Hidden in reports of [url=http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/david-cameron-insists-that-squeeze-on-publicsector-spending-is-permanent-8933539.htmlDavid Cameron's announcement of permanent austerity[/url, comes this little gem:

"The Prime Minister said the biggest threat to the cost of living was if Britain allowed its debts to get out of control, driving up interest and mortgage rates."

If this is correctly reported, then Cameron is saying that interest rates need to stay low. So, how will that encourage anyone to save?

Besides, house prices are on the rise again anyway, but it's difficult to see how, even if interest rates were to rise, that would change much, given the rate at which interest presently is and the rates at which the likes of transport and fuel costs are going up.

Presumably, his 'point' is that interest rates need to stay low to encourage people to spend.

Now I could be wrong, but hasn't everyone decided that cheap credit was a bad thing, and didn't even Cameron's Tories suggest that the economy needs rebalancing? Have they not also suggested that saving is a positive thing to do?

Or was that all rhetoric, as opposed to the 'truth', as fed to him by big business and big finance?

Of course they did and the fact this has not happened has meant they conveniently forget they ever said it. The fact the economy is growing in the exact same way as they said caused the problems in the first place has been conveniently forgotten. Institutions such as the IMF have not and point this our but it isn't very well reported. No surprise there then.

I can't save anything anyway so Call Me Dave will be happy with me.

I resemble that remark.

So Cameron espouses a "culture that...values that typically British, entrepreneurial, buccaneering spirit"

Let's check some definitions, shall we?





Yep, makes perfect sense. Mildly surprised he admits it so openly but they have become recklessly emboldened in recent times so maybe I shouldn't be.

It's all a ploy to return the country to the pre-Thatcher status quo - ie the masses with no prospect of advancement; and with power and prosperity held only by those who inherited capital and went to Eton or Harrow. Poor old Michael Gove, with his self-professed intellect one day he may realise he's the mouth piece for a party that despises him and oiks like him.

You are John Major and I claim my £5.

It's just a load of nonsense. He talks about not spending public money but then talks about HS2 (a complete white elephant that will just enhance London's dominance in the UK economy). They've also committed ridiculous sums of UK tax payers money to the French and Chinese governments over Hinkley Point. As to interest rates, the Governor on the BoE said they'd rise when employment improved. Well Cameron is today excitedly wittering about the huge rise in employment, so maybe interest rates will go up sooner than he thinks?

Talk about double-speak. The guy is a total .

When announcing permanent austerity, it is advisable to do so whilst standing around lots of gold things.... www.businessinsider.com/picture- ... ty-2013-11

When announcing permanent austerity, it is advisable to do so whilst standing around lots of gold things.... www.businessinsider.com/picture- ... ty-2013-11

Quote ="bramleyrhino"When announcing permanent austerity, it is advisable to do so whilst standing around lots of gold things.... www.businessinsider.com/picture- ... ty-2013-11'" And wearing sy evening get up and having had what was presumably a slap-up dinner. Yes, I'd seen that but decided not to go for what seemed a rather obvious target.

Quote ="bramleyrhino"When announcing permanent austerity, it is advisable to do so whilst standing around lots of gold things.... www.businessinsider.com/picture- ... ty-2013-11'" And wearing sy evening get up and having had what was presumably a slap-up dinner. Yes, I'd seen that but decided not to go for what seemed a rather obvious target.

Don't forget £200 of Primark vouchers if you breast feed your child

In fairness, the Conservatives themselves are [url=http://www.buzzfeed.com/jimwaterson/6-speeches-the-conservatives-dont-want-you-to-seecutting quite a lot at the moment....[/url

Oh dear, oh dear.

Thanks for that: bookmarked.

This goes into a little more detail on Gidiot's speech:

Look at the date on that article - September 3rd 2007 - note the phrase "writing in todays Times..."

George Osborne wrote that article, pledging to increase spending on public services on the presumption that the economy was "growing faster than public spending" just ELEVEN DAYS before Northern Rock sought liquidity support from the Bank of England.

If ANYONE is still in any doubt that the country is led by idiots, chancers and con artists then this should finally put those doubts to rest - Osborne is not alone in this however, NONE of our politicians saw what was coming on September 14th of that year and even as the board of Northern Rock were turning their pockets out and tearing the back off the settees for one final search for a bit more cash, our great leaders were contentedly making plans, nay, trying to outbid each other with their plans, for extravagant public spending on the strength of this great economy that they'd helped to build with their policies.

[url=https://twitter.com/DeanBaker13This bloke did see what was coming – an economist, he was out by about one quarter on saying when the crash would come.[/url

Lucky guess (like the "financial advisers" who predict interest rate rises every quarter), or just sidelined for convenience ?

He'd been warning about the bubble/crash since around 2002, IIRC.

I heard him speak a couple of years ago. He's respected, but not 'in with the boys' so to speak, and one whose comments often lead to other economists, plus politicians, putting fingers in ears and going: 'lalalalalalalala' etc.

So he was warning about a crash for five years before it happened ?

Let me start predicting here and now that there will be another financial crash just like the one in 2007/08 at some point in the future, I'll repeat this prediction four times a year until it becomes true.

Meantime, there will be another natural disaster like the typhoon in the Philippines, some time...

It hardly takes a rocket scientist to see that there's another bubble/crash coming, since none of the conditions that caused the 2008 crash have particularly altered, but since most economists and politicians don't seem capable of seeing it or don't want to see it, a sane voice is welcome.

After all, you would think, wouldn't you, that no government would actively contribute taxpayers' cash toward another housing bubble?

Absolutely, but its ok because thats not what they are doing, they've called it a different name and so its all ok.

Truth is that without the money going around in circles then no-one makes any more money, so it goes around and around again and again and then it goes "pop" again like endless games of musical chairs where some kids get hurt and some kids get all the prizes.

Aye.

Mind, on only a slightly different note, it's wryly amusing to see some economists and commentators, in the last few years, finding themselves musing that, after all, Marx might not have been entirely wrong.

There have also been calls to change the economic curriculum in schools and colleges (or universities as they are wont to call themselves - The Royal Agricultural University doesn't have the same ring), they are still teaching free-market economics as the only way, despite the numerous occasions in the past where socialism has had to rescue the market from itself.

[url=http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/why-do-privatesector-zealots-choose-to-ignore-the-countless-ways-public-money-underpins-daily-life-8937628.htmlOwen Jones writes on the role of the state[/url in Today's Indy. Thankfully he has the grace to credit Economics professor Mariana Mazzucato and her excellent book "The Entrepreneurial State"

The "Help to Buy" scheme has SUB-PRIME writ large all over it. The sensible answer is not to help people get into ever more debt, it is to help reduce the price of the desired item (a house) to an affordable level. That can only be done with a massive building programme.

It's worth a look at last night's Newsnight on iPlayer. Professor David Blanchflower (ex member of the BoE Monetary Policy Committee) was on and basically said that the whole of the miniscule UK "recovery" is built on debt and it wouldn't take much of a shift in economics to bring the whole down around our ears again.

One sensible answer would be to stop interest relief being avaiable in respect of funding residential property purchases. There is a huge market distortion - individuals borrowing to buy a home don't get relief but buying to let or via an offshore company allows interest to be offset against rental income arising as you suddenly have a property lettings "business." Why is it socially desirable for a few people / companiesc to own multiple properties? If it is, why should they be allowed tax relief, which effectively subsides them? It's effectively the same as the power companies / railways - taxpayer subsidy for a relatively to make gain at the expense of a captive mass market.