4 ms·

Does anyone have links to actual numbers on the austerity policy in the UK? Every time an article like this pops up, I look and stupidly fail to find any numbe

Does anyone have links to actual numbers on the austerity policy in the UK? Every time an article like this pops up, I look and stupidly fail to find any numbers specific to what years had what funding reduction in what program and what the total funding of the program was before. So it's "austerity" but I don't know what that means beyond spending cuts and tax increases.

icebraining 8y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_2010_United_Kingdom_budget#Measures_introduced https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_2010_United_Kingdom_budge... has some numbers, as does the main article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_government_austerity_programme https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_government_aust...
- isoskeles 8y ago
  Sure although I found these and none of this is digestible in a meaningful way. The best figure on the second link is a graph on disposable income, which says nothing about the claims of spending reduction. Similarly, the first page, which I also found, has "numbers" on it but nothing to give context to relative spending, as in, to prior years. The closest thing to what I am looking for is apparently here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_spending_in_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_spending_in_the_Uni.... To find it, you have to search for UK budget without mention of "austerity". I assume this gets to the heart of why anyone would 'downvote' me here for asking for simple information, there's a strict anti-intellectual force on HN that has a problem with anyone digging in to what "austerity" actually means. When you search for anything specifically related to "austerity" in the UK, unsurprisingly, you're met with articles containing photographs, but no real numbers to give you an idea of what "austerity" means in terms of relative changes to the government's budget. What would be REALLY nice is a chart like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_budget#/media/File:US_Federal_Budget_Comparison_2016_vs._2015.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_budget#/... (but for the UK, and with more years to compare, or remove the comparison aspect and just give me raw numbers, year by year). Presumably, I could find this on some UK government website in PDF form, but why didn't NYT do this instead of some puff piece about a kewl, hip young socialist.
  - yesenadam 8y ago
    >I assume this gets to the heart of why anyone would 'downvote' me here for asking for simple information, there's a strict anti-intellectual force on HN that has a problem with anyone digging in to what "austerity" actually means. Yes, I found your downvotes disappointing too! Chin up, the votes often seem to get better over time, as remedial voting is done - i.e. voting up of greyed-out things when you wouldn't bother usually etc. Who cares anyway. You're asking uncommon questions on here perhaps, and surprised they're downvoted? Complaining about voting gets you more downvotes, rightly so. The only reason I can think of is that you wrote 'stupidly', and read very quickly your comment looks like a complaint about the article. Maybe if you'd put more of this detail in the initial comment. p.s. Be very careful of nursing political conspiracy theories on here. ("there's a strict anti-intellectual force on HN that ..") People are convinced HN is right wing, left wing, and everything in between, and are totally certain of that. The political topics do tend to be more..careless and loose on here, perhaps unsurprisingly.

icebraining 8y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_2010_United_Kingdom_budget#Measures_introduced https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/June_2010_United_Kingdom_budge... has some numbers, as does the main article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_government_austerity_programme https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom_government_aust...

isoskeles 8y ago
Sure although I found these and none of this is digestible in a meaningful way. The best figure on the second link is a graph on disposable income, which says nothing about the claims of spending reduction. Similarly, the first page, which I also found, has "numbers" on it but nothing to give context to relative spending, as in, to prior years. The closest thing to what I am looking for is apparently here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_spending_in_the_United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_spending_in_the_Uni.... To find it, you have to search for UK budget without mention of "austerity". I assume this gets to the heart of why anyone would 'downvote' me here for asking for simple information, there's a strict anti-intellectual force on HN that has a problem with anyone digging in to what "austerity" actually means. When you search for anything specifically related to "austerity" in the UK, unsurprisingly, you're met with articles containing photographs, but no real numbers to give you an idea of what "austerity" means in terms of relative changes to the government's budget. What would be REALLY nice is a chart like this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_budget#/media/File:US_Federal_Budget_Comparison_2016_vs._2015.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_budget#/... (but for the UK, and with more years to compare, or remove the comparison aspect and just give me raw numbers, year by year). Presumably, I could find this on some UK government website in PDF form, but why didn't NYT do this instead of some puff piece about a kewl, hip young socialist.
- yesenadam 8y ago
  >I assume this gets to the heart of why anyone would 'downvote' me here for asking for simple information, there's a strict anti-intellectual force on HN that has a problem with anyone digging in to what "austerity" actually means. Yes, I found your downvotes disappointing too! Chin up, the votes often seem to get better over time, as remedial voting is done - i.e. voting up of greyed-out things when you wouldn't bother usually etc. Who cares anyway. You're asking uncommon questions on here perhaps, and surprised they're downvoted? Complaining about voting gets you more downvotes, rightly so. The only reason I can think of is that you wrote 'stupidly', and read very quickly your comment looks like a complaint about the article. Maybe if you'd put more of this detail in the initial comment. p.s. Be very careful of nursing political conspiracy theories on here. ("there's a strict anti-intellectual force on HN that ..") People are convinced HN is right wing, left wing, and everything in between, and are totally certain of that. The political topics do tend to be more..careless and loose on here, perhaps unsurprisingly.