6 ms·

Turns out Thatcherism only works as long as the state still has assets to sell off. The delusion that assets would stay in the hands of the working and middle c

Turns out Thatcherism only works as long as the state still has assets to sell off. The delusion that assets would stay in the hands of the working and middle class, and not end up with the wealthy inheriting class, has to be one of the biggest political failures of our government on the modern era. It's lead to the possible death of the Conservative Party if they fail to fight off Reform and the Liberal Democrats.

robertlagrant 2y ago
You're surely joking. The IMF isn't bailing out the UK, and there aren't 3 day week debates because of the failing power supply. What's led to the death of the Conservative party is them doing exactly the opposite what a lot of Conservative voters want: bigger economy, and slower immigration.
- bojan 2y ago
  Didn't they get more independence with Brexit? Regarding the immigration, sure, the Conservative voters maybe want less of it, but rich and influential Tories actually like immigration as it allows their businesses to thrive (even more). The UK has more capital going around than her own people.
  - mattlondon 2y ago
    Legal immigrants from the EU were not the only source of migrants to the UK. Many come from elsewhere, legally and otherwise. Guess what: we have Brexit but we still have immigrants - impossible?! </sarcasm> Plus it was never about immigration, it was always - I think - a classic case of misinformation and greed from many places. Sadly many people fell for it.
    - EndShell 2y ago
      > Plus it was never about immigration, It was partly about immigration. According to these surveys 43% of people that voted leave think immigration should be reduced. https://public.tableau.com/views/Publicopinion2023/FIGURE9?:language=en-GB&:embed=y&:sid=&:redirect=auth&:embed_code_version=3&:loadOrderID=8&:display_count=y&:origin=viz_share_link https://public.tableau.com/views/Publicopinion2023/FIGURE9?:... > it was always - I think - a classic case of misinformation and greed from many places. Sadly many people fell for it. Why do many people assume that if someone thinks differently about a particular political issue they must have fooled somehow? Considering there is data that partially contradicts your belief that it wasn't about immigration, maybe your assessment about their level of understanding of the issues involved is also incorrect.
      - youngtaff 2y ago
        > It was partly about immigration My view is it’s actually about people being racist
        EndShell 2y ago
        Well there is no evidence to back that up. In fact there is plenty that indicates the opposite. https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/uk-public-opinion-toward-immigration-overall-attitudes-and-level-of-concern/ https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/uk... There is in the section entitled "Preferences for different types of migrant: origin, similarity, skill level". (There doesn't seem to be a way to directly reference it in a document). > Country of origin is not the only factor that people take into account when considering preferences on immigration. In the European Social Survey 2014, British respondents reported how many immigrants should be allowed based on a question that specified both the country of origin (Poland or India) and the skill level (professional or unskilled labourer). The results revealed that when migrants are professionals, opposition is low, and when migrants are unskilled, opposition is high (Figure 5). Research has shown that people’s general preference for high-skilled over low-skilled migrants is mainly driven by perceptions of their higher economic contribution > The preference among the British public for highly skilled migrants aligns with previous research indicating that, when questioned about the criteria for incoming migrants, skills are considered more important than other factors such as race/ethnicity and religion. Direct link to the stats: https://public.tableau.com/views/Publicopinion2023/FIGURE5?:language=en-GB&:embed=y&:sid=&:redirect=auth&:embed_code_version=3&:loadOrderID=4&:display_count=y&publish=yes&:origin=viz_share_link https://public.tableau.com/views/Publicopinion2023/FIGURE5?:...
        the_third_wave 2y ago
        My view is there needs to be a version of Godwin's law related to client of supposed 'racism', i.e. the one who claims ${issue} is caused by/related to 'racism' thereby loses the argument unless he comes with solid proof. I see no proof, spurious claims of 'racism' do not count as such so it actually was about immigration.
  - EndShell 2y ago
    > Didn't they get more independence with Brexit? We didn't leave the EHCR. So there is an argument that we don't have full control of our laws. IANAL and won't pretend to know the specifics. > Regarding the immigration, sure, the Conservative voters maybe want less of it, but rich and influential Tories actually like immigration as it allows their businesses to thrive (even more). Not just Conservative voters. Almost 1 in 5 Labour and Lib Dem voters want to see it reduced. https://public.tableau.com/views/Publicopinion2023/FIGURE9?:language=en-GB&:embed=y&:sid=&:redirect=auth&:embed_code_version=3&:loadOrderID=8&:display_count=y&:origin=viz_share_link https://public.tableau.com/views/Publicopinion2023/FIGURE9?:... Generally 52% of the UK want to see it immigration reduced in some capacity according to the migration observatory. This was roughly the Vote Leave percentage. https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/uk-public-opinion-toward-immigration-overall-attitudes-and-level-of-concern/ https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/uk...
    - bojan 2y ago
