My friend Jaime, who occasionally comments on this blog, has introduced me to the f:following:
http://coppolacomment.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/the-end-of-britain-not-yet.html.
This is a blog by an economist called Frances Coppola, who is a "whiz" with statistics. The whole of the above link is well worth a read, but two of her charts stand out for me.
If M/s Coppola is is to be trusted, and I think she is, this chart, which measures public debt as a %ge of GDP, confirms the point of view expressed in this blog since its inception: that Britain's present public debt is relatively modest, nowhere near what it has been historically, and that comparisons with Greece and other ailing economies are spurious.The Tory excuse, that savage cuts are necessary to maintain confidence in our public finances, is clearly a lie but, for them, a welcome excuse to implement their ideology of rolling back the state.
This second chart measures total public spending as a %ge of GDP. Once again there is nothing particularly alarming or abnormal about it. It includes spending on "the Welfare State" and exposes as a lie that welfare spending has soared out of control, so that a safety net at a civilised level can no longer be afforded. The present savage cuts in "welfare"or, if preferred "social security" are plainly unnecessary and again ideologically driven.
I hope some leading Liberal Democrats will pick up on M/s Coppola's blog, take note, and stop mouthing untruths to justify their abandonment of the traditions of Keynes and Beveridge.
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