ISOS: Economic and Social Policy: What Next?

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Attracting Sixth form students from across the UK, on Tuesday the 24th February we held the first ISOS of 2009. Starting the day with a speech about the dangers of the predominant constructivist ideology in European institutions, Westminster City Councilor JP Floru brought strong points against how its continuation could hold back Britain’s economy. Following JP was Douglas Carswell MP, who spoke on his plan to renew Britain in twelve months. He drew excellently upon his influential book co-authored with Dan Hannan on the same subject.  After the first break, the ASI’s own Dr Eamonn Butler gave a speech on his excellent new book The Rotten State of Britain. Eamonn’s presentation considered how over the past decade New Labour has instituted by stealth a type of government more oppressive, arrogant, and authoritarian than what Margaret Thatcher was ever accused of. Following Eamonn, Kendra Okonski, Communications Director of the International Policy Network discussed with verve how a market-based approach is best suited for protecting the environment. Jeremy Browne MP spoke superbly after lunch on the recent boom years and whether they were just an illusion. He argued that although the UK’s citizens are better off now than they were, this does not excuse the fact that much of the current financial crisis was caused largely by a government induced credit boom. Steve Rolles’ from Transform was up next tackling the controversial topic of drug reform. He argued convincingly that the legalization of recreational drugs and the medicalization of harder drugs would benefit the country through a lower rate of crime and tax receipts from their sales. Dr Madsen Pirie spoke next on how to save Britain. The ideas presented were a synthesis of different necessary reforms to rebuild Britain after the recession; if only we had a government radical enough to institute them. Up last was Oxford Professor Martin Cox. He talked consummately on the bailout’s effects on the economy, considering who will pay for it in the end. Sadly the answer was of course the sixth form students listening.  The Independent Seminar on the Open Society was once again a great success, with thought-provoking speakers and excellent questions from the students for which we are grateful. We would also like to thank Total Politics, Prospect and Standpoint who kindly provided magazines for the students.

Blog Review 884

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We really do need to take a closer look at what is being taught in schools. Property is theft?

Obama's making sure that it sure ain't the neo-liberals making use of the "Shock Doctrine".

Governments involve social injustice. They sure do.

Are you ready for pessimism porn?

Back in the days when Paul Krugman was an economist.

What's Greek to you?

And finally, this is what stimulus means.

Wilders in the USA

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Heresy Corner on the difference between Hazel Blears and Geert Wilders.

Has Keynes trumped Adam Smith?

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Click here to read the latest ASI think piece.

Blog Review 883

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You know this huge housing bust in the US? Well, it's not actually nationwide: but all of the remedies are. Some mismatch there, no?

The art of politics is sometimes said to be not letting the right hand know what the left hand is doing. But when left and right are doing mutually exclusive, advocating entirely opposite, things, this might not in fact be all that good an idea.

Is it really a surprise that the more self-confident among us become entrepreneurs? And that the more self-confident in general a society, the more entrepreneurs it has?

Jean Baptiste Say or John Maynard Keynes?

Or perhaps it's all a monetary phenomenon?

What's the real background to this postal dispute?

And finally, explaining British success in radio astronomy.

The Rotten State of Britain

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Will Hutton's The State We're In famously shredded the record of the Thatcher-Major governments. Now Eamonn Butler shows how – after a decade of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown – the state of Britain has become very much worse than it ought to be.
 
Corporate publishers rejected Butler's picture of Britain as too cataclysmic and not worth publishing. But now, as the country slides into its worst recession in 70 years, his book The Rotten State of Britain (Gibson Square Books) shows for the first time exactly why Britain is in a worse state than any of the major world economies, how its democracy has been undermined by stealth, and why today's politicians are incapable of finding honest solutions to the problems that they themselves have created.
 
As an economist and Westminster insider, Dr Butler initially thought New Labour seemed purposeful and businesslike.  They promised a new, open kind of government to repair Britain. Two years later, though, he had become completely disillusioned. New Labour’s words were not backed up by deeds. From his vantage point at the Adam Smith Institute, he started to gather the material that is the basis of this deeply-researched book.
 
Gordon Brown's obsessive focus on central targets, and his party's willingness to subvert the apparatus of the state for its own party advantage perverted the state over the course of a decade. By stealth a new form of centralized and authoritarian government has been created that is the worst in Britain’s recent history.
 
Dr Butler scrutinises all aspects of our society and examines the political system, the sleaze, the justice system, the draconian powers the police and public officials have been given under the New Labour government, the surveillance and nanny state, public service bureaucracy and spending, the economy and how we need checks and balances to restrain our political leaders and the unelected advisors who actually control our lives. 

If you would like to come to the ASI launch party of The Rotten State of Britain, held at the ASI's offices (23 Great Smith Street, London, SW1P 3BL) on the 3rd March (6-8pm), please email andrew@old.adamsmith.org to be put on the guest list.

Blog Review 882

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On self sufficiency in food: bye bye Wales.

Bad enough to be tortured for reading a satire: but one by Barbara Ehrenreich?

This campaign against home education seems to be driven by fear that children will not be "educated" by the State rather than anything else.

No, reviving Northern Rock is not a good idea.

Contrary to received wisdom, most do not regret having had children.

Don't forget that there's a lot more going on in the economy than just the "crisis". Rising productivity, for example.

And finally, where the tax money goes: saving Mr. Harman the cost of flowers for Mrs. Dromey.

Blog Review 881

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As it is said, a damning indictment of our education system: "The Finns or Dutch would find it incomprehensible that a mother’s dying wish is for her children to avoid the state education system."

Stress testing the banking system right now would not be all that good an idea.

Is this the worst since the Great Depression, well, no, there are a number of qualifications. But that there are qualifications to the qualifications is less reassuring.

The politicians' responses aren't helping, of course.

Thankfully, we don't in fact have a CEO of UK PLC....if we did, this would be his speech.

An interesting nugget revealing the changes in relative prices over the years.

And finally, if we didn't have football, what would they do?

Two turkeys do not make an eagle

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'I prefer that we take structural measures that clear balance sheets, restructure or wind down banks and allow the survivors to resume lending without looking back. This is the clearest path to both financial stability of the sector and viability of its major players. This is much better than contemplating mergers between troubled banks. As I heard at the OECD yesterday: two turkeys do not make an eagle.'

Nellie Kroes, EU Competition Commisioner

Blog Review 880

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Getting your money out of Stanford's Bank in time might not be the end of your worries.

There is a publication bias in the publication of studies about publication bias.

John, Monty Python – are you sure that he is one of us?

It's rare enough to find a politician who has heard of Bastiat....but one who actually understands him as well is a treasure.

Defining government "investment": I drank eight pints of Stella and then 'invested' the proceeds against a wall on my way home.

The Krugman conundrum. He tells us that he knows, absolutely, that senior government figures rarely if ever know what they're talking about. Yet he still advocates that these know nothings should run ever greater parts of our lives. Eh?

And finally, a literary critique of the Prime Minister (note, one comment page editor for a national newspaper has told Netsmith that the PM does indeed write his own pieces. Sadly.)