The So-Called Recession

[poliphilo]

I was a little surprised at how chipper George Osborne seemed to be about chucking 8 billion in the direction of the Irish banks. I thought there was a squeeze on and we had to save every last penny. 

But then Lord Young explained the situation. What we're suffering is only a "so-called recession" and most people "have never had it so good". Ah, so Cameron's inner circle aren't nearly as worried about the economy as they'd like us to think they are.

They see the recession as a blip; it's manageable- and there's cash down the back of the sofa for the things they really want to do- like helping out their enterprising friends. The crisis talk is to soften up the rest of us for a set of cruel and destructive policies- throwing public servants out of work, dismantling the welfare state, harrassing the weak-  that are a matter of choice, not necessity.

Comments

[veronica-milvus.livejournal.com]

As far as I am concerned, Lord Young was right. Baz and I have never made as much money as we do now, and with reduced interest rates we've paid off the mortage. But we represent a subsection of the community. If you are trying to get your first mortgage, or you get thrown out of work, or you end up in negative equity, or you suffer from reduced social services, or you are dependent on earned interest to supplement your pension, it is not going so well.

Lord Young has probaby lived a life of privilege and cannot detach his own experience of the recession from that of other people.

And of course, I lose my job next summer, so I will get my turn too.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

This government is made up of people who have never known what it's like to be out on the edge. Young's a businessman and may have made his own pile (I don't know) but Cameron and Osborne (and Clegg) have all inherited their wealth.

We were driving through the manchester suburbs yesterday and passed building site after building site. It didn't look like the landscape of a recession.

[petercampbell.livejournal.com]

I read somewhere that the amount of goverment debt is the same amount as that we, as a country, owe on our credit cards. That's an entirely different picture from the one that the government is painting.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Interesting.

Obviously it's not a good thing to be so heavily in debt, but I think this Government is accentuating the negative so it can push through an agenda of cuts for the sake of cuts.