If you are REALLY interested...

[BillyStubbsTears]

...in looking at the big economic questions in the run-up to the election, there's help at hand. Oxford University prof Simon Wren-Lewis is the country's leading academic macroeconomist. He's been tearing his grey hair out over the last couple of years at how poorly "experts" like Robert Peston etc have been getting information over the the public. Basically, they have focused almost entirely on the deficit and have not engaged with the wider and deeper economic issues. Wren-Lewis calls these people "Mediamacro": media people who are supposed to be explaining macroeconomics and failing spectacularly.

So, Wren-Lewis has done what the very best academics should always do. He's taken on these difficult issues and set himself the task of explaining them to the wider public. He''a puishing on his blog a series of takedowns of "macroeconomic myths". One a day.

If you are REALLY interested in what happened, is happening and might happen to the economy, it's essential background information. If you prefer your own opinion, feel free to ignore it.

Here's today's
http://mainlymacro.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/mediamacro-myth-3-2007-boom.html?m=1

[wilts rover]

A bloke who is good with statistics and is connected with Merton College, hmmm...

[BillyStubbsTears]

Aye Wilts. Is it Dutch, the mild-mannered statto?
Could be!

[Sprotyrover]

Bugger that Arfur Scargill is promising a minimum wage of £25 k and he is going to tax the rich at 90%. !  Starting with himself I hope!!!

[IC1967]

Take my advice. Don't bother. The prof is a hardcore leftie and as such is unable to form rational opinions.

[Dutch Uncle]

A bloke who is good with statistics and is connected with Merton College, hmmm...

Not me then Wilts - I am rubbish with stats. Numbers I can manage.

Andrew Wiles maybe? Alec Jeffreys? Brian Leveson? Roger Bootle? Howard Davies? William of Ockham?

Only the last one was slightly before my time!

[bobjimwilly]

Take my advice. Don't bother. The prof is a hardcore leftie and as such is unable to form rational opinions.

You should get into professional politics Mick, see how far the one-liner gets you.

[BillyStubbsTears]

And today, Krugman has stuck his boot in with an equally easy-to-understand piece.

http://www.theguardian.com/business/ng-interactive/2015/apr/29/the-austerity-delusion.

"I don’t know how many Britons realise the extent to which their economic debate has diverged from the rest of the western world – the extent to which the UK seems stuck on obsessions that have been mainly laughed out of the discourse elsewhere. "

That is THE single most depressing thing about this Election. We're still stuck on the treadmill of obsessing about the Deficit, while the rest of the world has got over this obsession and has moved on to dealing with the genuinely important underlying issues. It is a sobering thought that Mick here, with his 1-dimensional obsessions and inability to deal with complexity is just an exemplar of where we are as a country.

[IC1967]

And today, Krugman has stuck his boot in with an equally easy-to-understand piece.

http://www.theguardian.com/business/ng-interactive/2015/apr/29/the-austerity-delusion.

"I don’t know how many Britons realise the extent to which their economic debate has diverged from the rest of the western world – the extent to which the UK seems stuck on obsessions that have been mainly laughed out of the discourse elsewhere. "

That is THE single most depressing thing about this Election. We're still stuck on the treadmill of obsessing about the Deficit, while the rest of the world has got over this obsession and has moved on to dealing with the genuinely important underlying issues. It is a sobering thought that Mick here, with his 1-dimensional obsessions and inability to deal with complexity is just an exemplar of where we are as a country.

Cobblers. If what you say is true then please explain why we have created more jobs than the rest of Europe put together. You are living in another dimension.

It's very simple. If austerity is as bad as you make out then there is no way we would have created as many jobs. I seem to remember you and your kind predicting a huge rise in unemployment. Just the opposite has happened. You and your kind are totally discredited.

[BobG]

I've been puzzled for several years now just how it is that the Tories have managed to shove down our throats these 'Labour created the deficit' and 'We've got to carry on managing to get the deficit down' catchphrases.

I know it's the power of the press etc etc wetc and the power of the messages that mean ther Tories simply carry on peddling them. I heard our sodding Home Secretary today, on Radio 4, repeat, again (!!) that it was the Labour Party that got us in this mess. It's facsinating how she can ignore bot the rest of the worlds role in what happened, and, what would have happened if the then Govt had not propped up the banks.

But you're right Billy. What's more scary even than the duplicitousness of the Tories, is the willingness of so many to believe the shite that the money of the press barons and the bullying of the Tory party have pumped out fo 5 years. Old Goebbels must be laughing fit to bust. You clearly can fool some of the people all of the time.

There are times when I really do loathe this country these days.

BobG

[BillyStubbsTears]

Bob

I think what's happened is two things.

First of all, the meme that ridiculously out of control spending caused the economic crash, and that when you are in debt you HAVE to stop spending is a very powerful one. It is utterly wrong on both counts, but it has a very large amount of traction.

Secondly, and this is the bit that I don't understand, the media commentators in this country have disgracefully failed to educate the public in the discussion going on in the outside world. You can understand some of them. People like Jeremy Warner, the Economics Editor of the Telegraph was totally open about it. He got savaged in a blog debate about the economics of austerity by Simon Wren-Lewis, who surgically took Warner's arguments apart. Then Warner flounced off with an amazing parting shot. He said that he was fed up of hearing about the economics.  This was about reducing the size of the State and the only time that the public had the appetite to do that was in a crisis. Quite astonishing! The Economics Editor of a leading newspaper in a liberal democracy openly admitting that his job was to deceive people on economic fundamentals for political ends. I mean, we all know they do it, but to publicly ADMIT it! 

But anyway, what I really don't understand is why the fabulously well-paid commentators at the BBC never challenged the Austerity issue. Paxman, Davis, Peston. Their job was to channel the global debate into people's living rooms. ANYONE who spends a tiny amount of time looking at the economic debate has known for years that the intellectual basis of the Austerity argument has been confined to the dustbin of history. That we were NEVER going to be Greece. That we aren't growing BECAUSE of Austerity, but because Austerity temporarily stopped. That the deficit doesn't mean a thing at the side of the really big issues like the productivity collapse. But those commentators have never taken in the job of discussing that. They still talk as though the deficit is the only issue in town. It is a disgraceful dereliction of duty.

[BobG]

 I kind of hinted in my last at why I suspect the BBC have failed in their duty. It's very easy for the Government to threaten. The BBC Charter is up for renewal. The BBC itself is on a sticky wicket after the traumas of Director Generals various. The BBC may very well feel it cannot afford to upset the Tory party. The Tories have shown, publicly ad without any care as to consequences, that they are prepared to bully really quite widely - and not just the BBC. That, of course, has led, as you say, to a massive and prolonged period of misinformation and disinformation.

This Government is looking more and more like it has triggered the end of the United Kingdom. They won't be blamed for it as it won't happen for 10 years yet, but when it does, think back to the lunatics in Government today. One stupid little example of just how the Tory party today don't care one jot about the morality, the veracity or the utility of anything they say: you'll all have heard of their statement yesterday that, in a new Government, they would enact legislation to prevent any rise in all tax rates. Well, that begs a thousand questions -  but here's just two:

1) what would prevent the succeeding government from enacting further legislation to repeal theirs?
2) how would the Tory party in Government pay the bills when the next war blows up?

It's pathetic. They are treating us like idiots. And they are demeaning the entire political process. And cretins like Mick are still lapping it up! Beggars belief it does. (and that is NOT a party political broadcast on behalf of the Labour party. I really don't care whio you all vote for. Tha's up to you. But whoever you do vote for, do it with some knowledge!

BobG