the Austerity Con or Con

[aeolium]

Calum and S_A (and others) should certainly watch, if you haven't tonight, this excellent documentary on inequality in the USA, and the way the wealthy have captured the political process in America over the last 30 years. I found it really disturbing, with plenty of resonances for other countries including our own. Apart from anything else, it shows how flawed the idea of meritocracy is when the starting points for different people in society are so unequal (something Tony Blair, for instance, never understood).

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

yes thanks aeolium excellent film .. very chilling and blood boiling simultaneously ... there seems little point trying to persuade or influence such people in any civilised way ....

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

my niece has been severely physically disabled all of her life, so severely that she is incapable of work - as are many many disabled people

i also know that much of the spend on benefits goes to subsidise low wages and the working poor

Laurie Penny does a good demo job on the argument that it is about getting us back to work .... and much more about taxing the corpocats

[teamsaint]

Thanks Aeolium and Jazzer for a those links.

Moral? don't be unlucky, I guess.

[Lateralthinking1]

groovy economist alert: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SkesgECRXtM

An interesting interview. I'm a believer (probably). Calum's Laurie Penny was very good too. The fundamental problem is that Keen, Penny and many others might as well sleep 24/7 or simply watch the grass shrink. None of it will be taken on board for decades.

[amateur51]

It's taking me a considerable time to digest the content of these great links but many thanks in between to those who posted them - keep 'em coming

[Serial_Apologist]

It's taking me a considerable time to digest the content of these great links but many thanks in between to those who posted them - keep 'em coming

They make a decent change from all the "experts" wheeled out on news programmes to claim there is "no alternative". So much for balanced unbiassed broadcasting eh.

[Serial_Apologist]

So now we know: it's gonna take 10 years since the banking collapse to get the country out of austerity. Which is to say, 2 years longer than it took following WW2. Neoliberal capitalism has delivered more damage than the Luftwaffe succeeded in doing.

[teamsaint]

So now we know: it's gonna take 10 years since the banking collapse to get the country out of austerity. Which is to say, 2 years longer than it took following WW2. Neoliberal capitalism has delivered more damage than the Luftwaffe succeeded in doing.

And both "funded" by the same US banks?

[Simon]

So now we know: it's gonna take 10 years since the banking collapse to get the country out of austerity. Which is to say, 2 years longer than it took following WW2. Neoliberal capitalism has delivered more damage than the Luftwaffe succeeded in doing.

Leaving aside your earlier hilarious post stating that you "told us so" - (the mess that the country would have dissolved into had those policies been followed would have effectively finished us all off with no hope of recovery at all) - it isn't "neo-liberal capitalism" that is at fault. It's stupid government.

I've heard and read all sorts of clever, weaselly arguments about the current mess. But the fundamental fact remains that it was excessive borrowing linked to spending on useless social engineering projects that caused this mess. As in Greece to a massive extent, so in Spain to a slightly lesser extent and in the UK, fortunately, less still.

Allied with corruption and graft and greed - (that's where we will all agree) - it was a recipe for disaster that some were predicting 20 years ago. THEY - the astute business people who lived in the real world of commerce, not the false promises of the never-never land of politics - told you so, not the tired old men of the left! I remember hearing a report on that very subject whilst travelling on an unnecessary and almost deserted motorway, built to provide jobs and therefore buy votes, in Southern Spain.

The banking collapse merely brought the chickens home to roost earlier than they would otherwise have arrived.

I don't expect most on here to agree, of course. Because it feels better when you blame the nasty capitalists...

[MrGongGong]

would you consider the present governments "free schools" and "academy" programmes "useless social engineering" ?

seems like it to me ...........

Royal weddings and the Olympics ?

[Serial_Apologist]

Leaving aside your earlier hilarious post stating that you "told us so" - (the mess that the country would have dissolved into had those policies been followed would have effectively finished us all off with no hope of recovery at all) - it isn't "neo-liberal capitalism" that is at fault. It's stupid government.

I've heard and read all sorts of clever, weaselly arguments about the current mess. But the fundamental fact remains that it was excessive borrowing linked to spending on useless social engineering projects that caused this mess. As in Greece to a massive extent, so in Spain to a slightly lesser extent and in the UK, fortunately, less still.

Allied with corruption and graft and greed - (that's where we will all agree) - it was a recipe for disaster that some were predicting 20 years ago. THEY - the astute business people who lived in the real world of commerce, not the false promises of the never-never land of politics - told you so, not the tired old men of the left! I remember hearing a report on that very subject whilst travelling on an unnecessary and almost deserted motorway, built to provide jobs and therefore buy votes, in Southern Spain.

The banking collapse merely brought the chickens home to roost earlier than they would otherwise have arrived.

I don't expect most on here to agree, of course. Because it feels better when you blame the nasty capitalists...

Glad I amused you.

Governments are part of neoliberal capitalism - either in enabling it or letting it happen. Social engineering is just a once-fashionable word for what all social systems do.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

well Simon and there was me thinking that the Thatcher and Reagan burning of the regulations had been at the request of the neo-liberal capitalists and their intellectual stooges in the academy ... the lack of that regulation unleashed the borrowing binges and unsustainable debt levels so cruelly exposed by the criminal and fraudulent activities of the major banks and funds that crashed in 08 costing the taxpayer billions in support and causing a cascade of doom ... and yes there was always Gordon Broon but not even he managed to do the whole job single handed on a global basis

and of course we now have the situation where the majority of the utility assets flogged off by Thatcher [how i enjoyed the family silver speech by MacMillan] are now owned and operated by French German and Spanish nationalised companies instead of the British Government .... what difference was all that meant to achieve?

[amateur51]

Leaving aside your earlier hilarious post stating that you "told us so" - (the mess that the country would have dissolved into had those policies been followed would have effectively finished us all off with no hope of recovery at all) - it isn't "neo-liberal capitalism" that is at fault. It's stupid government.

I've heard and read all sorts of clever, weaselly arguments about the current mess. But the fundamental fact remains that it was excessive borrowing linked to spending on useless social engineering projects that caused this mess. As in Greece to a massive extent, so in Spain to a slightly lesser extent and in the UK, fortunately, less still.

Allied with corruption and graft and greed - (that's where we will all agree) - it was a recipe for disaster that some were predicting 20 years ago. THEY - the astute business people who lived in the real world of commerce, not the false promises of the never-never land of politics - told you so, not the tired old men of the left! I remember hearing a report on that very subject whilst travelling on an unnecessary and almost deserted motorway, built to provide jobs and therefore buy votes, in Southern Spain.

The banking collapse merely brought the chickens home to roost earlier than they would otherwise have arrived.

I don't expect most on here to agree, of course. Because it feels better when you blame the nasty capitalists...

The usual load of nutty slack from Derbyshire

It was Goldman Sachs, wasn't it, who helped the Greek government to get around their addiction to debt and to 'make the case' for their entry into the Euro?

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-03-06/goldman-secret-greece-loan-shows-two-sinners-as-client-unravels.html

http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Devils-Derivatives-Traders-Regulators/dp/1422177815/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1354788408&sr=8-1

[amateur51]

Glad I amused you.

Governments are part of neoliberal capitalism - either in enabling it or letting it happen. Social engineering is just a once-fashionable word for what all social systems do.

Derbyshire libraries to blame for keeping our correspondent so ill-informed and behind the trend then, eh S_A?