Neoliberalism

[GIMH]

Really wouldn't call the Clark government 'Blairite', given they increased taxes, massively expanded public expenditures, reduced costs of higher education, avoided foreign intervention and provided large subsidies for working class families. If anything, the fact that there is now so little difference between National and Labour is more because National lurched to the centre under Key than vice versa.

Blair did a few of those things too

 

[hendrix]

Really wouldn't call the Clark government 'Blairite', given they increased taxes, massively expanded public expenditures, reduced costs of higher education, avoided foreign intervention and provided large subsidies for working class families. If anything, the fact that there is now so little difference between National and Labour is more because National lurched to the centre under Key than vice versa.

True about those key policies, but Clark's Labour definitely pushed centrist towards the end of their tenure as a deliberate strategy, at least in terms of political rhetoric. My parents were (and still are) "in the loop" in terms of Labour party internal policies and I specifically remember my father commenting on it as a strategy. IIRC it worked in the short term but I'd argue it's been catastrophic in the long term as anything left wing now is seen as pretty extreme; the whole country has embraced the centre. Can you imagine someone trying for interest-free student loans today if it hadn't been introduced all that while ago? Wouldn't happen.

National only lurched centrist in their second term IMO. The first term, or at least the rhetoric, was all about "fiscal responsibility" etc...(and bizarrely, "Change", hijacking the Obama wave).

 

[Flem274*]

I reckon national went the other way around. term one was all about "so how are you different from labour?" "change" and then term two was about selling public assets, much more traditionally right wing.

 

[watson]

.

 

[Victor Ian]

so.... who or what is the pen that popped the balloon at the end?

 

[harsh.ag]

so.... who or what is the pen that popped the balloon at the end?

The x-th job loss/y-th immigrant of different civilization obvsly.

 

[watson]

​

so.... who or what is the pen that popped the balloon at the end?

Too much credit in the system + consumer debt = GFC

 

[harsh.ag]

 

[Ausage]

Never thought I'd see ol Harsh reposting from r/Libertarian.

It's a good book, but doesn't quite go far enough imo.

 

[Prince EWS]

[...] good [...], but doesn't quite go far enough imo.

How ironic.

 

[Ausage]

How ironic.

Cmon mate. A little bit of cancer never hurt anybody.

 

[harsh.ag]

Heh. Someone forwarded it to me. Lord knows I don't need the smugness and righteousness that comes with being a regular of r/Libertarianism.

 

[Ausage]

Heh. Someone forwarded it to me. Lord knows I don't need the smugness and righteousness that comes with being a regular of r/Libertarianism.

It gets "brigaded" too much to be the hub of smug self-righteousness we deserve tbh.

 

[Uppercut]

love the pic.

Why Nations Fail is poorly argued imo, though I do mostly agree with them and they've made their case much better elsewhere.

Ausage's reading of it is interesting. I'd have said it's very un-libertarian (though certainly not anti-libertarian).

 

[Ausage]

love the pic.

Why Nations Fail is poorly argued imo, though I do mostly agree with them and they've made their case much better elsewhere.

Ausage's reading of it is interesting. I'd have said it's very un-libertarian (though certainly not anti-libertarian).

Mmm my main takeaway was basically that broadly distributed political power + security of individual property rights = development of a free market = successful nation. I wouldn't call that un-libertarian exactly, certainly not for a small government libertarian anyway. My issues with it were the references to "good regulation" and the freedom aspect being secondary to the political systems, rather than the primary focus. Didn't think they argued against the culture hypothesis particularly well either.

 

[andruid]

I dont know that median income is such a great measure. I always wonder why they don't use mean income. It would more accurately reflect the disparity in wealth between people.

I imagine because in a situation where a small minority has disproportionate (maybe even immoral and reprehensible) level of control of a nations assets their income can distort the average income to a level that is not representative of how the average person in that country lives. See the likes of Equatorial Guinea and Gabon.

Mean usually reflects inequality worse than median. Those Caribbean slave colonies that had one obscenely rich slave-owner for every 10 slaves would show a solid enough mean income but a median of almost zero.


Neither are great for it though tbf. Maybe just go with Gini.

Another great example

Globalisation is about the removal of barriers to trade: the elimination of subsidies and tariffs, the establishment of common standards and rules and the movement towards increased specialisation in commerce. The sale of public assets is neither here nor there as far as the debate around globalisation is concerned. If your argument is that public asset sales rob the people of the dividends of their labour, then it makes no difference whether the public asset is sold to a local entity or a foreign one.

One would think that globalization should be neutral, but with the amount of wealth and reach that some of the actors have in the 'globalization process' relative to others, you get a situation where said 'common standards and regulations' are 'optimized' to the benefit of the already powerful MNCs, other people be damned.

Privatisation to create competition just opens things up for take overs and you end up with super corporations with less competition than before.

Basically this,

While I am here, let me drop an example of how the whole globalization can go nuts where supposedly globalized standards are abused to profit off others