So apparently the economic crisis is now so bad that there's really no choice but to increase taxation, in order to continue funding our massive public sector whilst tax revenues are falling and welfare costs increase.
So in addition to all that debt you're trying to pay off and all those wage bills and other costs you're trying to meet - despite falling orders and cancelled contracts - the solution to your problems is to be taxed yet more.
Cos, apparently, we're all sitting on a great big wodge of cash that needs spending, and, you know what? If you're not going to spend it then the Government's just going to spend it for you. That's the deal. That's the plan, that's the message, that's the line and that's the choice being offered to you by
100% of the mainstream political parties.
Great. Absolutely friggin' great. Here was I thinking, "at least the Lib Dems are offering to reduce the overall tax burden" but as of today no we're not. We've joined the Great Stupid Concensus that states all political parties must offer exactly the same thing for fear they might get bullied by one of the others for being a bit different.
Never mind the fact that the Great Stupid Concensus is based on common economic fallacies and voodoo - and importantly because politicians - and activitists, and 'thought leaders' like Sunny Hyndal, and journalists and commentators - in fact anyone who's livelihood or reputation depends on telling people what they want to hear - are intrinsically incapable of being willing to make public sector workers redundant. It's bad politics you see.
So once again I find myself stuck between that bloody rock and that flippin' hard place. The desire to figure out a way to successfully sell the Lib Dems, and the fact that in order to 'win' you need to sell yourselves as being willing to do something that stinks. How do you sell good policy? How do you sell something that actually works? Damned if I know. Seems like the art of campaigning is all about eliminating any and all differences between yourself and your opponent and turning it into a beauty contest.
It's because there's so many people dependent on tax money now, you see. Not just the direct public sector workers, but many companies like Capita that depend on generous contracts anyway. This is a constituency that will be pandered to until the absolute ruin of the economy - the vested interests are too powerful and the disincentives for people willing to confront it a sort of political nail bomb - lethal and indiscriminately devastating to those around you.
I sigh. I sigh, I roll my eyes, then I sigh again. Then I bang my head against a desk for good measure. What hope I had for Nick Clegg's leadership has gone now. The difference between Huhne and Clegg, it seems, was that Clegg said he was going to do something different with the Lib Dems but then hasn't, pleading that the economic crisis means fuck liberalism, the only way to fly in 2009 is Social Democracy because, dammit, it's the ultimate tried, trusted ideology that's loved and working around the world! Yes, Social Democracy is awesome. Witness the awesomeness. You can have free markets and bountiful public services and everyone's happy and everything's great and it's all just peachy and grand. Stick with the normal stuff and leave the experimental 'weird' stuff to the fringes. Liberalism? That's just weird. No, Social Democracy is the best of everything, rolled up into a fantastic populist package with widespread support of everyone no matter what their political beliefs. It's normal. Normal is good.
Huhne, on the other hand, was honest and promised to keep us exactly as we were. I wish Huhne had won, so that I wouldn't have wasted the last few years in a stupid, vain hope that Clegg, underneath his obvious need to keep the activists happy, was actually a proper economic liberal. Silly, foolish me. I fall for it every time.
See, for every pound the Government spends, it is a pound that cannot be spent by the private sector. There is an opportunity cost that is invisible to those who aren't looking for it. Because of the overhead of collecting taxes, and because so much of this wealth is spent providing jobs for the sake of providing jobs, the final effect of redistributing this Capital is a net loss of wealth compared with simply having the money being used to make or do something that's in demand, which would be a net increase in wealth.
This, in terms of what economic liberalism is all about, is just the tip of the iceberg. Our current economic system is the cause of the unemployment and barriers to entry that keep the poor poor, yet we focus on the symptoms rather than the causes because treating symptoms creates shiny headlines, and treating causes makes your opponents - who demand you treat the symptoms - look more 'in touch' with the people than you, and so you get thrown out while the idiots causing the problem in the first place get to wreak yet more havoc and mischief whilst basking in the adulation of having 'fixed the problem' for oblivious and gulliable voters.
People are not sat at home hiding thousands under the bed, refusing to spend out of fear. We have no savings in this country - we just have lots and lots of debt. Taking more money from the private sector and dumping it in the public sector reduces wealth and productivity. It worsens the recession.
Capital is harder to accumulate under our system - and lacking the ability to borrow this crisis not of credit but of capital itself, where the size of the public sector has grown so large that it has begun strangling the life out of the private sector. Dependent on credit to make ends meet, the credit crunch means that there's no hope, no escape, no alternative.
Because God Forbid a single public sector worker loses their jobs, while those of us in the private sector sit absolutely terrified that a simple cashflow issue could force our employers into administration and ourselves onto the dole. God Forbid public sector workers should be exposed to uncertainty, fear, unemployment, redundancy or anything like that. Gord Forbid, and Dave and Nick scurry to spread the word.
Now of course there are things that Government can legitimately spend money on, but it should be because it's absolutely necessary - never for the reason that it would 'create jobs.' Because, once you've taken the buggers on you can't get rid of them. Our politicians would rather see us in permanent depression than make a single public sector worker redundant and be seen as 'the bad guy'. Is it any wonder why people think that Thatcher's the only politician that actually had a pair of balls? I don't agree with much of what she did but, christ, she actually did kick people off the public sector payroll, something I don't believe any modern politician is capable of.
Must get a move on and get my new blog up and running. This not blogging thing isn't working out for me at all. I need to vent, and vent I shall.
UPDATE:
Obviously the reason is that, according to the FT, the Government needs to find an extra £350 billion in the next two tax years. That's.. £125 billion a year, or the entire Social Protection budget per annum. It is the cost of the police and the NHS put together. It is more than 1 6th of the total budget for 2008 - £610 billion
In other words, we're in deep, deep trouble. £610 billion plus the extra £125 billion would equal more than the total wage bill of the entire UK put together, which considering less people are working it's going to be a lot more.
Someone please explain to me how this is sustainable or desirable, how 'cuts to public services' are anathema, forbidden, not allowed, completely unaccepable but an additional £125 billion of either borrowing, printing money or tax is? What is wrong with people? Why don't they share my sense of horror at this?
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