      > Not just Conservative voters. That's also not what I said nor implied. The parent comment discussed Conservatives, so I replied to that.
      - EndShell 2y ago
        I know. I felt like it needed to be pointed out that even on parties that are seen to be more centre-left/left that there is good portion of voters that are opposition to immigration. This is because I don't think it is as much of a right/left issue like it is frequently framed.
    - pmyteh 2y ago
      The ECHR is an international agreement like many, many others. It has special status in UK law only because we chose to: that was the purpose of the Human Rights Act. You can also take complaints of breach to the European Court of Human Rights, but they have no enforcement powers (in particular, Russia often decided not to bother complying, and we've avoided enforcing their ruling on prisoner voting rights with their tacit consent). It used to be the case that we were also tied into the ECHR (and playing nice with the rulings of the ECtHR) because it's required by EU law even though it's not an EU instrument and the ECtHR isn't an EU court. But as we've left that's no longer an issue. Finally, I'd just say that there's little objectionable about the Convention, and for the most part it tracks very closely with existing British common law (not surprisingly, as it was a Churchill-supported project in the first place and intended to export what was great about the British tradition of liberty as much as to bind us into Europe). There are a few edge cases where politicians and certain newspapers get into enormous flaps about individual cases, but it's really not that constraining a convention: most of the clauses have get-outs for crime, morality and public order and the margin of appreciation is generally quite broad. It's not perfect any more than, say, the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms is, but the complaints are mostly grandstanding.
  - mmooss 2y ago
    > The UK has more capital going around than her own people. Wealth and income are not zero-sum. Generally, people produce more than they consume (or we'd all be living in caves). Reducing people reduces output, growth, and wealth.
- ForTheKidz 2y ago
  The UK economy is already pretty small per-capita compared to other first-world countries. I'm certainly not one to argue for growth, but what is it about UK's conservatism that demands degrowth? It strikes me as antithetical to the liberalisation that I would think would form the right flank of the spectrum. From my perspective, even economic concerns are driven by fear of immigration: it's just the same old "immigrants are taking my jobs but also somehow not growing the economy so I am now economically displaced" trope.
  - mmooss 2y ago
    > The UK economy is already pretty small per-capita compared to other first-world countries. ? Where does it rank? What is per capita GDP?
  - linksnapzz 2y ago
    There is a finite amount of housing. Britons do not, actually, wish to carpet their entire island w/ semidetached housing, so each and every immigrant occupying a flat is one less that a native could be living in.
reverendsteveii 2y ago
>has to be one of the biggest political failures of our government on the modern era Thatcher/Reagan neoliberalism only has to be a failure if you assume the goal was to best serve the general population. This is a POSIWID moment.
PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago
> Turns out Thatcherism only works as long as the state still has assets to sell off. Thatcherism works as long as there are still people receiving state assistance, since their assistance can be reduced even further.
- dboreham 2y ago
  Also works if you have North Sea oil revenues that you can use to pay for mass unemployment.
milesrout 2y ago
It works as long as you have an economy and eyes to see it worked with her policies in place and didn't work before she was elected. The Tories benefited massively from Thatcher because her policies massively benefited Britain. Without them, Britain would be far poorer today. Britain's problems today are not because of too much Thatcherism but because of far too little. The areas of greatest concern are those areas that they didn't manage to do much with, like local planning. The idea of the market building housing only works if the market is allowed to do so. It isn't. That isn't a problem with the idea of the market building houses - it manages to do everything else in the economy just fine - but with planning laws.
- Aromasin 2y ago
  Thatcherism is shortermism manifest. It's the same attitude that plagues the corporate world - focusing on next Quarter profits rather than the next 20 years. It leaves nothing left at the end but a broken state and more billionaires than we ever had medieval kings, while the rest of us slide back into Dickensian poverty, be you doctor, engineer, soldier, or social worker. We traded state wealth (sold off massive amounts of passive income generating assets like housing and utilities) for short term economic GDP growth in the 90s and early 00s, and now we brunt the cost of it because our passive income has gone. The Tories were more worried about re-election than they were keeping the middle class alive. Our utilities and infrastructure are now drain us for every penny we're worth, and guess what? They're largely owned by other countries now. Our train networks, our energy companies, our communications, and so on, go to pay the French/Chinese/Scandinavian/etc government's. Somehow other countries manage to make profit on state asset; something which Thatcher never had the capacity to do. That's not considering the private industry, which makes £MM in profit, pocketing it instead of reinvesting it in the state which is the primary mandate of public ownership. Individuals abroad or in the 0.1% profit make money from our state, while the rest of the country withers.

