A grey morning and a gentle run, musing on economic matters again.
The world financial markets seem very uncomfortable, with the US facing a possible 2nd recession, the euro possibly collapsing, and the Asian stock market becoming very nervous about the oceans of debt. Here in the UK we are being told repeatedly that the economy isn’t escaping from its debts as fast as had been predicted by the government.
All of this gloom may be the first signs of puncturing the global bubble of expansionist consumerism, and thus not altogether a change for the worse. Nevertheless it does seem an extraordinary time for Prime Minister Cameron and Chancellor Osborne to be considering tax cuts for the wealthiest sector of the UK population in order to attract more “wealth generators” to the country (ref). On reflection, there are maybe some positive aspects to the idea. Such blatant disregard for the views of the other 99% of the population serves as a valuable reminder of how farcical our so-called parliamentary democracy has become. And a policy of bribing the very rich to come to the UK in the hope that they will invest their money here must surely lead some people to doubt the sanity of global capitalism – but perhaps that’s being too optimistic.
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