Ladies and Gentlemen - I give you the CON-DEM party.

[torledo]

That'll be why they just cut hospital building programmes, roads and job creation schemes then, with school cuts imminent - announcement to follow apparently.

 

The country hasn't gone down the pan over the last 13 years, but it has struggled to cope with the legacy of the 1980s and the selling off of social housing stock, the selling off of public utilities and services, the mass unemployment and a trickle down approach to finances which hoped that money fed it at the very top would trickle down to those at the bottom, whereas what actually happened was those at the top just kept it, thankyou very much.

 

Once the family silver was sold, and the social problems were exarcerbated, how exactly do you pull yourself out of that - revenue streams gone to line another fat cats pockets.

 

At least tax credits were some attempt at redistribution of wealth, and we wouldn't be in the current financial state if it wasn't for the US causing a global problem.

 

gordon, is that you ?

 

you were doing so well up until the last line. the prosperity and subsequent credit crunch was a global phenomenon. if you insist on calling the bust a US caused problem.

then call the boom as being started in the US with low inflation and low interest rates with the US leading the way....did the nulabour ideas factory not derive inspiration from the US ? Brown and Balls didn't have an original idea between them. It seemed to be all pinched from the US Fed and Clinton administration of the late 90's.

 

So what do you want, another five years of nulabour neoliberalism dressed up as progressive socialism ? Or something else. the electorate voted for something else because we needed something else.

[flyinghaggis]

At the risk of an offtopic tangent, here are the videos I mentioned earlier.

There's five of 'em. Well worth watching. It starts off a bit slow, but it soon becomes a very watchable and enjoyable animation.

 

 

Ever since the "banking crisis" I've wondered exactly how the situation could arise where banks lend more money that they could ever

actually cover and can nearly bring down the entire financial system because of it. Now I know though to be honest the reality is so scary I almost wish I didnt !

Edited June 18, 2010 by flyinghaggis

[kylewilliamson]

As far as the banks go - lets not forget that the whole country had it's fair share of the period of boom too. It's very easy to say 'ooh the bankers got really rich' but in effect, they were only lending money out on public pressure. We (all) to some extent lived the life of 'ok, lets spend 50k on a credit card' followed by 'oh i cant pay it back' followed by 'lets go bankrupt'. I'm not saying its right or wrong, but that money had to come from somewhere. As well as that, we generally perceive measures of success to be things like 'owning a home' and 'having a nice car' and that was facilitated by this cheap access to finance - and on that basis, this money couldn't simply come out of nowhere. No government wants to be the one that tells it's voters that they can't have.

 

For the record, both the Labour and Libdems had no money to fight another election - it's a very expensive business. As for 'it should be illegal'.. why? At the end of the day, individual constituencies vote for an MP, and that MP is then free to align to whichever party leader he or she see fits. Let's not forget than MPs can also cross the floor. And I think a fair point was that under PR, deals would get made all over the place. Parties are also free to change their policies etc as they see fit. It's well known that in a five year parliament policies and ideals will change. For instance, in 2001, nobody had (without getting into conspiracy theories) any idea of the September 11th attacks, and the political response that was made to those.

 

However, what I can't forgive the Labour party for is robbing a generation of this country of it's retirement - and that is a Gordon Brown policy, and for that he cannot be forgiven. We have all lived through the boom years, and we'll have to suffer the bust - from whichever party, if we don't cut spending sooner or later we'll end up like Greece. The British Dunkirk spirit was to shut up and get on with it, and we need to do that now more than ever. For the record, the Stonehenge Visitor Centre and the access arrangements up there are appalling, but I think we can live with it against closing schools or firing doctors.

 

I think the Sheffield Forgemasters loan cancellation is quite telling to. Sheffield Hallam is Nick Clegg's constituency, and is very close to Sheffield Forgemasters. For a lib dem (Danny Alexander) to stand up and announce cutting a public loan to practically the leaders constituency says a lot (I think) about the strength of decisions this government is willing to take.

 

Kyle

[PeteM]

This one will run and run. As someone who voted LibDem I think that the Coalition, whilst not ideal, is the only way to start tackling the mess left by the ineptitude of Labour. If things do improve after the inevitable period of pain and everyone (& that includes the rich) makes a fair contribution to sorting out the mess we're in then maybe it will have been worth it. I guess we have to give them time to make whatever cuts are coming and not listen to the hysterics of the media. As far as yesterday's announcement on cuts goes - there's no way you can continue to promise money/loans/grants to organisations if it physically doesn't exist. I feel disappointed for Forgemasters and the others but I think any blame has to lie with Labour for deliberately (or otherwise) making promises they knew couldn't be fulfilled. Hopefully, in 12 months time we'll have a clearer idea of whether the coalition is a disaster or whether there is light at the end of the tunnel.

[torledo]

good question - when my son asked i did not know - all of europe, US and Japan are in huge debt - who to exactly?

 

pensioners [and future pensioners] and banks primarily.

 

govt. debt is providing someone's savings.

 

for the banks, they are in effect required to hold govt. bonds, so they will always buy some proportion of govt. debt.

[Duane_Dibbley]

Until they get cut or abolished too, at which point, civil war anybody?

