One might be tempted, late at night and behind closed doors, in the priv... (come on man, I have a job to do and the electricity to pay, children to feed and all sorts of business to attend to... Ed) to say ARSE to austerity, we have never had it so good. That might be a mistake. We are all in this together and I have no wish to see my neighbour beggared. I allow that I might feel different if I were the possessor of a small fortune, a millionaire Da and a name like Gideon. If I had invested my somewhat short political future on the idea of cutting the nations economic throat as a cure for fiscal obesity I would be committed (or possibly should be committed...Ed) to the idea of austerity. However, there is this wee Scots guy who makes a very strong case for equating austerity with madness. If you think of Billy Conolly on Speed with the intellectual power of the laureated Mr Krugman you may be able to imagine the economic cruise missile that is
Mark Blyth. If not you can watch him here giving a talk at Google or Guggle as it is referred to in Scotlenad. For ye of little faith and shorter attention span
the Grauniad has an interview here.
So Gideon, we want
- Hipocratic Economics, No Slash and Burn
- Pay down debt and build buffers when you have the money,
- Now we need hope based priorities, policies and spending!
Three pointers for the young leader of a party near you.
Merv the Swerve at the Old Lady always appeared to me to be a bit of a Banker! In a FT lunch conversation with Martin Wolf he is quoted as saying that one of his prescriptions for the eurozone's woes...
to continue with mass unemployment in the south, in order to depress wages and prices until they've become competitive again. FT Life and Arts p 3 June 15/16 2013
A brave man indeed and perhaps the shy and soon to be retiring banker will offer to share his retirement package with the sons of Hellas, Napoli and the Reyes Catolicos who pitch up in the summer, on his doorstep, asking for a crust or two or even a job.
I believe - Da me un trabajo, pendejo is roughly equivalent to - Gis a job la! in Spanish. It might be useful to know that.
