I returned to work yesterday, having fulfilled the promise I made to myself to really take last week off, a little blogging apart.
I hoped to have another part of the Taxing Wealth Report out today. However, other issues that had accumulated during the week off got in the way of that, and might continue to do so today. Be assured, though, I will be back on it soon.
What are the diversions? Every one of them is in some way or other about narrative building. Whether the issue is accounting, tax, microeconomics or macro, the need is always the same, it seems. The requirement is that we find a better way of explaining what is happening, what we want to happen, and what the constraints in achieving that might be, with all that being told in a way that suggests that the obstacles might be overcome.
This, I think, is really important. Most people have no idea what economics, accounting and tax are really about. And yet, the consequences of decisions made on these issues by a tiny number of people have profound consequences in their lives. Because of climate-related issues, those decisions will also have similar consequences for generations to come.
In every case, the issue is the same. It is that a discipline developed for social benefit has been captured by professionals who then wish to secure their position within society by making their expertise mysterious and so accessible only at a price. This requires that it be wrapped in language intended to exclude understanding by all but a few. And the more inaccessible the methods that the practitioners of these arts are, the better it is for those who are active within these fields because this (by and large) moves them beyond challenge. This is, for example, the reason for most of the maths used in these disciplines. Much of it adds little value because it is based on dubious data and even more dodgy assumptions, but the mystique of the techniques used disguises that fact to produce results that are supposedly of value.
I have always questioned this approach. I inherently doubt disciplines that seek to exclude others from understanding to secure the privileged position of the practitioner. That does not mean I reject the idea of expertise. Nor do I reject the significance of technical skills, including in statistics. What I question is the creation of shibboleths - which are the deliberate barriers constructed by so many with the primary intention of excluding others.
Proper narratives and debates about them should break these barriers down. They would also explain what is not apparent because so much goes unsaid in our society.
So, for example, it is simply not said that the core beliefs of the Conservative and Labour Parties are now remarkably similar. That fact can be ignored because core political economic narratives are neither known nor discussed. And so, a pretence of difference can be constructed in the place of real debate.
This matters. What both parties can do in the absence of narratives is suggest that there is a choice available within our electoral system when, in a very real sense for most people, there is almost none: the option is to choose between one pro-market, small state exponent and another, and that is it.
Whether this can be changed given the forces lined up to reinforce the system of control hidden behind veils of pretence that we now have is a good question. Maybe that is simply not possible. It could be that the vested interests are too strong to permit that change.
I, however, live with hope. When it is so apparent that the existing narrative is failing - with the people of this country very clearly thinking that to be the case - the opportunity for change has to exist. And when people can see - as is again apparent - that the political choices they are being given do not answer the questions, needs and wishes that they have - with the majority of people in this country appearing to want solutions more radical than those that politicians want to present them with - there has, again, to be the opportunity for change.
But I keep thinking that this cannot happen unless we have better narratives. We need to have the best stories to tell. Or, as was said by Julie Walters in 'Educating Rita', there must be a better song to sing.
That is the most pressing need we have now. The old is dying, as Gramsci noted, perhaps a little prematurely. The new is waiting to be born. The problem is, no one seems quite sure how to deliver it. That is the political economic coundrum of our time. Solving it is all about creating new narratives, I think.
How to do that is the question needing an answer.
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I think we have the kernel of a new narrative , both here on this blog and with many people thinking along similar lines….the problem to my mind is how to communicate that to the public at large , how to break through the wall of media compliance with the current story and lack of journalistic challenge. I say this knowing how hard you are trying here!!
The continuing war in Ukraine, and the unfolding terrible situation in Israel, underlines the geopolitical instability of the current moment. While perhaps not a primary driver in either, economic troubles since 2008 and failure to adequately address global warming will continue to increase tensions and the potential for rupture at existing pressure points.
Is this a “Gramsci moment”? We’ll only really know in retrospect.
Gramsci was writing in 1930, from a fascist prison cell. Although a parliamentary deputy with immunity, he was arrested under emergency powers in 1926 and sentenced to 20 years in prison by a “special tribunal”. He died still in detention 11 years later.
A very interesting and insightful post. Economics is fundamental to society and cannot be escaped. An accessible narrative that addresses the key principles , exposes the myths and can be easily passed on is urgently needed. A tough challenge which if successfully addressed could make a huge difference.
I think there are many people singing a new song already, but the majority don’t get to hear it, because the attention of the majority is commanded by the forces that support the status quo.
What’s needed is a mass murmuring, as the relatively few use their personal contacts to open the ears of their family, friends and colleagues.