 

I'm down!! *sharpens throwing knives*

[mattx]

Quoting myself? Well, why not.

 

Set your recorders. The "Money as debt" programme has made it to TV. It's being aired on showcase.tv, 21st September 2010 7:00 am

Information TV > Showcase TV

 

It's on Freesat channel 403. I thought it was one of those crackpot channels, and despite the compulsory crackpot quota being filled, there's some interesting stuff there. "Money As Debt" should be compulsory viewing in schools to pull back the Wizard of Oz curtain on the world of finance.

 

 

Even if you disagree with John Harris' conclusions, the programme is very interesting.

 

John Harris is presenting a lecture on another programme. I haven't seen it, but it should be interesting.

Information TV > Showcase TV

 

You are right, this should be shown in schools - great piece of film making. Easy to understand [ for a div like me ] and very informative.

[torledo]

You are right, this should be shown in schools - great piece of film making. Easy to understand [ for a div like me ] and very informative.

 

it'd be an interesting talking point in schools....some of the points mentioned appear to be true, but it's no subtitute for reading some of the literature out there on modern monetary systems...emphasis on the word modern. as a visual starting point, fine....but i'd want to move on quickly to something else to further knowledge and question..

 

you'd have to be careful about what conclusions you drew from that video, it might be worth asking students about why it's not practical to have money creation backed by a quantity of physical commodities, or questioning the modern credit creation is backed by 'nothing' argument. it's backed by borrowers' ability to service that debt, that's why even if banks aren't reserve constrained the aforementioned is a pretty good reason why there are some practical limits on how much and to whom money can be lent.

[DrummerBoy]

Just to throw a small hand granade into the 'redistribution' arguement, here's a very good piece by the BBC on who pays what already: BBC News - What do the rich give back to society?

 

I for one refuse to pay for an able bodied person to sit at home, without them doing at least something to try and either get a job, or help out in the community.

 

There has to be carrot and stick, and also the ability for the state to look after those who need looking after, not those who have chosen to give up trying and sponge off the states.

 

I remember a quote from someone along the lines of 'The benefits systems should be a safety net, not a trawler net'.

 

Asbestos suit on!!

[flyinghaggis]

I think my main problem is that I've read/understood enough to scare me but no in depth enough to fully understand it!

 

Main bullet points being :-

 

 

1) Banks don't need to have enough money in reserve to cover what they lend

 

2) Money isn't actually backed by and kind of physical commodity

 

3) Our economy is pretty much based on debt and the promise of future debt

 

 

Will somebody please tell me why I shouldn't be worried by the above cause based on that it doesn't look good .....!

Edited September 20, 2010 by flyinghaggis

[torledo]

I think my main problem is that I've read/understood enough to scare me but no in depth enough to fully understand it!

 

Main bullet points being :-

 

 

1) Banks don't need to have enough money in reserve to cover what they lend

 

2) Money isn't actually backed by and kind of physical commodity

 

3) Our economy is pretty much based on debt and the promise of future debt

 

 

Will somebody please tell me why I shouldn't be worried by the above cause based on that it doesn't look good .....!

 

ok, i'll try my best...based on my somewhat limited understanding.

 

2) having money backed by a physical commodity is incredibly restrictive. The outcome of having fiat currencies and the move away from the 'gold' standard is that we have seen tremendous investments being made globally in all sorts of areas which otherwise would not have been possible.

 

3) again i don't think point three is anything to be particularly worried about. most investments are made because of expectations of getting a return on investment in the future...again i think it would be incredibly restrictive otherwise. there's obviously a concern where there's 'too much' debt in certain parts of the economy and so debt servicing and ultimately repayment becomes an issue, as we've seen with the origins of the financial crisis ....but how was that issue addressed ? through govt. intervention, the biggest issue for banks is liquidity and the biggest issue for borrowers is incomes. here is where govt. makes the difference based on it's net spending position.

 

one area where i'd advise you to have a look at is the relationship between public sector debt and private sector debt....a very hot topic at the minute. it shouldn't surprise you to know that the 'debt' a govt. issues is money. when people say the govt. is 'borrowing' x pounds or dollars, it is infact providing income streams...but you'll rarely hear it described as that

[CHR1S]

Some very nieve questions, But where does the money come from? What's stopping us printing more money to pay off debts?

[localzuk]

Some very nieve questions, But where does the money come from? What's stopping us printing more money to pay off debts?

 

Isn't the answer to that 'same place it has always done - from our minds'. ie. Money is just a concept made up by us. So, money is simply a reflection of the worth of the population, and the work they do. So, that concept could be based on a physical object - due to rarity of that object, and its perceived importance, or it could be based on the idea that people will be indebted to other people for their work etc...

 

That's my simplistic view of it anyway.

[CHR1S]

Very deep that localz, lol

[flyinghaggis]

The answer is that they could but like any other commodity the more of it the print into existence the less valuable it becomes. So in simple terms let's say there's £100 in cash floating around in the world. If the Government prints another £100 then the effective value of the existing currency is halved. This is a pretty half-baked examle but you get the idea.

 

As I understand it Money is effectively an IOU backed by a government?

[CHR1S]

As I understand it Money is effectively an IOU backed by a government?

 

That makes sense