Labour can do a lot more than wait for economic growth (which may or may not happen). Indeed, it MUST do so if it hopes for the second term it needs. It must reverse the shift in economic wellbeing away from the rich and back to those less well off that occurred under the Tories. This is not only essential to be perceived as fair, it is essential for economic growth (if it is possible), and for investment. The shift in wealth from the less well off to the rich was not earned in any sense - it was a by-product of quantitative easing. During the last decade, productivity more or less stagnated, while the richest doubled their wealth and everyone else worked harder and earned less. Fix that, and you take thousands out of welfare-dependency and thus reduce unproductive government spending. Furthermore, as the Equality Trust (https://equalitytrust.org.uk/) endlessly points out to deaf ears, you also reduce crime and improve health outcomes. What a boon to those "missions" that have such aims.
The Tories forgot (if they ever knew) that there is no such thing as a free tax cut. Labour should remember that.
This is fascinating (and I love "Bidenomics without the money!"), but this sort of technocratic, business-like approach to government is that while the logic is impeccable, government is not a business and nation-states are not logical.
A key, intangible role of a modern government is to inspire their people. This can't really be quantified, but Thatcher and Blair were both so successful in their separate ways not only because of an ability to set and achieve clear metrics, but by presenting a vision of a better future and convincing millions of Britons to trust them to lead them there. So far, this government seems oddly uninterested in doing that.
I lived through the Thatcher and Blair periods and did not feel in any way that the fundamental problems of the country were being solved. Thatcher initiated the liberation of the financial industry that eventually led to the 2007/8 financial crisis and sold off one third of the social housing that had been built over the previous fifty years. Blair got waylaid by GW Bush but achieved his task of making the NHS comparable with European health services. He rebuilt many of the Victorian school building that Thatcher had railed against in her Housing Ministry days. Both failed to resolve the housing shortage, both failed to stop the rich avoiding paying their fair share of tax. Yet both had ten years or more in office, sufficient time to put the economy on a sound footing and revolutionise the way we earn a living. I expect Starmer and Reeve’s to at least attempt to get the economy growing at 2% a year and to achieve the greening of the energy generation so that net zero is achieved by the end of their second term.
Labour can do a lot more than wait for economic growth (which may or may not happen). Indeed, it MUST do so if it hopes for the second term it needs. It must reverse the shift in economic wellbeing away from the rich and back to those less well off that occurred under the Tories. This is not only essential to be perceived as fair, it is essential for economic growth (if it is possible), and for investment. The shift in wealth from the less well off to the rich was not earned in any sense - it was a by-product of quantitative easing. During the last decade, productivity more or less stagnated, while the richest doubled their wealth and everyone else worked harder and earned less. Fix that, and you take thousands out of welfare-dependency and thus reduce unproductive government spending. Furthermore, as the Equality Trust (https://equalitytrust.org.uk/) endlessly points out to deaf ears, you also reduce crime and improve health outcomes. What a boon to those "missions" that have such aims.
The Tories forgot (if they ever knew) that there is no such thing as a free tax cut. Labour should remember that.
This is fascinating (and I love "Bidenomics without the money!"), but this sort of technocratic, business-like approach to government is that while the logic is impeccable, government is not a business and nation-states are not logical.
A key, intangible role of a modern government is to inspire their people. This can't really be quantified, but Thatcher and Blair were both so successful in their separate ways not only because of an ability to set and achieve clear metrics, but by presenting a vision of a better future and convincing millions of Britons to trust them to lead them there. So far, this government seems oddly uninterested in doing that.
I lived through the Thatcher and Blair periods and did not feel in any way that the fundamental problems of the country were being solved. Thatcher initiated the liberation of the financial industry that eventually led to the 2007/8 financial crisis and sold off one third of the social housing that had been built over the previous fifty years. Blair got waylaid by GW Bush but achieved his task of making the NHS comparable with European health services. He rebuilt many of the Victorian school building that Thatcher had railed against in her Housing Ministry days. Both failed to resolve the housing shortage, both failed to stop the rich avoiding paying their fair share of tax. Yet both had ten years or more in office, sufficient time to put the economy on a sound footing and revolutionise the way we earn a living. I expect Starmer and Reeve’s to at least attempt to get the economy growing at 2% a year and to achieve the greening of the energy generation so that net zero is achieved by the end of their second term.