I wish this year was not ending as it was. I know I am far from alone. 2020 will be remembered, but not with much affection.
It seems as if it is the destiny of fate that as Christmas approaches things are at what might be their lowest ebb yet. This was, of course, what Brexit pessimists like me always predicted. How could leaving the best (even if mightily flawed) trading relationship we could ever have, which had coincidentally delivered European peace for multiple generations, ever go well? It very clearly has not, and has no prospect of doing so.
But no one could have predicted that the appalling management of Covid 19 in the UK would combine with Brexit to deliver the prospect of international isolation on an unimagined scale. And yet, until the British variant of the coronavirus spreads beyond our borders (as I suspect, unfortunately, that it will) that is the prospect that we face. Being in international isolation for one reason is bad enough. For two is nigh on impossible to manage.
There will be those who will more than happily blame coronavirus for all that is happening. That will be disingenuous, at best. Of course the current outbreak will make things very much worse. But both disasters are so predictable. And both have similar cause.
Theresa May, living in fear of her backbenchers, thought free market sentiments would deliver a benign Brexit of advantage to all, because that's what the supposed guiding-hand of free enterprise does, in their opinion. How little they did and do understand about the whole complex nature of human relationships where profit maximisation is never once given a thought.
Johnson thought letting the virus rip through the UK population would have the same consequence: it was suggested by those of a free market mind set that the guiding hand would soon see it expire. We would lose our grannies on the way, but as they're unproductive, so what? How little they did and do understand about the whole complex nature of human relationships and virus contagion, where profit maximisation is never once given a thought.
The same, hopelessly flawed, belief that if only the ‘natural order', which happens to amount to the unalloyed pursuit of self interest, were let rip all would work out fine for those fit enough to survive (amongst whom the wealthy would, naturally, be a pre-eminent part) was allowed to prevail by governments made up of deeply flawed and uncaring people possessed of intellects stunted by the toxins created within the cauldrons of Oxford University. And now we pay the price for that.
That we share a common humanity is now apparent.
That there is such a thing as community should be equally obvious.
That economics does not dictate all politics should be clear.
And whilst compassion, empathy and the simple ability to care about the person not known, but who is known to be in need, may remain beyond the comprehension of anyone in this government, is it beyond hope that they might have noticed that others think this way?
My argument is very straightforward. It is that the price we are paying is the reward for governments that are indifferent to others. Given that I think that there are such things as morals, this can alternatively put: we are paying the price of our immorality. Or selfishness, to be blunt.
What can we do about that? I admit I do not know. In Scotland and Northern Ireland, where there have long been different moral sentiments and so, overall, very different societies, the answer is to leave this cesspool that is the creation of English politics, which they very clearly no longer wish to participate in.
For Wales, the suffering will continue.
And of England? What hope is there when almost 40% still back the Tories, and Starmer appears to have absolutely no fight within him?
In England the need is for something that I see, all around me, but which gets no expression. That is a need for moral revival. But, beware: populists also go there, of course. And they pollute this idea. So too do some who make this religious, when morality is not their preserve to claim. And yet we need it.
We do care.
We do have compassion.
We do love our neighbour, even if not as we love ourselves.
But, how do we make that into a new politics of caring? That's a question for Christmas. I have no answer, as yet.
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Start with UBI.
I don’t know how familiar you are with the literature around Universal Basic Income, Richard, but a lot of the trials have shown significant social outcomes. Parents spending more time with their children, communities pooling their resources to set up beneficial infrastructure. (On a Namibia-based project a village set up a post office).
I’ve worked quite a lot with people claiming benefits and an overriding theme is how bitter and alienated and paranoid people can become. The Left often wonders why such people “vote against their self-interest” but it makes complete sense when we understand that the system has the effect of crushing hope. Why vote for someone promising jobs and prosperity when you don’t believe it will ever apply to you?
Then there’s the recognition that our society should support voluntary care which is implicit within UBI. Parents choose to donate their time money and care to another person, a person that society needs but doesn’t really pay for. Elderly adults often need support from their families and if they don’t get it the social care system can rapidly fail them.
Then there’s the massive issue around mental health and happiness. The basis for political support for a caring society has to be that people feel loved, that people feel cherished and supported. UBI could be seen as a way of society saying to its citizens you matter, you are valued, we’ve got your back come what may, you need never go hungry.
I discuss the issue with Guy Standing, often
Oh now I feel silly. Professor Standing is my hero (along with you too).
I’m not a hero and I very much doubt Guy thinks he is
But is a good scholar with his heart in the right place
https://politicsandinsights.org/2020/12/21/nudge-the-expedient-alibi-of-conservative-neoliberalism/
Government policies are expressed political intentions regarding how our society is organised and governed. They have calculated social and economic aims and consequences. In democratic societies, citizens’ accounts of the impacts of policies ought to matter. But we are systematically excluded from policy decisions, which are not ‘for us’: Instead, policies ‘act upon us’, and contain instructions from the government about how we must be. How we must be is very much aligned with government ideas about ‘ideal’ neoliberal policy outcomes.