robertlagrant 2y ago

You're surely joking. The IMF isn't bailing out the UK, and there aren't 3 day week debates because of the failing power supply. What's led to the death of the Conservative party is them doing exactly the opposite what a lot of Conservative voters want: bigger economy, and slower immigration.

bojan 2y ago
Didn't they get more independence with Brexit? Regarding the immigration, sure, the Conservative voters maybe want less of it, but rich and influential Tories actually like immigration as it allows their businesses to thrive (even more). The UK has more capital going around than her own people.
- mattlondon 2y ago
  Legal immigrants from the EU were not the only source of migrants to the UK. Many come from elsewhere, legally and otherwise. Guess what: we have Brexit but we still have immigrants - impossible?! </sarcasm> Plus it was never about immigration, it was always - I think - a classic case of misinformation and greed from many places. Sadly many people fell for it.
  - EndShell 2y ago
    > Plus it was never about immigration, It was partly about immigration. According to these surveys 43% of people that voted leave think immigration should be reduced. https://public.tableau.com/views/Publicopinion2023/FIGURE9?:language=en-GB&:embed=y&:sid=&:redirect=auth&:embed_code_version=3&:loadOrderID=8&:display_count=y&:origin=viz_share_link https://public.tableau.com/views/Publicopinion2023/FIGURE9?:... > it was always - I think - a classic case of misinformation and greed from many places. Sadly many people fell for it. Why do many people assume that if someone thinks differently about a particular political issue they must have fooled somehow? Considering there is data that partially contradicts your belief that it wasn't about immigration, maybe your assessment about their level of understanding of the issues involved is also incorrect.
    - youngtaff 2y ago
      > It was partly about immigration My view is it’s actually about people being racist
      - EndShell 2y ago
        Well there is no evidence to back that up. In fact there is plenty that indicates the opposite. https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/uk-public-opinion-toward-immigration-overall-attitudes-and-level-of-concern/ https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/uk... There is in the section entitled "Preferences for different types of migrant: origin, similarity, skill level". (There doesn't seem to be a way to directly reference it in a document). > Country of origin is not the only factor that people take into account when considering preferences on immigration. In the European Social Survey 2014, British respondents reported how many immigrants should be allowed based on a question that specified both the country of origin (Poland or India) and the skill level (professional or unskilled labourer). The results revealed that when migrants are professionals, opposition is low, and when migrants are unskilled, opposition is high (Figure 5). Research has shown that people’s general preference for high-skilled over low-skilled migrants is mainly driven by perceptions of their higher economic contribution > The preference among the British public for highly skilled migrants aligns with previous research indicating that, when questioned about the criteria for incoming migrants, skills are considered more important than other factors such as race/ethnicity and religion. Direct link to the stats: https://public.tableau.com/views/Publicopinion2023/FIGURE5?:language=en-GB&:embed=y&:sid=&:redirect=auth&:embed_code_version=3&:loadOrderID=4&:display_count=y&publish=yes&:origin=viz_share_link https://public.tableau.com/views/Publicopinion2023/FIGURE5?:...
      - the_third_wave 2y ago
        My view is there needs to be a version of Godwin's law related to client of supposed 'racism', i.e. the one who claims ${issue} is caused by/related to 'racism' thereby loses the argument unless he comes with solid proof. I see no proof, spurious claims of 'racism' do not count as such so it actually was about immigration.
- EndShell 2y ago
  > Didn't they get more independence with Brexit? We didn't leave the EHCR. So there is an argument that we don't have full control of our laws. IANAL and won't pretend to know the specifics. > Regarding the immigration, sure, the Conservative voters maybe want less of it, but rich and influential Tories actually like immigration as it allows their businesses to thrive (even more). Not just Conservative voters. Almost 1 in 5 Labour and Lib Dem voters want to see it reduced. https://public.tableau.com/views/Publicopinion2023/FIGURE9?:language=en-GB&:embed=y&:sid=&:redirect=auth&:embed_code_version=3&:loadOrderID=8&:display_count=y&:origin=viz_share_link https://public.tableau.com/views/Publicopinion2023/FIGURE9?:... Generally 52% of the UK want to see it immigration reduced in some capacity according to the migration observatory. This was roughly the Vote Leave percentage. https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/uk-public-opinion-toward-immigration-overall-attitudes-and-level-of-concern/ https://migrationobservatory.ox.ac.uk/resources/briefings/uk...
  - bojan 2y ago
    > Not just Conservative voters. That's also not what I said nor implied. The parent comment discussed Conservatives, so I replied to that.
    - EndShell 2y ago
      I know. I felt like it needed to be pointed out that even on parties that are seen to be more centre-left/left that there is good portion of voters that are opposition to immigration. This is because I don't think it is as much of a right/left issue like it is frequently framed.
  - pmyteh 2y ago
    The ECHR is an international agreement like many, many others. It has special status in UK law only because we chose to: that was the purpose of the Human Rights Act. You can also take complaints of breach to the European Court of Human Rights, but they have no enforcement powers (in particular, Russia often decided not to bother complying, and we've avoided enforcing their ruling on prisoner voting rights with their tacit consent). It used to be the case that we were also tied into the ECHR (and playing nice with the rulings of the ECtHR) because it's required by EU law even though it's not an EU instrument and the ECtHR isn't an EU court. But as we've left that's no longer an issue. Finally, I'd just say that there's little objectionable about the Convention, and for the most part it tracks very closely with existing British common law (not surprisingly, as it was a Churchill-supported project in the first place and intended to export what was great about the British tradition of liberty as much as to bind us into Europe). There are a few edge cases where politicians and certain newspapers get into enormous flaps about individual cases, but it's really not that constraining a convention: most of the clauses have get-outs for crime, morality and public order and the margin of appreciation is generally quite broad. It's not perfect any more than, say, the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms is, but the complaints are mostly grandstanding.
- mmooss 2y ago
  > The UK has more capital going around than her own people. Wealth and income are not zero-sum. Generally, people produce more than they consume (or we'd all be living in caves). Reducing people reduces output, growth, and wealth.
ForTheKidz 2y ago
The UK economy is already pretty small per-capita compared to other first-world countries. I'm certainly not one to argue for growth, but what is it about UK's conservatism that demands degrowth? It strikes me as antithetical to the liberalisation that I would think would form the right flank of the spectrum. From my perspective, even economic concerns are driven by fear of immigration: it's just the same old "immigrants are taking my jobs but also somehow not growing the economy so I am now economically displaced" trope.
- mmooss 2y ago
  > The UK economy is already pretty small per-capita compared to other first-world countries. ? Where does it rank? What is per capita GDP?
- linksnapzz 2y ago
  There is a finite amount of housing. Britons do not, actually, wish to carpet their entire island w/ semidetached housing, so each and every immigrant occupying a flat is one less that a native could be living in.

