You said some comments above: "Yes, because a left-wing discourse is about solidarity not about I want more for me and those like me." I have never doubted that. I even have assumed that everybody is really concerned about real solidarity. I only pointed out the risk, that unintentionally some may overlook a part of the society, which really needs help. I get currently 1050 Euro per month. If you someone from middle class couldn't be left, I couldn't be conservative, could I? Der Amerikaner ist die Orchidee unter den MenschenVolker Pispers
The first example is tax-free savings. The UK allows £7,000 per year (of which up to £3,000 can be cash and the rest financial assets such as stocks or bonds or units in trust funds) to be saved in so-called ISA accounts which earn interest (or capital gains) tax-free. This only benefits people who actually have £7,000 a year to save, which requires a very substantial household income. The working poor (and not so poor: even the "key workers" such as London's police, teachers and medical workers) don't benefit from this.
The second example is the famous "10p tax". Brown raised the minimum taxable income bi a bit, but then he abolished the 10% marginal tax band and replaced it and the 22% tax band with a 20% tax band. This helps the very bottom of the income distribution a bit, by saving them maybe £200 out of their first £2,000 of taxable income, but then it hits the £10k to £20k with twice as much tax (20% instead of 10%) while reducing the marginal rate by 2% above that, until about £40k where the highest marginal rate of 40% kicks in. When this came out 18 months ago I was livid because this lowers the tax for the high earners at the expense of the low earners with a £200 sweetener for the very bottom (whose income is very substantially supplemented by tax credits and other benefits anyway). It's highway robbery for the benefit of the middle class and it's wrong from a left perspective.
The third example is that the government is going out of its way to help people "get on the property ladder" even as the bottom is dropping out of the housing market. They are going to spend £100M propping up the housing market by allowing all first-time buyers (and not only key workers) to buy property by sharing the purchase with a local authority or the government. This panders to middle-class narratives of home ownership but it encourages people who can't really afford it to get into mortgages, props up the mortgage sector and the real estate sector, and attempts to prop up housing prices so the middle class doesn't lose its home equity. This is wholly unnecessary, possibly counterproducing, won't stem a recession, and uses government money to prop up asset values instead of running a keynesian employment stimulus while at the same time the government refuses to raise public sector wages to match inflation. Again, it may benefit me if I decided to buy a home since I would be a first time buyer, but it's just wrong from a left perspective. When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. — John M. Keynes
Actually I don't care what kind of economic policy is done in the UK or in France or in the US. As I already said, I tried to make a valuable contribution, because there are so many valuable contributions on this blog by other people, which I enjoy to read and I tried to do something as well. Independent of political direction I enjoy the existence of something like a European community, to feel that there is something personal about Europe and not only abstract institutions. From my job or my hobbies or things like that, there isn't too much I can contribute. So I have written this peace in the hope that I can help to sharpen the minds of ETers. And you take my contribution just as something intended to hurt. Where do you take that from? Wouldn't I have more effective ways, if I would have a political agenda to divide people on this blog? I really think your comments are beyond any reasonable proportion. Shall I guess what is your intention of that? Der Amerikaner ist die Orchidee unter den MenschenVolker Pispers
If you allow me some edge, I think that usually has a bread-and-circus nature - not sufficient to lift them out of poverty, but enough to win their support and/or toleration. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
- Jake If you only spend 20 minutes of the rest of your life on economics, go spend them here.
I have been informed by several members in good standing of fundagelical American churches that "the poor will always be with us" (chapter this-or-that, verse something-or-another), so nothing we can do can prevent the poor from starving - therefore, we might as well not bother. Or words to that effect anyway - it's been a while since I tired of pointing and laughing at fundagelicals.
I have no reason to doubt the sincerity of their Christian piety. Their sanity, yes. But not their piety.
No party or society adheres to biblical ethics through and through. They always pick and choose the bits they like based on other criteria (cultural, ethical, political, tactical). Nothing wrong with that, of course, but please don't pretend that you're doing something else, or I shall have to drag out Leveticus, Judges and Revelations and quote you where it says that wearing mixed polyester-cotton clothes is a capital offence. Chapter and verse.
BibleGateway.com: Acts 5:1-11
Acts 5 Ananias and Sapphira 1Now a man named Ananias, together with his wife Sapphira, also sold a piece of property. 2With his wife's full knowledge he kept back part of the money for himself, but brought the rest and put it at the apostles' feet. 3Then Peter said, "Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land? 4Didn't it belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, wasn't the money at your disposal? What made you think of doing such a thing? You have not lied to men but to God." 5When Ananias heard this, he fell down and died. And great fear seized all who heard what had happened. 6Then the young men came forward, wrapped up his body, and carried him out and buried him. 7About three hours later his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. 8Peter asked her, "Tell me, is this the price you and Ananias got for the land?" "Yes," she said, "that is the price." 9Peter said to her, "How could you agree to test the Spirit of the Lord? Look! The feet of the men who buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out also." 10At that moment she fell down at his feet and died. Then the young men came in and, finding her dead, carried her out and buried her beside her husband. 11Great fear seized the whole church and all who heard about these events.