However, in the UK, the way that policies are justified is being increasingly detached from their aims and consequences, partly because democratic processes and basic human rights are being disassembled or side-stepped, and partly because the government employs the widespread use of linguistic strategies and techniques of persuasion to intentionally divert us from their aims and the consequences of their ideologically (rather than rationally) driven policies. Furthermore, policies have become increasingly detached from public interests and needs. Instead they are all about fulfilling private needs of a privileged, minority. The 1%, as David Graeber neatly summed up.
In this context, I thought I would briefly explore the government’s uniformly ineffective and ideologically tailored response to Brexit, inequality, poverty, unemployment, disability, ill health and a pandemic. The Conservatives offer us nothing material, that’s just for wealthy people. Apparently wealthy people need ‘incentivising’ with financial rewards, poor people need ‘incentivising’ with having money taken away.
Ordinary people just get elitist pseudoscience imposed upon them: nudge — ‘behavioural change’ policies and ‘behavioural messaging’. Oh, and a flourish of blame: your poverty is all your own fault. It’s nothing to do with policies that give handouts to the rich from public funds, according to the government……..
I tend to define it as providing jobs that pay enough to maintain a family
Well I agree.
It will start when politicians start telling us that the growth in the elderly is NOT a burden – that it is an opportunity for well paid, wide spread caring jobs , as are jobs in helping youngsters with their mental health problems courtesy of the internet and Covid 19 and too much pressure at school.
It will start off with joined up thinking in policing – joining up mental health and crime services, genuine jobs for those who are in prison to be apparently ‘corrected’.
It will start when we finally accept that we can have all the money we need for our problems , and that that money needn’t be just be swallowed up by the property sector and Amazon in the pursuit of stuff and bling- we can spend more wisely on flood defences, pandemic resources and a well funded NHS for a start.
We will care when those of us who do care get our hands on the money supply.
Of course, the growth in the number of frail older people was spotted as an opportunity – for the state to force outsourcing of care and for their business chums to enjoy the stream of public funding that came their way.
Indeed. A symptom of the sickness that is at the heart of Govt (of any colour this last 40 years) and exemplifies the commodification of all caring and everything else. We somehow have to cure it. I think the ‘healing’ will be turbulent. It will not be pretty and many, I predict, will suffer in the treatment. There is no simple or easy way to combat the ills of a society governed, shaped and fed by neo-liberalism and those who are governed by it. But fight we must.
We can’t look to a Labour Party led by Sir KS to take up the cudgels. Who then will take up those cudgels? Who will be the persuaders? Who will stand on the frontline to feed themselves to the inevitable cannons? The system must be changed but who will change it?
I don’t know…
I am willing to help, but am not a frontline politician
May I mention again the work by Richard Layard (and others) on happiness economics. Would you rather live in an economy where the majority of assets was held by a small fraction of the population, and most people were unhappy even the rich ones because there is always someone richer, or a more equal society where the total amount of wealth was perhaps a little lower but most people felt happy with their lives.
To put it another way, leading better and more fulfilled lives with less “stuff”. Not least because we don’t have enough planets to live any other way. There are countries with a relatively standard of living, good education and healthcare, on relatively low inputs. Not like the wasteful US.
May I commend one of the FT books of the year “Bigger Government : the future of Government Expenditure in Advanced Economies” by Marc Robinson
https://biggergovernment.com/
He convincingly defines the rising tide of government spending on health, long term care , pensions, infrastructure and climate change as unstoppable , but manageable.
On long term care , compulsory insurance is the answer. The only issue is whether it be organised by the state or insurance companies. The obvious answer is the state.
On healthcare, which he sees as the biggest spenders of all he sees its increase as primarily a function of its ability to deliver more, better , for longer ;and attempts to stop this unethical and impossible within democracies.
On climate Change the sums involved are manageable if we start now.
On UBI he discusses this in depth but concludes that it should be used as a general measure only in extremis ; and that fears that people are about to be replaced in labour markets are exaggerated.
incidentally he discusses MMT but given he worked for the IMF he still lives in a world where inflation remains the enemy and Zimbabwe the signpost to inevitable ruin if MMT is embraced and “governments run continuous large primary deficits well in excess of what might be justified by any demand gap” otherwise in his words “interest rates must rise substantially or the economy seriously overheat”.
My understanding is that taxes could rise to forestall inflationary pressures in those circumstances. But Richard and others may wish to engage with him as I think the book has much to commend it as a serious discussion of the impracticalities of small government advocates.
Noted
Shifting taxes off of productive enterprise and onto polution, monoploy and rent seeking in all its forms is the way to go. First and foremost a land value tax is needed as land is the mother of all monopolies. Scrap VAT. Implement the Henry George solution!
With the greatest of respect – if you want a tiny, inoperative state this is fine
Those of us who think the state has a role in society can rumble why you make this claim that has not a hope of delivering what is required in a modern libveral democracy