Neatly put
But the message still needs to be better made
An extremely good analysis of the issue. As you said most people do not understand economics and neither do most commentators. It is therefore easy for preferred narratives to be presented as common sense or the only options available. There is a similar situation with housing issues where targets are bandied about without reference to evidence and assume that lack of supply is the answer to all aspects of the housing crisis.
In a way I think we start by admitting that for the majority of elapsed 21st century, centre left politics has failed to create any sort of narrative. It is in a crises of being constantly surprised and only ever seems to react to political events rather than being the driver of political events.
We also have to note that the promise of left populism has also failed. Counter narratives to austerity have failed to gain electoral support and when they have won elections, they seem to lose momentum and revert back towards some form of austerity.
I am unconvinced that austerity is at all necessary. But I have to acknowledge the fact that many people across the world look at the last decade and think the total opposite. They vote for what they think is a necessity. They don’t believe they have a choice.
Narrative A: government finances should be run like a household, save a few % round the edges because governments can print money
Narrative B: government finances should not be treated as something to be run like a household
I think you’ve been pushing B for a while, and not making much headway. It’s too negative. What is needed is a positive sounding analogy.
Narrative C: Governmment has the power to make money to transform lives
“Narrative C: Governmment has the power to make money to transform lives”
And create colossal inflation…so your comment does not come without consequence
You do realise that tax cancels that inflation don’t you?
Which makes your com ment utterly irrelevant?
“Narrative C: Government has the power to make money to transform lives”
That doesn’t work for me I’m afraid as that’s an old and tired car that failed its MOT.
We know that government has used its powers over the last 16 years to make money, massive amounts, record deficits.
We know that lives have been transformed, not for the better in my view.
We really do need a new story and an engaging analogy.
OK
Your suggestion is?
Narrative C: Government has the power to make money to transform lives
And create colossal inflation…so your comment does not come without consequence
Governments have been printing money since it was invented. There have been times of inflation, but one does not necessarily lead to the other. Shortages of physical resources leads to inflation, whether it is energy or employment. Think energy price rises, oil price rises, house prices etc.
What we also see is the architects of the failed neoliberal Tory economics now blaming “printing money” for their ransacking of the economy.
Further reading
“Weimar Republic Hyperinflation through a Modern Monetary Theory Lens”, by Phil Armstrong and Warren Mosler (2020)
http://moslereconomics.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Weimar-Republic-Hyperinflation-through-a-Modern-Monetary-Theory-Lens.pdf
What Causes Inflation? (Twitter thread)
https://twitter.com/MMTmacrotrader/status/1619482684161662977
Why “Printing Money” DOESN’T Lead to Inflation, PEGS Institute
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihPtDyS6RkU
Thanks
The problem is this. In 2010 the Conservatives and Labour both said there was no money. The Conservatives then executed thirteen years of austerity with the intention of eliminating the debt and producing surpluses (the only way to reduce the national debt). The economic effect of these measures was to increase the national debt from <£1Trn, to £2.5Trn today. This did not stop them wrecking the economy and squandering most of £1.5Trn+. The reason for this contradiction is that the Conservative ideology is based on a false economic theory, and their basic failing of understanding what they are doing. There is no defence against ignorance, incompetence and stupidity.
You therefore miss the point. Money is not the most critical problem for sovereign Government (Government with an independent currency). Not ever.
Interesting that you’re using the first two names of a certain Von Hayek.
Indeed….
“Most people have no idea what economics, accounting and tax are really about”
Brussels, conference on energy. Discussion afterwards with Brit, responsible for the UK operations of an oil & gas major. We agreed that the meeting could best be described as collective hand wringing amongst the powerless, given that whilst finance (and its cost/availability) was indentified as key, the assembled group had no solutions.
I mentioned the ECB & its central role in both interest rate setting and money creation (I characterised Eurozone countries as little better than Uk country councils from a finance pov). It was at this point that it became clear that the person I was speaking to did not understand the role of central banks & money creation. It took me 5 mins to get him up to speed (whilst putting forward the ECB paying Euros for EIB bonds as a way to fund de-carb of the EU’s energy system).
An educational hill to climb? More like Mount Everest in terms of “how does finance & the economy really work” – given the meeja and its adherence to the corner shop model for the nation state.
It feels like Everest…
You are winning the arguement when the denial more from the core proposition to the proposed solutions.
This we can see happening with climate change.
‘Menus’ of solutions such as those you are producing in the Taxing Wealth Report are so important as they provide a foundation upon which discussion might shift from ‘if’ to ‘how’.
