This comes from the mornings Bank of England Inflation Report:
The message is clear: we're working hard to go precisely nowhere.
No wonder wages are down.
No wonder the tax take is down.
No wonder the deficit remains.
This is a failing economy.
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I suppose we could instead the French/European model. They’ve managed to have zero growth, no wage growth, much higher unemployment and slower fiscal consolidation. France and it’s large tax rises is a prime example of not providing a solution.
If the UK is “a failing economy” what is the rest of Europe?
No one is proposing the French model
You just make up straw men
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“No one is proposing the French model”
If that is true, why do you think nobody is proposing it? Is it because it is too left wing and does not have the desired results?
It’s the wrong model
Eric
Interesting you dare mention that!
Why, pray, do the French outperform us by so much? Why is it that the French GDP per employee is so much higher than the British ?
Why are we so much less efficient than the unionised, highly-taxed, highly-regulated French?
Eric
You seem to glory in the idea that whereas the French have high unemployment, we have millions of people out there working. Producing v little & earning even less but at least they’re working!
It is a bizarre idea, suitable only for the c16 puritan’s view that work, of itself, no matter how unproductive, was good.
This is as clear a sign as possible that the recovery is illusory. It is a sign that the raw employment figures, so trumpeted by the Coalition, say nothing about quality of life. When unemployment falls, and productivity stays flat, it means that people may have *jobs*, but they’re not working. This is underlined by the shameful wage-growth figures.
The criteria for being classed as employed are now so broad, that they are meaningless, and are clearly a classification trick to polish the Coalition’s record.
We need a new economy as soon as possible.
Luke
I’ve been saying for some time now that the unemployment figures are a complete con.
IDS brought in private agencies & gave them strict targets to get people off JSA anyway/how.
Sitting at home waiting for a call to drive a van, wandering the streets with a Shammy leather & ladder or selling the Big Issue are all, in their way, self-employment. Do they in any way suggest there are loads of jobs available? No.
it’s no coincidence the 400 000 drop in unemployment that has taken place over the last 12 months has been matched be a 400 000 increase in self-employment over the same period. put simply claimants are being parked on Tax Credits.
and the truth won’t come out until Universal Credit kicks in and they all get reassessed. which (conveniently) won’t happen until after the election.
Graeme
As a generally apolitical person I do wonder how one brings this to the attention of the people that matter.
I posted here before that a really good economist wouldn’t just sit in their office collating data but go down into the pubs, cafes & markets & work out what was really happening.
Instead I listen to eminent economists on R4 puzzling over why the massive growth in employment has lead to no equivalent growth in GDP.
Err, BECAUSE ITS A CON! There is no real employment boom anywhere. Bullying people into self-employment doesn’t make work miraculously appear. I just feel like I’m constantly saying “Osbourne has no clothes”.
(Although the thought of George Osbourne naked is not a pleasant one, & has made me reach for my glass of Aussie Brut).
You are right
Go to the school gate to discover this
@eriugenus
i’ve puzzled over that myself.
like with so many of the scandals surrounding the current government, the mainstream media have been shockingly silent. a blind man on a horse galloping could see whats going on but because the evidence is all anecdotal, the government gets away with denying it (it was the same with the controversy around ATOS).
but it’s a bit like the various financial bubbles that have appeared; the more they are denied, the larger they loom and the greater the eventual damage to political credibility is.
but the question remains (particularly from a left-leaning perspective); how do we burst these bubbles before the next election?
We need to remember herman Daly’s words (as quoted by Rowbotham)when considering GDP as a measure:
” The progress indicated by conventional national accounts is…just a myth that evaporates when a welfare-oriented measure is substituted.”
So true
A large proportion of extra jobs are taken by East European immigrants, especially Polish. Employers love them because they pay them minimum wage (or less), they work hard and never complain about anything. I have many Polish friends who all work at the local 5* country house hotel near me. Most of them are highly skilled but flog themselves half to death for the pittance wages serving the super rich who can afford to stay there. There is no way they can organise to achieve better conditions because if the management got a whiff of it they’d be out the door immediately.
I admire them and like them a lot but it cannot be denied that the EU free movement of labour (and capital) has been disastrous for British workers
Agreed Carol -David Ricardo pointed this out in the early 19th Century. Of course, it is a gift for the neo-liberal mind-set.
I disagree with Carol Wilcox about the EU policy on the free movement of workers, for the simple reason that this is divide and rule by our masters, setting one lot of workers against another. We must not allow ourselves to be distracted by this stratagem. There may be other, and perfectly valid, reasons why this country should withdraw from the EU, but that isn’t one of them. European worker solidarity must be maintained, and is essential, regardless.
I strongly agree, on the other hand, with Simon about welfare-oriented measures of national income as opposed to the conventional measure of GDP, and with Luke William Thomas about the many so-called ‘jobs’ that are counted as jobs for purposes of the employment figures: self-employment, ‘McJobs’, zero-hours contract jobs, etc.
Because it is a difficult subject is no reason for ignoring it. Before the 1950s we experienced waves of immigration, mainly to our great credit (and benefit) from those seeking refuge. But since then immigration has been a deliberate capitalist policy to lower labour costs, whilst countries like Japan instead invested in capital goods. We also need to be aware that emigration has robbed the eastern EU states of their brightest and best.
Being aware of these things should strengthen us and resolve to counter the ‘divide-and-rule’ tactics of our masters.
Having gone through a recent political re-education which initially brought despair, I now accept that EU membership is here to stay and we had just better unite with our brothers and sisters to force changes for the benefit of all workers.
your obviously right about foreign workers undercutting and driving down wages of UK nationals in recent years. but that never had to be the case.
as you’ve already eluded to, these are young, well educated, multilingual, highly motivated, hard working people. how could that ever be a burden to any country?
i’d suggest the problem is more that the fruits of their labours aren’t being reaped by either them or their fellow workers. and that their potential isn’t being properly realised because of a lack of investment in skills and training, and more generally a lack of social mobility. if these issues were addressed, we could let in as many people as we liked regardless of what skills they had as they would simply replace those moving into higher skilled jobs.
contrary to Boris Johnson’s thinking it isn’t only rich peoples kids that have the potential to be doctors and scientists and engineers. they once thought it impossible for the poor to read and write. logic tells us there’s a lot more untapped potential at the bottom than the top.
and your right about us robbing eastern EU countries of their brightest and best. a good reason why people need to get over the fact that many send a few quid back home.
Net the NIESR argue immigration assist the UK economy
isn’t this an argument for abandoning the Euro so countries can regain sovereign currency which they can selectively ‘devalue’ to revivify their export markets?
Countries could then decide to train their brightest and best without the ghastly ECB hegemony imposing austerity and sell-offs which benefit multinationals.?