Tuesday 13 April 2010

Labour Manifesto; Top 5 economic fails

Well, a fail from Labour as expected, half motuhed platitudes and aspirations with very little they would actually do. However, manifesto's always look like this and I am not convinced about the other ones being any better. here are my top five fails in economic policy:

 1.  Full employment - The manifesto says they will create a million new jobs and so restore full employment. Lots of these in health and education, so they really do mean Government increasing its payroll. Also there are 8 million economically inactiv people of working age. So a million does not cut it. Plus of the last million jobs the economy created, 950,000 went to immigrants. Rating: Delusional.

2. Tough Choices - £38 billion in public sector savings, no real plans beyond £20 billionof where these will come from. So no truth at all in what so ever and no way to judge what cuts they are going to make. Does not compute with point one either. Rating; Deception.

3. Deficit reduction - Well not detail at all, except some laughable tax pledges to keep taxing the rich and not raise basic rates. No mention of fiscal drag, eh? No commitment not to raise VAt despite accusing the Tories of it: Rating: Hugo Chavez populism

4. Bank breaking - The Government will break up the banks in state ownership. Thi is not very good news for the taxpayers as the shareholders are going to flee when they twig that any sales will repay Government whilst overall value is hollowed out. Plus Northern Wreck is to be mutualised, haha, no mention of the toxic books hiding on the Government balance sheet. Rating: incredulous.

5. High tech economy - This is to be done with taxpayers money. After all if there is one thing British Leyland taught us, is that it is the Government that knows best, not that bloke who sold Bebo for millions having started with nothing...naah. Tax breaks or innovation zones which may spur investment are not in favour either, instead it is money for distribution by regional quango's etc to favoured lackeys. Rating: Trator Production Statistics Generation.

Also bad, silly ideas in corporate Governance and a singluar drop off of the idea of Football fans buying their clubs. Maybe they read this blog....

4 comments:

Budgie said...

The economics sound appalling, and completely delusional as you say.

Apparently (see Guido and EU Referendum) the cover is a warm glow 1950s scene of a functional family gazing into the sunset of a bucolic idyll. Almost everything Labour is not, in other words.

cosmic said...

"Hi tech economy" sound good.

The point is you have to create the conditions where these things come about, and let people get on with it, not have politicians and civil servants chucking money at things they don't understand. They're not about to do that. Their view is that there's nothing politicians and civil servants don't understand.

The best that will come of this is another Inmos, most likely will be a few quangos wasting money, as you say.

Mark Wadsworth said...

I assume that 'No more boom and bust' isn't in this manifesto?

As to 'tax breaks for innovation', they are just as bad as subsidies. In fact they are subsidies, it's just the right-wing name for subsidies.

Across the board tax reduction and simplification and leaving-well-alone is the best strategy 99% of the time.

Anonymous said...

It isn't surprising that they do not have much clarity on how to reduce the deficit. After all they are responsible for most of the phenomenal increase. By my calculations about half the forecast National debt of £1400 billion in 2014 will be down to economic mismanagement since 2001. If the Labour party - the self-proclaimed defender of public services - were to admit that they have wrecked the public finances for a generation, the party would implode.

(I justify the claim on my blog)