reverendsteveii 2y ago

>has to be one of the biggest political failures of our government on the modern era Thatcher/Reagan neoliberalism only has to be a failure if you assume the goal was to best serve the general population. This is a POSIWID moment.

PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago

> Turns out Thatcherism only works as long as the state still has assets to sell off. Thatcherism works as long as there are still people receiving state assistance, since their assistance can be reduced even further.

dboreham 2y ago
Also works if you have North Sea oil revenues that you can use to pay for mass unemployment.

milesrout 2y ago

It works as long as you have an economy and eyes to see it worked with her policies in place and didn't work before she was elected. The Tories benefited massively from Thatcher because her policies massively benefited Britain. Without them, Britain would be far poorer today. Britain's problems today are not because of too much Thatcherism but because of far too little. The areas of greatest concern are those areas that they didn't manage to do much with, like local planning. The idea of the market building housing only works if the market is allowed to do so. It isn't. That isn't a problem with the idea of the market building houses - it manages to do everything else in the economy just fine - but with planning laws.

Aromasin 2y ago
Thatcherism is shortermism manifest. It's the same attitude that plagues the corporate world - focusing on next Quarter profits rather than the next 20 years. It leaves nothing left at the end but a broken state and more billionaires than we ever had medieval kings, while the rest of us slide back into Dickensian poverty, be you doctor, engineer, soldier, or social worker. We traded state wealth (sold off massive amounts of passive income generating assets like housing and utilities) for short term economic GDP growth in the 90s and early 00s, and now we brunt the cost of it because our passive income has gone. The Tories were more worried about re-election than they were keeping the middle class alive. Our utilities and infrastructure are now drain us for every penny we're worth, and guess what? They're largely owned by other countries now. Our train networks, our energy companies, our communications, and so on, go to pay the French/Chinese/Scandinavian/etc government's. Somehow other countries manage to make profit on state asset; something which Thatcher never had the capacity to do. That's not considering the private industry, which makes £MM in profit, pocketing it instead of reinvesting it in the state which is the primary mandate of public ownership. Individuals abroad or in the 0.1% profit make money from our state, while the rest of the country withers.