We're All In This Together .....

[Serial_Apologist]

brilliant exposition!

Yes that's very good - and I'm only halfway through the written text.

The thing is, compared with the 1920s/30s, when the working class was not so much plied with advertised lifestyle promises as the middle and upper classes who could save, the motivation for living was solidarity. Added to which was the idea, however illusory in many if not most cases, of loyalty to the firm you worked for, provided you knuckled under and behaved yourself, because that loyalty gave access to the promotion escalator. If you were lucky you got to work for a philanthropic concern like the Quaker-owned Baker Pirkins in Willesden my dad apprenticed in after school in the late 1920s, who, because of their philanthropic treatment of the workforce, were exempted from the General Strike by the TUC in 1926. That's largely gone, with through-employment training now required to produce the necessary skilling that means adaptation to perennial technological change without any sense of career security providing the motivator; and at the end of the day capitalism's apologists had to come up with better answers to social and economic injustice and inequality than naked exploitation because the alternatives were socialism and even communism, based on that working class solidarity. Other than the one offered by Hollywood musicals there was no capitalist dream to betray, back then, but there is today, when so many bought the nuclear family ideals and supposed security of home ownership, which for some are the only remaining safety net now that privatised social provision proves inadequate to a nation's basic housing needs. Ironicaly enough, the only thing that kept capitalism wedded to an idea of social betterment for all was the existence of the Iron Curtain: look for yourselves what freedom offers. That had to fall - and I'm sure outspending the E Bloc in armaments - a drain there, a profit here - was part and parcel of bringing back the ideal of the boss being allowed to boss unhindered by unprofitable restrictive practices. No wonder that with the east offering itself as a gift of low wages, whether there or by way of free movement of labour under an extended EU, there is disillusionment and reversion to the mentality of scapegoating and divide-and-rule.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

in the 20s and 30s the casual labour markets in the docks and elsewhere [eg mines] were pretty awful, we are now with our zero hours etc coming back to the 20s ... i suspect the job for life was an aspiration in the post war years after the workers voted in Atlee, but then the working class Tories were a major force in the 50s ...

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

IMF says

The Fund has recognized in recent years that one cannot separate issues of economic growth and stability on one hand and equality on the other. Indeed, there is a strong case for considering inequality and an inability to sustain economic growth as two sides of the same coin.
...
by focusing on the role of redistribution. It finds that, from the perspective of the best available macroeconomic data, there is not a lot of evidence that redistribution has in fact undercut economic growth (except in extreme cases). One should be careful not to assume therefore—as Okun and others have—that there is a big tradeoff between redistribution and growth. The best available macroeconomic data do not support such a conclusion.

[Beef Oven!]

IMF says

Shame on you.

The part that you cut out, which is slap-bang in the middle of the sentences you quote says:

"But the Fund has rightly been cautious about recommending the use of redistributive policies given that such policies may themselves undercut economic efficiency and the prospects for sustained growth......."

We edit for the simple reason of summary - never because we wish to alter the meaning of what is being said because it does not fit what we want to believe.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

i cut it out because as they say quite clearly they no longer think that this is the case and that redistributive policies do not harm growth ... indeed they now argue that more equal economies enjoy greater growth ... and i did you the courtesy of the link to the full text so that you could form your own views

[Beef Oven!]

It's a very interesting topic and I thank you for the link.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

So the chumps are congratulating themselves on the reduction in the number who are unemployed to "only" 2.2 million people. That's 2.2 million people with very little to live on and many will have low self-esteem as a result.
It would make a very long dole queue. If the imaginary queue were to file past your front door in single file starting today, walking close enough behind one another to avoid treading on anyone 's heels, walking day and night with no meals or rests, the queue would still be passing relentlessly on at the beginning of July.

As Harold Wilson said, it matters not what the unemployment statistics are - if it's you it's 100%.