“It is that a discipline developed for social benefit has been captured by professionals who then wish to secure their position within society by making their expertise mysterious and so accessible only at a price. This requires that it be wrapped in language intended to exclude understanding by all but a few.”
An aside really, but this is true of other disciplines, such as physics, not just economics, accountancy etc. There is an interesting book by Lee Smolin, a respected theoretical physicist, called “The trouble with physics” which discusses similar problems in that part of academia. There’s some quite heavy physics in there (translation: I don’t understand it all) but, if you skip through that, the substantial part of the book about the sociology of physics is both familiar and disturbing.
Thanks
You are right.
Mark Twain said “I apologize for such a long letter – I didn’t have time to write a short one.”
It is really difficult to explain simply and clearly so that people can understand. But it’s quite easy to spout nonsense in a complicated way so that it cannot be understood.
The problem is, collectively, finding sufficient time to create clear explanations. That’s especially true for heterodox views for which getting sponsorship,in some form, is extremely difficult.
So many thanks for your efforts in trying to explain these issues clearly.
One example I saw recently, in a small group discussion, was a chap going on about ‘structural deficits’. The others then deferred to his superior knowledge. I wasn’t part of the group so I didn’t comment.
You have said this many times and in many ways, and its so true.
‘How best to tell the story’?
Goebbels ‘‘Make the lie big, make it simple, keep saying it, and eventually they will believe it.”
This is what weve had for decades about ‘taxpayers money’.
I keep coming back to Keynes ‘anything we can actually do we can afford’. At least it tells enough of the story to capture attention.
Keynes was right
well why on earth dont at least some Labour spokesmen quote it
Thank you for a most percipient article!
You might find “The Subversion of Christianity” by Jacques Ellul interesting.
You/we might be up against “Systems Justification” attitudes and behaviours which involve those who benefit from the present set up fighting to keep their advantages and the general public accepting/wanting it to continue because they cannot yet conceptualise something better.
Resilience, determination and attractive understandable stories seem to be among the keys to a fairer, more sustainable future.
Please keep going!
Thanks
A much needed reframing and taking stock my friend in order to refill the tank!!
One of the aspects I’ve been sensitised to is this false idea these days that there is a ‘third way’ allied to a notion that all radical ideas are tolerated and therefore if one idea becomes popular it implies that this is magically by society’s consent alone and is somehow a form of ‘democracy’ (political agonism).
The pretence of ‘difference’ as you say above is used to present an antagonistic politics, one where it is expected the voter gets behind one or the other when in fact there is no real fundamental difference between politicians.
There is evidence to suggest however that voters are increasingly dissatisfied with the outcomes, disenfranchised and turned off.
This view ignores such key issues about how information is distributed in society as well as what resources drive that distribution (some ideas have more resources than others).
I don’t think Gramsci could conceive the rate of information delivery in the future nor how capitalism and fascism would join hands to collaborate and exploit the information supply chain.
There is a huge risk therefore that as the old is dying, all we will get is the same instead, rehashed and buffed up.
That is why ‘being there’ is the only option.
My simple narrative suggestion would be:
Creating money is the way all government gets things done
Tax is the way all government prevents inflation and influences behaviour
You then simply have to decide whether you want that government to be kind to people or cruel to people
I will muse on that
“You then simply have to decide whether you want that government to be kind to people or cruel to people”.
I think you have to decide first what you believe government is for; to serve principally some majority you can cook up to hold power in Parliament through FPTP; or a Government that has the single purpose to serve every individual by focusing exclusively on the security, wellbeing and flourishing of everyone; that every person is an end of Government, and never a means.
I like your version
I agree of course, but I was trying to go for something brief and and pithy…
Killing TINA.
Professor, I have refrained from commenting here for a long while , though I still regularly visit. Because of the War, the Nazis and the escalation to a worldwide conflict as we are slow boiled frogs, As the Old refuses to die but will anyway. I posit my personal opinion below, am I deluded?
The lie of the Narrative we are daily inhabiting, that’s been sold to us for decades – two generations now, is of course – TINA – There Is No Alternative.
This was done not by a single fearless grocers daughter who came down off some mountain with that inscribed in stone, to lead us to that TINA World. That was a myth created at the time. It was done by the most expert propagandists in the World during the 70’s and 80’s – the Advertising agencies and their partners in crime the Public Relations supremos. Aided by their compatriots in the mass main stream media. It is their world we live in and believe daily. They have only tightened their grip and got a lot more powerful since and we live in the fantasy they daily Narrativise for us. Telling us to keep blinkered and repeat by rote what we are supposed to believe.
