EMPIRE AND AFTER^441
Their departure did not leave the Algerians bereft. They had their
land back; the Christians (and Jews) were gone. (They also kept the
oil in the Sahara.) Yet the loss of these human resources was a
crushing blow. Over the years, the Algerian economy slowed, and
even oil and gas could not stem the tide. Algeria started exporting
people to France, where economic growth increased the demand for
labor. So much for the alleged capitalist need for empire.