those that locked down more and earlier.

But in that case, cities that shut down earlier recovered more quickly. http://news.mit.edu/2020/pandemic-health-response-economic-r...