Hence we now inhabit a non-political state, where politics is banned, where any sting that might be caused by radical politics has been neutered. By tight control of the electorate and the choices that electorate is given. There are not just 2,3 or more parties, they are no more than a pretend choice. We are in effect offered a Uniparty, under new colours. Just as Ford offered us the automobile a century ago in whatever ‘Color’ we like as long as it’s black!
It is Fascism, we live under, as has been discerned here by the author and many over the years. Yet we voters believe we are the most free, the most righteous, the most rational, the most expert – because that is now our internalised credo after the last 40 years.
What can change that narrative? What can be the New Narrative that can reintroduce the sting of change that the status quo avoids , how do we kill TINA?
The best attempt I can offer in that quest today is by updating what is now an old ‘new paradigm’, one that did successfully change much older prejudices – the one that really got equality of sexes going in the 60’s&70’s , it brought feminism to the fore front- and updating it for this century, the new Millenia; that might take us beyond Gramsci’s morbidity. And that is :
The Personal is Political, is GEOPOLITICAL – TPIPIGP.
Because we are not living in isolation as the tens of millions in the U.K. we are part of many billions of humanity. Most of ‘them’ have never been treated as worthy humans like ‘us’. With our ‘civilisation and Rules that we make up and only apply to ‘them’.
We have instead been led to firmly believe they should be left in poverty, by the few that have benefitted for centuries, from actual slavery and exploitation. The forefathers of our PR supremos and the unelected ‘leaders’ who rule over us.
They claim themselves to be Gardeners protecting us from the dangerous Ogres . That is how fascists always talk – That the majority of humanity are no more than savage animals. Living in some jungle, while we live in the only civilised garden and our rainbow uniparty are the gardeners we get to choose from, hey but in any colour we like!
I say NOT IN MY NAME, there is no alternative for me , I turned 60 over the summer, I do not buy the lies anymore, I will not acquiesce to these lies I was raised and also believed in for most the last half century.
Where are the anti war politics? Or shall we sleepwalk, eyes wide open into that darkness again as we did a hundred years ago and every century before?
I’ll repeat – The Personal is Political, IS GEOPOLITICAL.
TPIPIGP
Thanks
Welcome back
Well it didn’t take long. Sunak has apparently already disclaimed the list of projects as compensation to the North for the cancellation of HS2. The projects were only “illustrative”. The whole thing announcement has collapsed in less than a week.
You can add that false claim to Sunak’s long list: Seven bins (false). Meat tax (false). Heat pumps (false). 100,000 European asylum seekers (false). Inflation is a tax (false and stupid). UK decarbonising fastest in Europe (false). Britain 2nd highest spender on supporting Ukraine (false – Germany 2nd).
And that list was not complete, but merely illustrative, to coin a phrase: but unlike anything Sunak says, this list will survive inspection.
We must all of us keep going with the message wherever and whenever we can in the full knowledge that change may not come about in our lifetimes.
“He who plants a tree seed knowing he may never get to sit in its shade is a long way towards understanding the meaning of life”.
Mariana Mazzucato is doing her bit for the cause…. https://www.lbc.co.uk/radio/presenters/andrew-marr/tonight-with-andrew-marr-watch-again-09-10 ..26mins in.
,…”the core beliefs of Labour and Conservative parties are remarkably similar” is not, I think, true.
I accept that the leadership’s sound bites are similar but that is not the same thing.
The Conservative members are to the right of Rishi, Labour members to the left of Keir. Tories always deliver policy to the right of what they say at election time. Labour? We will see.
By all means push Labour to be more radical but don’t suggest “they’re all the same “.
True of the membership, I agree
But they will have precisely zero influence on what Labour will do in office
Stymied’s reaction to the bloke who sprinkled tinsel over him today says a lot about the Labour party to me. He could have empathised and told the conference that Labour’s job is to stop fear like that.
But no – Blue Labour rose to the fore didn’t and we got a load of baying turds instead goading him on as if it were a Tory conference. So, Laboured are after all an authoritarian party telling us what is important despite the fact that large numbers of potential voters feel like the chap ejected from the stage.
Instead he denigrated his ‘attacker’ (honestly!!) and then spoke about how there was not enough money for people to have little treats because of the cost of living crisis, so Laboured was going to fix the economy so that the people could go out and buy their treats under a Blue Labour government!!
And we all lived happily ever after.
