According to George Osborne, as reported by the Guardian, it is within Britain's grasp to become the wealthiest country in the G7 measured by GDP per head of population.
The G7 states are Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, UK, USA and the EU (yes, that is 8: the EU doesn't count).
This is core data to assess this claim based on World Bank information via Wikipedia:
So the UK has to move from fifth to first, leapfrogging France, Germany, Canada and the US on the way and see a massive relative increase to overhaul the US whilst they sit back and let us do just that.
And apparently we're going to do that by requiring that future governments would be forced to operate a budget surplus each year in what he described as “normal times”. That's a sweet attachment to pure Keynesianism on Osborne's part. It's also a commitment to reduce GDP in every year when a budget surplus is run, because that is what the impact of doing so is.
So Osborne says the UK will become the richest G7 state despite the government doing all it can to prevent that process by consciously reducing GDP through its own actions. As interesting ideas go that are very unlikely to have any relationship with reality that's a good one.
And this also shows a touching faith in UK business which is at present refusing to invest and is so poor at making what the world wants that we're running record trade deficits. But again, George appears not to want to ket facts get in his way. It could happen, but is as likely as Scunthorpe (currently 17th in League One) winning the Premiership.
I have to conclude that if his is the hype we're already getting in the election campaign we're in for a lot of complete nonsense being said between now and May. And if I am already beginning to wonder whether this stuff is even worth paying attention to, how many who are less interested than me (and that's probably most people) are feeling the same?
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You’re talking about a government (or at least one party within it, with the other content to be silent until recently) that has been marked out by the scale and scope of the false claims they’ve been prepared to make for the need/justification of their policies. The benchmark was set by Cameron’s claim before the last election that there’d be no top down reorganisation of the NHS when in actual fact they already had Lansley’s plans for the NHS well mapped out.
Subsequent claims and justifications for the deficit , universal credit, local government funding, the so called ‘red tape challenge’, environmental policy, planning reform, house building, most of their education policies, and many more, have all been based on questionable, highly dubious or just plain false statements and claims. Indeed, I think I’m right in saying that this government’s record on the misuse of statistics is unsurpassed by any previous government.
One reason that this situation has arisen is that the Tory party knows that it can rely on most of the media to go along with pretty much anything it claims, but that even where there’s disagreement – as with Cameron’s brief flirtation with environmentalism – they’ll never be as harsh in their criticism as they would be with anything a Labour, Lib Dem or Green politician does. Just read The Sun or The Mail to see that in action.
But there’s another far more fundamental reason. Just as is the case with big business, for the Tories, ethics, morality and truth are seen as primarily an exercise in PR (as another of your blogs today more than illustrates with the level of fines imposed on banks but without any real action being taken). The main thrust of their actions and utterances are thus directed at appearing to be ethical or truthful, while in practice being happy to say anything as long as the result is capturing control of the state and then staying in power. In short, the ends always and everywhere justify the means. And democracy is reduced to a mechanism to legitimate the increasing dominance and control of government by big business and the 1%. That is the overarching aim.
This is, as many people will recognise, much as it is with politics in the US – particularly with the GOP – and it is unsurprising we’ve gone so rapidly down the same path given both the Tories and Labour’s reliance on political and election campaign advisers from the US. When this is allied with neoliberal dogma it’s a potent mix that’s powerful enough to corrupt any political system.
Ultimately, therefore, we should not be surprised by anything anyone associated with the Tory party claims (and as a variant of the Tory party, UKIP is already heading down the same path). But it does create a dilemma for other political parties, who are reluctant to so readily throw ethics and truth out of the window in pursuit of power. As with so many things this government have done they’ve succeeded in creating a race to the bottom in politics, from which escape will not be easy, or perhaps even possible under our current democratic system.
I agree: we do have a race to the bottom
The apparent goal of market based economies is now to destroy all that is of worth
I see another golden rule coming where future chancellors spend their time adjusting the definition of “normal times”.
Indeed
The times won’t be “normal” again. That’s gone. “Interesting” is the new “normal”.
He will probably be using the massive wealth and income of the 1% to massage the figures.
Off topic but hopefully interesting…
Just watching the Daily Politics…apparently there’s a Westminster Film Club that’s just started, set up by a shiny Toryboy from ConservativeHome. The first choice was a 1940s version of Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead.
Update: there appears to be a courtroom scene of some importance in the film which our Culture Secretary, Sajid Javid read (romantically?)to his wife at university and it seems that The Fountainhead is Javid’s favourite film. Thankfully no Labour MPs turned up to the screening but I would suggest that these New Vandals (i.e. the young Conservatives) are beginning to show their true face.
These people have to be stopped. As soon as possible.
If true about that being his favourite film, that is quite an astonishing admission – its virtually tinfoil hat territory. It’s analogous to David Attenborough citing the works of Trofim Lysenko as an inspiration. Even if considered solely on its artistic merit its laughable. I could understand an admission of youthful naivety – but its *still* his favourite film and this guy is a member of the government…..scary stuff.
