From the Guardian this morning:
"Having set out his fiscal consolidation plan, it is important that chancellor George Osborne resist the temptation to engage in any significant net giveaway in the budget," the IFS said in its green budget, produced jointly with Barclays Capital and Barclays Wealth and published this morning.
I think the identity of the sponsors says it all in this case.
That and the fact that the Institute for Fiscal Studies is, of course, inextricably linked to the Oxford Centre for the Non-Taxation of Business.
Neoliberals to the core, all of them, and utterly indifferent to a) reasoning b) rationality c) the reality of the economy d) the needs of real people e) the reality of democratic politics.
Update: I gather the IFS backed off from the harsh line of its backers when presenting its report. At least Stephanies Flanders (not wholly objective as a former IFS insider) said so on her blog.
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this is a new level of delusion and denial even for you richard. I know many people who work at the IFS and they are mainly left of centre like most academics. they just understand the scale of the mess the country is in.
still, reason never stopped you slagging off the motives of people who disagree with you in the past so why stop now eh?!
@joanna
Look, there are left winders writing for the Mail – it remains a profoundly right wing newspaper
I judge by outcomes – and the IFS proposes profoundly neoliberal solutions that are profoundly right wing
There is no way the IFS can be described as neo-liberal unless you mean that at some stage a fiscal balance should be achieved. It has often come up with analysis that is definitely in the pro-Keynesian , anti -government camp. I am sure if the report had supported your left wing views you would have been the first to support it and to highlight the independence of this body.
@joanna
I have no knowledge of anyone who works at the IFS, but I have worked alongside a range of academic economists over the years, observed (and been the recipient of) the teaching of economics, and taught a fair few students (including many working as managers and policy makers in the public and private sectors). I was struck, therefore, by the following passage which I recently read as it certainly captures what I’ve observed. Maybe it applies to the IFS?
‘The justification for this concensus [that the transfer of wealth from the poor to the rich of the past 25 is acceptable] is classical economics. This is the economics that is taught to students, accepted by policymakers, politicians, civil servants, financiers, commentators, industry, most academics, and even some unions; collectively those that accept and advocate these doctrines make up the “mainstream”. According to this economics, market outcomes are optimal and the concensus straightforwardly follows. While economists are often portrayed as holding many inconsistent and opposing views, few do not support the basic policy concensus. Indeed, the economic theory that dominates permits only slight divergence from that concensus and the extent of any debate is really very small when it comes to practical implementation.’
Tily, G. (2010) Keynes Betrayed,Palgrave-Macmillan.
On World at One today IFS spokesman got a long, unusually uninterrupted and respected run, to puff the IFS message. Could have been a Govt Minister or Govt spokesman. Though WatO presented him, and he took the chance of intoning like, a neutral objective observer, his line was pure TINA (though he would like a Plan B). You would never have guessed that serious and respectable alternatives are fully part of the the current political spectrum and stage. I was more shocked at WatO than the IFS guy – he at least was doing his job.
You were quick to use the IFS when they said that last year’s Budget was regressive, Richard.
But I guess it’s only “neoliberal” because it disagrees with you.
Hello Richard Murphy,
My name is Jes??s, I from Spain.
I have seen the TV Documentary named “Paraisos fiscales” in the Public Television in Spain and You stay in it.
You interview is very good, and your job is wonderfull.
Thanks for your ideas.
😀
@Leon
I really do wonder why I have to explain some things that appear necessary on this blog
The explanation is simple. If I was asked a question by a peson such as “Do I qualify to be non-domiciled in the UK” I would give an objective answer. If they asked me “Should I apply to be non-domiciled” I might give a very different answer
I trust the IFS to give objective answers on facts or interpretation of some data
I do not trust their judgement
Is that so very hard to understand?
@James Alexander
Very, very BBC
Just as BBC Jersey was very aggressive with me last week
Neoliberalism rules at Aunty
@Ivan Horrocks
Great book by Geoff by the way – who I am pleased to have as a friend
For me, the problem with IFS isn’t necessarily that they are a bunch of raving Tories (a few of them are, but most aren’t), but that, whatever their political leanings, they tend to accept the conclusions of mainstream economic theory (which is, in the main, very right wing) at face value, and hence this lends a neoliberal hue to their analysis. Added to this is the fact that they rely on external macroeconomic forecasts for their Green Budget and for the last few years they have used Barclays Capital – hardly the most unbiased source of expertise!
If you compare IFS with somewhere like the New Economics Foundation, it seems to me that nef are much more willing to challenge the fundamental assumptions of economic theory – which makes their work considerably more interesting.
The BBC reporting on IFS (and indeed other mainstream economic research institutions like OECD) is very lazy as it assumes that because these are independent experts they are unbiased, whereas in fact that simply doesn’t necessarily follow. In the interests of fairness I should also note that some at the BBC – particularly Paul Mason and also to an extent Robert Peston – do take a more sceptical view of the mainstream.
@Howard
Pretty much agreed
Not questioning such an important issue is, in my opinion either a) dumb b) pragmatic acceptance c) agreement
Either way – it undermines their policies
And yes – Peston seems to be moving on