After that we got some numpty woman on the R4 news telling us that the Britain was in crisis because of our planning laws – nothing to do with BREXIT and the curtailing of labour movement and supply chains or Covid – planners were vilified so our economy could get back to sucking on the property titty that makes us all rich apparently!!
And I’m supposed to vote for THAT?
Bollocks!!
One of the correspondents above asked why Labour don’t quote Keynes. Keynesianism is as dead in today’s Labour Party as is socialism.
I think it is best to start with some thing simple and irrefutable.
The royal mint owned by the government prints money to buy anything it wants.
This can be extended by pointing out the government can borrow from its own bank and the loan is paid off by taxes.
Too confusing by far to start with printing
And actually, the Royal Mint only does coins: the Bank of England issues notes.
Richard, you are so right, I have been wrestling with this problem for a long time.
The older alternative narrative had power but suffered from brand pollution; simply by pointing at dictatorships any one who advocated could be dismissed as commies. Its moderate version – social democracy – was weakened by the compromise at its core – what kept left critics occupied – trying to tame capitalism whilst at the same time supporting it. Social Democracy ran out of steam for a number of complex reasons
(1) when the easy stuff (housing, sanitation, pensions, education and jobs) were delivered it came up against the difficulty of supporting capitalism whist simultaneously trying to tame it
(2) The stuff it did deliver had been helped by the two world wars – so it looked like it won the argument when it hadn’t.
(3) its opponents claimed the victory
(4) the historical force that gave it strength ended
The last point is deep – summarise it as individualism. There are many components not the least being big trends fuelled by technology and consumerisation. There was also globalisation so that keeping the majority of people well off (at home) was at the expense of exporting the exploitation – a form of neo-colonialism. And dont underestimate simple expediency when it was clear we no longer needed mass armies why keep the population well resourced, a process of taking back could get started.
For a number of reasons the process of making ordinary people better off stalled. We end up with the Thatcher/Reagan counterrevolution, and for many people the gains go into reverse. That lie about shareholder primacy isn’t the worst of it, brutally it also teaches a practical lesson about politics – that you can win even when ignoring as much as 1/3 of the population.
In the meantime the left didn’t do its homework, to much talk of big change and vision but rooted in a polluted brand and in language the spoke to poverty which had (at least in OECD countries) become quite marginal – tragically nothing on the detail of the reforms we need to make real change – the building blocks that could become transformative. So little of Blair-Brown survives not because its impact wasn’t good but because the case was never made or the case was wrong – competition based not cooperation based – too easy to reverse.
Here is my effort to frame the alternative narrative, I call it holistically political economy but it doesn’t matter what you call it, participative political economy, wellbeing economy – whatever – it looks like this i think.
The narrative structure for a Holistic Political Economy;
Provide the resources for all citizens to achieve their potential within sustainable
global limits
Politics is a collaboration to achieve good governance (as opposed to win power to do stuff to people)
Business is an endeavour to improve the common wealth (as opposed to get rich and ignore externalities)
Values
• Freedom is limited only by its impact on others (but that is a real limit, to be negotiated btw)
•There is equal citizenship regardless of wealth (because money buys power, either crudely or just as influence so we have to design round it)
• The ends do not justify the means (if you want to achieve good ends you cannot do it by bad means, this applies as much to how you do politics as anything else, winning by FPTP is bad because you don’t have a majority but can impose your views anyway – as we have learned since 2008 with disastrous consequences – Aristotle and Lord Hailsham recognised these last 2 points)
•People are encouraged to act in ways that they would like to be treated by others (i.e. the golden rule, enlightened self interest)
In short the state becomes the embodiment of empowered citizens (not a separate force that does things to them)
I do fear that so much power has gone offshore that domestic politics doesn’t have much of a chance…but I strongly agree that step 1 is to work out the alternative narrative; if the narrative gets traction then there are ways, NVDA may have to be used creatively.
https://brianfishhope.com/index.php/part-2-assess/vision
(My footnotes aren’t working jut now – i am trying to fix them)
Thanks
Suggestion: Engage by asking questions
Slogan: “Follow the money!” (Not the Public or Private Debt)
– Where did the money come from?
Do you know that a £ is an IOU from the Bank of England?
Do you know that most BoE £ IOUs are actually written by commercial banks, not the Government?
– Where is the money now?
How much is doing anything useful?
How much is actually tangible and how much is locked up in assets of uncertain value?
– Where will the money go next?
Will it circulate in the economy and gradually be cancelled as tax?
Will it be salted away offshore?
Will it be found to never have really existed?
There are still issues there.
For example, money never becomes another asset. It is always debt.