[ahinton]

So the chumps are congratulating themselves on the reduction in the number who are unemployed to "only" 2.2 million people. That's 2.2 million people with very little to live on and many will have low self-esteem as a result.
It would make a very long dole queue. If the imaginary queue were to file past your front door in single file starting today, walking close enough behind one another to avoid treading on anyone 's heels, walking day and night with no meals or rests, the queue would still be passing relentlessly on at the beginning of July.

As Harold Wilson said, it matters not what the unemployment statistics are - if it's you it's 100%.

That's true, of course - thought quite how full employment could ever be achieved is far from clear; who would pay how much from what source to ensure that everyone capable of fulfilling employed offices and willing to do so - and what would they all do and for whom? Reductions in unemployment (provided tht they can be believed as such and are not a mere dressing up of statistics) can only be a good thing but, with the best wilol in the world, there would inevitably come a point at which it could become very difficult to cut it further, I imagine.

Yes - "only" 2.2m unemployed in a country whose entire population is less than 70m is indeed an ironical expression and not something of which to be remotely proud. I'm not sure, however, to what extent the percentage of the British workforce that's currently unemployed is higher or lower than that of other nearby countries such as France, Spain, Italy, Germany &c.

[aeolium]

Yes - "only" 2.2m unemployed in a country whose entire population is less than 70m is indeed an ironical expression and not something of which to be remotely proud. I'm not sure, however, to what extent the percentage of the British workforce that's currently unemployed is higher or lower than that of other nearby countries such as France, Spain, Italy, Germany &c.

There are comparable figures for other countries here. Britain's figures are better generally than those of eurozone countries. The statistics for Spain and Greece in particular are pretty horrific, with youth unemployment above 50% in both countries.

[ahinton]

There are comparable figures for other countries here. Britain's figures are better generally than those of eurozone countries. The statistics for Spain and Greece in particular are pretty horrific, with youth unemployment above 50% in both countries.

Many thanks for this. It would seem from it that UK's figures are bettered nearby only by Norway, Austria, Denmark, Czech Republic and Germany. Spain's figure indeed looks really scary - almost as bad as that of Greece, as you note, although there's been considerably greater publicity to economic woes in Greece than there has to those of Spain.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

on a more operatic note the conjunction of these two stories on the same front page is noteworthy eh?

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/classical/news/cast-of-homeless-people-wows-opera-snobs-during-twoweek-residency-in-covent-garden-9507182.html

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/homelessness-spikes-outside-london-flats-spark-outrage-on-twitter-9506390.html

[ahinton]

[QUOTE=aka Calum Da Jazbo;405466]on a more operatic note the conjunction of these two stories on the same front page is noteworthy eh?

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/classical/news/cast-of-homeless-people-wows-opera-snobs-during-twoweek-residency-in-covent-garden-9507182.html

Sir George Young's remarks, if correctly and fully quoted in this piece, are so reprehensible as not to merit such quotation, although one may suppose that it's as well to know what such people do appear to think, however disgusting may be the thought.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk...r-9506390.html

Unforgivable though the installation of the spikes is, it's hard to figure out their deterrent factor against a reasonable mattress...

[french frank]

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/classical/news/cast-of-homeless-people-wows-opera-snobs-during-twoweek-residency-in-covent-garden-9507182.html

Sir George Young's remarks, if correctly and fully quoted in this piece, are so reprehensible as not to merit such quotation, although one may suppose that it's as well to know what such people do appear to think, however disgusting may be the thought.

It has often been quoted thus.

Though, if I may, I do somewhat object to the headline about 'opera snobs' which seems to conflate all opera goers as a Sir George Young.

[ahinton]

It has often been quoted thus.

Though, if I may, I do somewhat object to the headline about 'opera snobs' which seems to conflate all opera goers as a Sir George Young.

So Sir George Young is what you step over when rushing for an overcrowded train, especially after visiting the opera. I see. Had Henze known about this he'd surely have re-entitled his Elegy for Young Lovers and perhaps Max might also have thought to write a sequel to one of his works under the title Operas of a Mad Knight. Seriously, the man deserves to be Elektracuted for speaking out in that manner...

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

uk tax is more regressive than people think it is and certainly far less than it was when i was young and Supermac was PM