h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I'm not a lover of the LSE, or the NYSE or of trading-floor denizens anywhere.

I am alarmed, though, by the public mood about the City right now. Everyone seems to be having a go at the place, from the Church of England to the TUC. It's as if we've all forgotten (or never knew?) that the deals that go on there underpin our pensions, sustain our employment and generally make it possible to have what we want, when we want it, well in advance of our ability to pay for it.

What has happened to intelligent comment on the economy?

I think it's the usual "Media Frenzy = lack of intelligent comment" equation. Any actual intelligent comment is being drowned out by the sheer weight of headline-grabbing crap.

"What has happened to intelligent comment on the economy?"
Still intelligent people commenting, but pandering to the lowest common denominator of the unintelligent masses.

I don't think people have forgotten how important the City is. They know it all too well now it's in trouble and the pensions it underpins are being lost, the employment it sustains isn't paying well enough, etc.

But I think it is because the people working there are rich, and massively so. This kind of wealth will always annoy people, so it makes them easy targets.

"have what we want, when we want it, well in advance of our ability to pay for it"

It's this attitude that has brought-about our current financial crisis. You can't build a stable economy based around loans and credit. If the people in "the city" are responsible for promoting the use of loans as a quick way for people to get everything they want (rather than a sensible way of paying for something expensive and unafordable even in the reasonably long-term eg a house) then people are right to blame them (although they're hardly the only ones to blame - no one is forced to take out a loan after all).

Hi all! And thanks for joining in with this one.

The point Zagreb picked up on ( of course) is the issue at the centre of the crisis for me. Credit sustains growth, but the balance is precarious and reliant on confidence. Good or bad?

A Tory spokesman today said the MEP's decision to hold the line on car emissions would destroy jobs, because it would mean people didn't buy new cars and instead keep their dirty old ones, so harming both economy and environment.

I can't decide whether this is a fair point or complete nonsense. I fear, though, that Sustainability and Capitalism might be incompatible concepts. It seems we all have to consume more than we need, or else succumb to a Depression

That's it almost in a nutshell - growth is seen as good. But we cant go on growing infinitely.

The point about the City and the Hate being directed at is is that we normal people who have normal paying jobs can't understand why bonuses are paid to people who mess up spectacularly. Even when fired they can pick up massive bonuses.

And a lot of the Hate is coming from quarters who received little sympathy and short shrift (miners, steelworkers etc) when their companies fell foul of the natural laws which apply to capitalism.

I'm sure that most people realise that we need the City - but I for one would prefer a bit less flash and a bit more thinking from those highly paid (not all of them) eejits (not all of them).

And perhaps the acknowledgement that as much as we need the City, they need the rest of us plebs.

I find it hard to sympathise with people who see no harm in destroying a business for the sake of their own personal gain.

They have made much of their mantra that only the strongest survive, yet now they want us to prop up their excesses and they don't even have the grace to admit they were in error.

My pension has already been destroyed over the last 10 years, thanks to the government and a short sighted FSA.

I'm happy to see them suffer.

If I could believe it would only be the City-boys who suffered, I'd completely agree with you.

I'm really ambivalent about this one (which is why I posted the thread, hoping for some persuasive analysis either way).

On the one hand, as you imply, it's just a local mess caused by a bunch of parasites who inflict long-term harm for short-term personal gain. Let 'em hang.

It's much deeper, though, surely. For one thing, it's the bankers not the traders who do the real harm. It's the failure to extend credit that destroys enterprise. But lending money willy-nilly to people who'll never pay it back is unsustainable, so where's the balance?

The thing that really frightens me, and maybe others feel this too, is just how much better I feel for my own belt-tightening. My food bill hasn't increased, though I buy less and more discriminatingly. As a result, I'm eating healthier and enjoying the effort. I'm using the car less. I'm reading more. I've got something to talk with the neighbours about. My waste is half what it was six months ago it seems. My bin is going out half full and I feel like a good citizen again.

So why frightened? Because of the dichotomy of these virtues spread across 10 million households. I only buy what I really need. I make damn sure I get value for money. And if we all do that, the economy contracts and the uncompetitiveness of UK manufacture and produce is brutally exposed. We can't all stop paying the premium for our own life-style, or we won't have it any more.

The UK government is particularly knackered because the pampering (and the electoral dependence) is to the public sector. You just can't protect the economic overhead's pensions in preference to those of the productive economy. And of course another upshot of the virtuous drive of the paragraphs above is a contracting public sector. If we eat better and stop being collectively obese, we'll need a smaller NHS. If we decide two kids is a sensible number, we'll need fewer teachers. I seem to be making a case for fewer bin-men etc, etc.

I think there's a risk of protecting the jobs the economy needs least. If there's one thing this whole episode is teaching us big-time it's the extraordinary (and inappropriate?) power in a democracy of the economic and intellectual Lowest Common Denominator. Just look at the terms of the Wall St Bailout debate in the US this week for evidence of that, and of course all this might apply cross-pond after a few years under the Democrats. Maybe we all need to get back to something short of Universal Suffrage, even?

See why I'm confused? Half of me thinks its walking into the light, and the other half that I'm plunging into oblivion.

Tightening your belt is only a virtue if you're overweight to begin with. For those of us who need all the food we can afford, food price increases are not going to make us healthier.

Well, that's nice. Try reading properly, then post.

Sheesh.

What you're describing is the fat being trimmed from society. If we're reducing our waste levels, becoming more efficient in our transport, and improving our health, then maybe the government can spend their money on worthwhile causes instead of hectoring social engineering programmes.

If there's less waste, then we need to import less, if we grow our own vegetables then there's less airplanes transporting luxury items to be over-pacged in supermarkets.

I too am enjoying some of the belt tightening - but I am a fat basket.