And back to the matter at hand then, we have George Osbourne spouting more nonsense…….good lord the next few months are going to be long and painful.
I hope that you do not mind that I shared this on Facebook. Chilling…
I think that’s unfair on Scunthorpe. They could get taken over by the Saudi royal family and spend their way to the Premier League title in five years.
🙂
Be careful, be very careful, one mega billionaire and Scunthorpe could be on their way. I recall Grimsby being in the First Division and look where Hull City are now. As for leading the G7, it is quite possible. The trouble will be that the middle and lower orders will be much poorer in that the loot will be with the very rich and the figures simply indicating a stage in the movement from where they looted it to one tax haven or another.
Bizarrely Grimsby were the first professional club I ever saw play – back at Blundell Park
Saw the Mariners at Filbert Street, Leicester must have been 48-49. City lost in the cup final that year due to “deferential refereeing”, Wolves having status and Billy Wright.
Excuses don’t change much
“we’re in for a lot of complete nonsense being said between now and May” I think this is clearly the case. The election is a charade, a simulacrum of a notional democracy. If only we had an abstention vote!
It’s interesting that Labour seem too ‘meek and mild’ to remind everyone who is actually gaining from this growth we know it’s the very high earners in the South East. – certainly not the low paid families or newly redundant, jobless, underemployed or the misfortunate needing medical care , or public service employees on frozen salaries etc., or many beyond the M25.
Labour has to establish a discourse that can remind the electorate of how unequal Britain has become and also say how it would be socially just as it handles the deficit of 90 billion. The ‘articulation’ of that debate is urgent otherwise Miliband’s And Ball’s Labour looks too close to the current coalition and voters might say stick with nanny
Whilst I admire your optimism, Leslie, I am afraid I cannot share it. The Labour Party (or at least the effective part of it) have become too wedded to a political paradigm rooted in Neo-liberal economics. That school of thought has in itself become a lens through which everything is evaluated. The relative success (or failure) of every action or reaction is adjudged not in real or pragmatic terms, but in relation to its adherence to the long-time plan. I am often surprised that more commentators don’t recognise the similarities with Maoist China or Stalinist Russia.
The pdf document posted by JohnM highlights the aspirations of the technocratic right only too well, whilst conveniently ignoring the all too often forgotten fact that a nation is by definition its people. The author also ignores the fact that such a future has its failure built in. A consumerist society that places increasing restrictions on the number of people who are in a position to consume is destined to fail from the outset. That is without even considering the compounding variable of human nature. Assumptions on the part of those that rule us that the disadvantaged will simply lie down and take it are so fatuous as to be beyond contempt. We are already seeing the beginning of the mass exodus of citizens from continents rendered virtually uninhabitable by the consequences of Western consumerist capitalism, be it through inept interventionism, global inequality and/or climate change. If the fact that these unfortunates are prepared to risk everything (their lives included) to achieve a tolerable standard of living for themselves and their families doesn’t suggest to the architects of the Neo-liberal dream that the human spirit is a powerful adversary, they should think again.
In Europe too we are seeing a rejection of the Neo-liberal paradigm with the growing support for Parties such as Syriza and the extraordinary Podemos! It is unlikely that supporters of either are unaware that they will face the vituperative wrath of the banks and the markets, who will do all in their power to thwart the will of the people. But that does not deter them.
It remains to be seen whether those parties have any or all of the answers to the challenges we face as nations and individuals. But what is clear is that the aims and aspirations of the people are at odds with our politicians.
What is needed is a completely new political and economic paradigm that takes as its start point ‘Maslow’s hierarchy of needs’ and prioritises Humanity and sustainability over wealth and growth.
All that being said the chance to forge a new democratic movement that encompasses those ideals by peaceful means will I suspect be higher after 5 years of a Labour Government.
You probably will not want to read this then:
https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/303335/the_future_of_work_key_findings_edit.pdf
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“In terms of that great abstract thing we call the economy, the robot future is, without doubt, better than long-term stagnation. For those **excluded from its benefits** though, it might not feel that much different”
https://flipchartfairytales.wordpress.com/2015/01/14/the-future-of-work-tech-yeah-vs-tech-meh/
Whatever became of “expansionary fiscal contraction”? Did that slip from our “grasp”?
I have a feeling he still thinks it will work
Which is very frightening
‘Economics, said Mr Stanley, is 50% psychology – what we need, apparently is is not statesmen but hypnotists. Not scientists but witch-doctors, not confidence born of scientific predictions of the future, but confidence created by a political Confidence Trick. There is nothing surprising in this. It is the kind of mystic mumbo-jumbo to which capitalism is driven when austere reason pronounces sentence of death on it. It is the primitive recoil from reality and the burdens of reality which lies at the root of fascist psychology.’
-Aneurin Bevan