Ananias and Sapphira
1Now a man named Ananias, together with his wife Sapphira, also sold a piece of property. 2With his wife's full knowledge he kept back part of the money for himself, but brought the rest and put it at the apostles' feet.
3Then Peter said, "Ananias, how is it that Satan has so filled your heart that you have lied to the Holy Spirit and have kept for yourself some of the money you received for the land? 4Didn't it belong to you before it was sold? And after it was sold, wasn't the money at your disposal? What made you think of doing such a thing? You have not lied to men but to God."
5When Ananias heard this, he fell down and died. And great fear seized all who heard what had happened. 6Then the young men came forward, wrapped up his body, and carried him out and buried him.
7About three hours later his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. 8Peter asked her, "Tell me, is this the price you and Ananias got for the land?" "Yes," she said, "that is the price."
9Peter said to her, "How could you agree to test the Spirit of the Lord? Look! The feet of the men who buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out also."
10At that moment she fell down at his feet and died. Then the young men came in and, finding her dead, carried her out and buried her beside her husband. 11Great fear seized the whole church and all who heard about these events.
Relieving suffering is all well and good, but addressing the social injustice that causes suffering is more important in the long term. Look what Ratzinger did to the Liberation Theology movement when he was Wojtila's Chief Inquisitor. When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. — John M. Keynes
the "a priori" and its like are (I think) what define the limits of policy (manifestos)--a friend of mine suggested that we need a new rule book, that everyone in the world can subscribe to. The Koran is a rule book, the Torah is a rule book, Paul's letters in the New Testament are, when put together, a rule book--
So why not a new rule book? I'd have a non-hoarding rule in there--maybe a multiple of the minimum wage as the maximum an individual is allowed to own--including properties, etc--so when one reaches the limit one can by all means acquire more things, but at the same time other things must be given away, and they'll be given freely because profits would push the amount over the maximum again...
Only a pithier version.
What I'm thinking is: you're right, I don't want policy makers to be using The New Testament to make rules--
Eye of a needle - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
...I tell you the truth, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. Matthew 19:24
has managed lo these many years to be comfortably spoken to rich people without them being hounded from the church or if they have been hounded, there have been other churches happy to accomodate them--shifting interpretations! More like: I have my idea of what it means, and I'm right!
So: as a non-rhetorical question, given that religious texts are not valid as the basis of policy due to their inevitable internal contradictions, inconsistencies, and historical and other confusions or limitations, on what basis should one make policy? I mean, what texts should be used, or is the written word in itself dubious because all texts are open to various interpretations, the keener the mind the more ingenious (but that's what lawyers do with rules--)--so I think you're right and I wonder--if one can create, say, twelve rules that all humans could find acceptable--without that meaning that--or would it mean that six billion interpretations would flow and shift--so yes, but if I were a believer in one of the world's rule books I would ask: what are your rules--that limit the a priori concepts from which policies will flow? I suppose because a person whose actions are limited and determined by a specific set of texts will have a different approach to a person whose actions are--changing based on ever-changing information from an endless supply of texts...ach! And all the positions in between! Don't fight forces, use them R. Buckminster Fuller.
One of the ideas that you can see expressed here on ET, especially by Jerome but also by others is that the existence of a strong middle class appears to have been a prerequisite for prosperity and democracy. Therefore the current environment in which the middle class is being destroyed doesn't bode well for the future.
It is an unfortunate paradox of the left that by lifting people into the middle class it loses their political allegiance because then people shift to wanting to lift themselves to the wealthy class. And it is a tragedy that the social democratic parties have acquired "middle class" cadres and morphed into economic-liberal parties alienating their base. The result is, as in the 30's, that a lot of the working class is turning towards fascist options. When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. — John M. Keynes
And the idea "that the existence of a strong middle class appears to have been a prerequisite for prosperity and democracy" is not a defense against my charge! That is part of what I've written. You can have a strong middle class and ignore the lowest 10-15% at the very same moment. Trickle down doesn't work greatly from the rich to the middle class, and it doesn't work greatly from the middle class to the real loosers of the society. Der Amerikaner ist die Orchidee unter den MenschenVolker Pispers
That is part of what I've written. You can have a strong middle class and ignore the lowest 10-15% at the very same moment.
Sorry if I offended you. When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. — John M. Keynes
I don't see how the people of ET come to be 'salon socialists' by arguing on behalf of continental European economies, however. By arguing that 'x' is better than 'y' you are not saying that everything is fine with 'x'. The fact that there is a growing permanently poor 'underclass' in Europe has not gone unnoticed.
As I had this (as you say false) impression, I have made a diary. I perfectly appriciate comments, as "I've thought 30 seconds if there is something true on this diary and it isn't". Der Amerikaner ist die Orchidee unter den MenschenVolker Pispers
and yes, of course, it does not mean that the eurozone does not have problems, nor that some policies are going in the wrong direction (we do have a number of rightwing governments in place), but it does help fight the neoliberal discourse, which is our goal. In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
Most of us observed that there was/is a constant denigration of continental EU economies from the business press, especially Anglo-Saxon. The aim of this propaganda is precisely to get our governments to apply more of the same 'medicine' that produced the worsening conditions for the underclass. It's two aspects of the same issue. *Lunatic*, n. One whose delusions are out of fashion.
