Kureishi: financial crash a legacy of Thatcherism

[Maino88]

Legacy of Thatcherism? Nonsense. We are living in an era of vast, corpulent levels of unsustainable public debt, caused by overspending on cradle-to-grave welfare which is unaffordable and ruinously keeping people dependent on the state.

We are living with the legacy of socialism and big-spending, big-state politicians from all sides of the "spectrum".

[freddyvis99]

We are alson living in an era of vast, corpulent levels of unsustainable accumulation of wealth. Debt has simply become the lubricant which, interestingly enough, deepens the root cause of problem. It isn't by sheer coincidence our economy has becomed increasingly dependent on the financial industry. A non value adding industry. A parasite that feeds upon the system: the people.

[bhattkris]

He has a point.

[flightofthecondor]

Hanif Kureishi is correct. I was a student in Britain in the 1970s and it was a desireable place to live, where rents and the cost of living were low but since Thatcher, prices have skyrocketed and many of those great egalitarian, socialist ideals of that time are no more. None the less, I remain committed to those ideals till the day I die.

[goodie73]

Billy Bragg lives in a castle. A castle!!

[goodie73]

I bet Kureishi lives in a big house and owns lots of stuff.

[esob902]

also, there are a number of well written arguments placing today's financial crisis within the contextual history of both Thatcherism and Reagonomics:

[mbb05jb]

i would have to say in the uk's case it is purely to be blamed on 'gordonomics'. brown seriously fucked up the fsa/boe seperation.

[mbb05jb]

this is always a left wing argument and a cop-out, blame maggie. what they don't realise is that she was a prudent spender, and ran the goverment like a house wife runs her home, if the money isn't there then there is no goverment spending. the reason why the uk's economy is on its arse is that gordon brown has had the biggest economic growth probably ever, and still managed to be in debt. gordon brown has bred a culture of buy now pay later.

[bertiethetoupee4]

Hmmm an explaination for the Falklands please?

[mbb05jb]

whats that got to do with this? i can give u an overview if you still want.

[bertiethetoupee4]

I just meant that you should look at what Maggie did in going to war over the Falklands. She was a monster.

[mbb05jb]

she ran it clinically and efficiently. the falklands war was more than just the people of the falklands, it brought down a fascist junta that killed more of its oen people thannt hte war ever did. also it showed russia that the west would not accept military aggression.

[esob902]

"ran the goverment like a house wife runs her home"

-and how does that take shape? is that commendable?

[mbb05jb]

well, it is opposite to where we are now. the goverment certainly hasn't lived within its means.

[islandcaptain]

I think what needs to happen is that we need to differentiate between capitalism and consumerism. Capitalism, in itself, is a very efficient way of allocating resources, but a culture of unbridled and irresponsible consumerism leads us to the situation we are in today.

[rumpraisin]

@islandcaptain Capitalists derive their capital from workers and consumers.