Since the 1990s, privatization efforts in the European Union, most of Canada, and some countries in the Asian-Pacific region (including Japan and Australia) have caused governments to implement austerity measures in those regions. The austerity measures that were imposed to address the 2008 financial crisis were harsher than many people initially perceived, and this has caused an increase in poverty in most of those areas (most of them being located in the eastern portion of the European Union's territory).

Since the beginning of the 2010s, the European Union has been mired in a sovereign debt crisis; when the debts of all 28 members of the union are combined, they exceed the debt that America has. In 2015, a bailout referendum in Greece was rejected by votes, but the bailout went ahead anyway due to the policies of the Greek government towards businesses and billionaires rather than the public population. Bailout measures increase a country's division and results in populist political parties forming, which would often take the parties that have been in control of democratic regimes out of power. A country cannot have a debt-to-GDP ratio of above 100% or else the country risks going into sovereign default. This is exactly what happened in countries like Cyprus, Greece, Ireland, Portugal, and Spain, which exceeded the limit within 2 years of the crisis and required bailout measures to stabilize their economies. Some countries, like Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia, were affected by the crisis less severely than others, but the last three countries experienced increases in poverty that were comparable to what happened in Greece. As a result of the poverty increases, fascist parties began rising to power in all three of those countries, and they would gain control of their legislative and executive branches between 2010 and 2020. Since then, Hungary and Poland have not only passed legislation banning abortions and same-sex marriages, but also decreased taxes for the corporations and increased taxes for the rest of the population. This pattern is set to increase in intensity in the eastern half of the European Union before the middle of the 2020s, then expanded to the rest of the union by the end of this decade.

The same thing is happening in most Canadian provinces, whose legislatures have imposed austerity measures since the early 1990s despite recommendations not to do so. The first national austerity measures in that country were imposed shortly before the crisis; this caused poverty to increase in a few provinces, including Alberta. After the ruling party of Alberta was defeated in the 2015 election, the government replacing it promised to not cut any health and social services. However, despite this promise, austerity measures were imposed in a rapid manner. This caused severe poverty increases, which forced Jason Kenney to be elected premier of the province in 2019. Fascist parties are now continuing their advance into Canadian politics at a faster rate than anyone has ever imagined, thanks to the election of Trumpist members into the legislatures of North America since Donald Trump became president.