Why? (UK version) Because our government continues to shovel money into propping up the banks (who caused the problem in the first place, and simply keep the money, despite the fact that two of the major banks are majority-owned by government) instead of putting it into infrastructure projects – or simply handing it out to taxpayers.
Example: Keeping RBS/NatWest going has to date cost fifty billion pounds (£50,000,000,000) and that bank has approximately 200,000 employees – which means that every job in that bank has cost the UK taxpayer £250,000. I can think of a hell of a lot of better uses for that sort of money.
Why has the UK government done all that? Who knows? But I would stake money on several of the board members being Old Etonians just like the upper-class twit we currently have as Prime Minister. Or fellow Masons, perhaps. Or both.
Actually, if we got the gubbmint out of the way, freed up free enterprise, slashed taxes to no more than 5%, you’d see a snap-back of the economy so rapid that even David Brooks might conclude that a well creased pant leg isn’t enough…..
Fletcher,
are those Contest winning Upper-Class Twits?
.
.
OK, I’ll ask, if this report is true, and if we’ve got as many people NOT being counted any longer as unemployed, as there are being counted AS unemployed, why is this not a Depression?
“OK, I’ll ask, if this report is true, and if we’ve got as many people NOT being counted any longer as unemployed, as there are being counted AS unemployed, why is this not a Depression?”
Well I think the word “Depression” has a pretty strict definition which includes DE-flation of the dollar rather than IN-flation.
Regardless of the technical definition of depression I think soup lines represent depression more than anything else. Food being the one item even the poor have an abundance of in America it’s hard to see how we’ll ever again say we are in a depression no matter how many people are out of work (India may be the model for our future.)
Why? (UK version) Because our government continues to shovel money into propping up the banks (who caused the problem in the first place, and simply keep the money, despite the fact that two of the major banks are majority-owned by government) instead of putting it into infrastructure projects – or simply handing it out to taxpayers.
Example: Keeping RBS/NatWest going has to date cost fifty billion pounds (£50,000,000,000) and that bank has approximately 200,000 employees – which means that every job in that bank has cost the UK taxpayer £250,000. I can think of a hell of a lot of better uses for that sort of money.
Why has the UK government done all that? Who knows? But I would stake money on several of the board members being Old Etonians just like the upper-class twit we currently have as Prime Minister. Or fellow Masons, perhaps. Or both.
Actually, if we got the gubbmint out of the way, freed up free enterprise, slashed taxes to no more than 5%, you’d see a snap-back of the economy so rapid that even David Brooks might conclude that a well creased pant leg isn’t enough…..
Fletcher,
are those Contest winning Upper-Class Twits?
.
.
OK, I’ll ask, if this report is true, and if we’ve got as many people NOT being counted any longer as unemployed, as there are being counted AS unemployed, why is this not a Depression?
“OK, I’ll ask, if this report is true, and if we’ve got as many people NOT being counted any longer as unemployed, as there are being counted AS unemployed, why is this not a Depression?”
Well I think the word “Depression” has a pretty strict definition which includes DE-flation of the dollar rather than IN-flation.
Regardless of the technical definition of depression I think soup lines represent depression more than anything else. Food being the one item even the poor have an abundance of in America it’s hard to see how we’ll ever again say we are in a depression no matter how many people are out of work (India may be the model for our future.)