Osborne’s Wednesday statement, when he will be forced to admit he will miss his target to be cutting debt as a share of GDP by 2015-6 and that he will be extending spending cuts to 2018, is going to be wretched. So he will try to enliven the House, and the nation, by telling us [...]
Posts Tagged ‘George Osborne’
Mark Carney’s shock appointment means more of the same
Nov 28th, 2012 by Ann Pettifor.This week the chancellor confirmed that there will be no real change at the Bank of England. There will be no change to the Treasury and Bank of England’s obsession with inflation targeting and “price stability”. Above all, he confirmed that there will be no reining-in of the banks; that banks will not be re-structured – [...]
Hypocrite Osborne gives multinationals massive tax cut
Oct 22nd, 2012 by Michael Meacher.If you think that cutting the 50% income tax rate by 5% for the super-rich on more than £150,000 a year was the worst thing that Osborne has yet done, think again. He is just about to give £multi-billion trans-national companies a tax cut from the current 23% to just 5.75% on the internal financing [...]
IMF revision destroys Osbornomics
Oct 12th, 2012 by Michael Meacher.It is incredible the hold that mathematical modelling has over economic policy-making under neoliberal capitalism. This was the arcane and esoteric world that drove the brief ascendancy of toxic derivatives before they crashed and nearly brought down the global economy. More seriously still, these economic wizards who have until recently prided themselves as ‘the masters [...]
Osborne commoditises labour
Oct 10th, 2012 by Michael Meacher.After Vice Cable refused to accept no-fault dismissals recommended by the private equity capitalist Anthony Beecroft, Osborne has brought them back via the back door. To offer £2,000 worth of shares in the company in exchange for giving up all your employment rights is not an equal exchange of benefits, it’s a sacrifice of job-protecting opportunities for [...]
Benefits, an increasing deficit and the obsession with cuts
Sep 25th, 2012 by Michael Meacher.Pace Andrew Mitchell, Osborne’s proposed £10bn benefit cut for poor families looks set to become the litmus test for the party conference season. It is almost incredible that Osborne should be demanding this when (i) £18bn is already being sliced from benefits, (ii) no increase in taxes at all is being proposed to fill the [...]
There’s a hole in his bucket
Sep 4th, 2012 by Michael Meacher.It is really bewildering how far the Tories continue to push supply-side economics, and are now preparing to do so yet again even though every such initiative has failed miserably, but deliberately ignore the open goal of demand-side economics. Osborne softened the Vickers bank reform package as a quid pro quo for the banks increasing [...]
Osborne goes for broke – making Britain broke
Aug 23rd, 2012 by Michael Meacher.Is there anybody left in Britain who seriously believes that Osborne’s strategy is a success and the right way to cut the deficit? Well, yes, step forward, John Redwood. But who else is there? The perversity of carrying on with the present policy is mind-blowing. Despite the savagery of the cuts already inflicted, the whole [...]
Paul Ryan’s nasty lesson for Britain
Aug 19th, 2012 by Michael Meacher.The arrival of Paul Ryan on the US Presidential scene not only has big implications for that election in November (perhaps the opponent that Obama really wanted), but also casts interesting light on the British political situation. Ryan’s plan is based on the now regular US Republican device of unfunded tax cuts – a device [...]
A Greek Tragedy beckons in Britain
Aug 15th, 2012 by Darrell Goodliffe.I remember the days when George Osborne used to faithfully swear by Greece as a brilliant example of why austerity was absolutely needed (that was after he abandoned Ireland due to austerity tipping it over the economic edge). I am sure the reader does too. I think opponents of the austerity agenda should take Mr [...]
