I read this morning's news as I tried to persuade my slightly reluctant body that it is back in UK time. Having read that news, here is a summary of the economic elements of it:
Economists are worried that there will be another economic downturn. This will be for all the usual reasons.
And:
Economists are worried that all the usual solutions to an economic downturn created by all the usual reasons will no longer work.
Economists concerned are heightened by:
Stock markets reached an all time record high yesterday, which is one of the usual signs of the usual overheating of the market which precedes a usual economic downturn for which there are now no usual solutions.
And:
To add some unusual flavour to this situation, Brexit talks are collapsing, with the surest sign that the problem emanates from within the UK being the unusual change to the parliamentary timetable to defer discussion of the Brexit Bill because there the usual fears that the government will lose in the Commons.
There are, I am sure, other issues of consequence to note. But these dominate. They too can be summarised:
The usual headless
chickenspoliticians pre-programmed to repeat past mistakes appear destined to deliver major economic crisis with a Brexit twist.
And there is only one possible response:
Economists propose new economic models that abandon past prescriptions of growth and substitute a focus on the increase in the wellbeing of ordinary people in a world where climate change is a reality as a solution to world economic crisis.
I call it the Green New Deal.
You call it what you like.
I suggest that unless something like it happens the next few years may not be a lot of fun.
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Well done you Richard for getting back into the office after a dashing trip like that. We all welcome your efforts (and wish some so called business people would give the same efforts!)
It’s about what sort of country, or countries within the British Isles, we want to be. There is a discussion ongoing among those seeking Independence in Scotland about what an independent Scotland would look like, but there seems to be nothing of the sort happening in England.
Anthony Barnett, in his “The Lure of Greatness..” suggests both Cameron & May asked this question (re Brexit), “not to start a debate but to impose their own solution.” Meanwhile the Left and Labour fled the field.
G Hewitt,
“fled the field”?
There may be more to it than that. The Tories are digging themselves into a hole. Labour currently sees no advantage in jumping in with them. Some might see that as being too cynical or expedient. If so they need to devise a better alternative. That won’t be too easy.
With respect to the Green New Deal – unless this is in place – come the next crash low carbon/zero carbon investment will dry up. Since climate change is immune to financial ups & downs it will roll on regardless. The latest gov’ “strategy” doc on Green Growth published this week by BEIS is mostly tinkering at the edges/small-scale, tactics rather than large-scale strategy & a reliance on markets to deliver. Your “same old same old” point about economists also covers 40 years of UK gov – mostly small-scale thinking a reliance on “markets” to deliver & guaranteed failure when there is an economic downturn.
A somewhat pessimistic outlook, Mike Parr.
Wish I had some convincing arguments (or even one) to persuade you it was mistaken.
Is it a coincidence that while London property prices go down stock prices rise?
Where else can surplus cash go when there are very low interest rates and Brexit uncertainty?
Bill Hughes,
“Where else can surplus cash go…”
Apparently it be hoarded (effectively) in the form of highly liquid, ‘risk-free-rate’ investments:
http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2017/09/29/for-once-the-worlds-wealthiest-people-may-have-got-something-right/
http://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2017/10/03/it-really-is-time-to-put-money-to-work/
The rush to invest in blocks of student flats across the country is another unwelcome use of excess capital. In Cardiff we have seven being built and another seven in planning…
Bill Hughes,
Whoop! Whoop! (Digression alert)
I’m sure your question is intended to be rhetorical, but rhetoric is a dying art. (Evidenced by the number of Education ministers who refer to the ‘Three Rs’ as Reading, ‘riting and ‘rithmatic without knowing it used to be a joke and now they are the joke)
Witness the fuss that was made of Hilary Benn’s speech to ‘the house’ about bombing ….where was it that time? Syria, I think. The media response was almost hysterical because someone had made a speech in sentences instead of soundbites. They were so delighted they failed to register that it was tosh.
Q. “Is it a coincidence that while London property prices go down stock prices rise?”
A. I don’t think it’s coincidence. But of course it’s not necessarily the same money.
Q. “Where else can surplus cash go when there are very low interest rates and Brexit uncertainty?”
A. Into absolutely anything that might make life better for someone, in some way Anyone, in any way.
The paucity of imagination that seems to go hand in glove with possession of wealth is probably the most cogent reason for not let people acquire it in the first place.
My apologies.
I forgot to sound the digression all clear siren. Appended herewith:
Whooooooooooooooooo…..
Andy Crow
Thanks. I thought I was alone in hearing Hilary Benn’s speech as selective truisms delivered portentously. It impressed me only as oratory & it didn’t impress me much as that.
As Dorothy Parker said “you can tell what God thinks of money by the people He gives it to”
In fairness, the money in the London housing market shouldn’t go into the UK at all. It isn’t our money! It should go back to the countries it was looted from. Oftentimes they’re poor countries & the odd £500m could make a real difference. Here i just makes the difference between Chelsea & the achingly untrendy lower Kensington.
Oh! My God, eriugenus
“…In fairness, the money in the London housing market shouldn’t go into the UK at all. It isn’t our money! It should go back to the countries it was looted from…..”
Yes. Yes. Definitely. But how far back can it be unwound?
If I bore my mother’s family name, which would have been her mother’s family name I would be a ‘Coldwell’. That’s as far as I can confidently go. I would need to research parish records to be sure whether the previous generation ‘Herris’ was the matronymic . (My on-board dictionary incidentally, declines to acknowledge there is such a word as ‘Matronymic’ and insists I must mean ‘Patronymic’ I find that ‘telling’)
If we were to go only the two generations I’m sure of, it would take a forensic accountant of considerable prowess to to wind back the inheritance implications that have arisen from following the male line.
I think we have to draw a line where we are and hope Richard (and others) can recruit enough minds to the task of redressing some of the distortions of wealth distribution through a more enlightened tax system which would establish a new fair distribution of the wealth that in many cases started to accumulate at least as long ago as Domesday.
And William of Normandy only had title by fighting for it.
I picked up a ‘motto’, or perhaps ‘credo’, from a character in a play (by David Hare, I think). Faced with the imminent prospect of destruction in a street fight his oppo urges him to to walk away from, Our ‘hero’ says. ‘You don’t go back.’
I’ve found it wise counsel on occasions.