Sunday, Sep 30, 2007
Gordon Browns Economic Mirage
Telegraph: Has Gordon Brown's 'economic miracle' come to an end?
One of the Best Comments I have seen for a while on a newspaper site, the first one nicely sums up our Economic Mirage.
Posted by enuii @ 06:35 PM (621 views) Add Comment
11 Comments
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1. sovietuk said...
Understand what high inflation is and what it does - because you're going to get plenty of it.
2. Paranoia Blue said...
Yes Gordie won't be able to use Nelson's action and, ammended comment, for much longer:-
"I see no shipwrecks.................."
Davey Jones has a rather large locker....keep your bow into the storm ahead, cos it's going to be a big one!!!
3. Ian said...
I agree the first comment is excellent.
4. denzil said...
Some excellent comments. What surprises me is the complete and utter malaise in the media regarding investigating the legitimacy of Brown's claim of an "Economic Miracle".
5. David Smith's Sub Prime. . . said...
Nonsense there is no such thing as inflation, I say so...
Love David Smith 13 and a quarter..
6. Orwell said...
And, he has poured extra billions of tax-payers monies into parts of Africa but we have no idea where it is has gone.
His and other New Labour pension funds perhaps?
7. shipbuilder said...
Gordon Brown's 'economic miracle' would have happened in pretty much the same way under the Conservatives because, as we all know, it was just Britain's version of the worldwide economic debt and asset price boom. The only difference is that under the Conservatives the wealth gap would have been even wider. The real story here is the widespread funneling of wealth from the relatively poor (in debt) to the rich (heads and major shareholders of private corporations). The reason that none of this is delved into too deeply in the media, even the right-wing rags, is because they are an integral part of that system. Papers are hardly going to criticise the system that keeps their owners in the lifestyle to which they have become accustomed, are they? Perhaps this might sound like lefty nonsense to some, but look at the balance sheets of Fortune 500 companies over the last couple of decades and ask if the increase in your wealth in any way compares to the increase in theirs. Do you feel wealthier, safer, more secure, happier, less stressed, 'time-rich'?
8. dbnazz1 said...
Denzil...
The mood of economic reporting has changed in most media over the last, say 5 weeks. Reporters are starting to question the Brown miracle. Loook at Sunday Express for
30/9/07. It had two pages dedicated to UK heading into big recession. Daily Mail on28/9/07 was reporting that lots of Chief Execs of major UK companies are very worried that UK is heading for recession and the reporter also poored scorn on housebuilders who are publicly saying that the current situation with UK property is a temporary blip and that the property market has good prospects.
9. Orwell said...
Shipbuilder..
Guess you have read Chomsky then?
10. C'mon Correction said...
Shipbuilder - you are assuming that it would be the same under the Tories?? Would the Tories have done as much tinkering as Gordon Brown to keep the credit bubble going (the list is long)?
It annoys me that left-wing politics always try to pin blame on a Tory government from 10 years ago for their failings, when they inherited a sound sustainable economy. Whenever a Labour government has been chucked out of power, there is always a huge economic mess to clear up.
Most of the trouble that Thatcher had to deal with was made by the previous Labour government. By their very nature a conservative goverment will be more prudent; and so NO, they wouldn't have made an unsustainable economy like just about every UK Labour goverment has.
11. shipbuilder said...
Don't get me wrong, i'm far from being either a New Labour or Gordon Brown supporter, but do you really believe that house prices and debt levels would have been any better under the Tories? The fact is that the same economic 'miracle' has happened in many other western economies, regardless of the colour of government - Gordon did nothing really to make it happen (we know it was created by the central banks), he just stoked it and hoped to use it to generate as much tax revenue as possible. In that sense, given that the tax burden an the rich probably would have been lower under the Tories, I believe that the wealth gap would now be wider. The only recognisably left-wing New Labour policy is that of taxation - I just don't see how the Tories would have been any different otherwise.
And no, I haven't read much Chomsky - it just seems obvious to me - on the one hand we have seen multi-national company profits skyrocket over the last 10 years and an unprecedented boom in the financial sector, yet everyone on here is moaning that they can't afford a house and feel poorer than they did years ago and the debt statistics, well I don't need to repeat them, do I? I'm not seeing much of the famed 'trickle-down' effect, i'm afraid.
It's interesting, Orwell and C'mon correction, that neither of you actually responded to my last point - do you believe it to be valid or not? Responding to differing opinions than your own by dismissing them as received wisdom or applying simplistic labels is much easier than addressing the points made. My main point is that our market economy is anything but 'free' as evidenced by recent pressure brought to bear by the banks - those with the real power. The fact is that those who consider themselves 'right-wing' economically should be the loudest critics of this situation - instead it is easier to stick one's head in the sand and dismiss it as lefty conspiracy theory. Not one media article is posted here without a torrent of accusations of spin, VI and left/right wing bias, yet suggesting that a media corporation might just be influenced by the economic status quo that pays its wages is not credible?