Tag Archives: Labour Party

Sustainable cost accounting and the political necessity of addressing reality.Tax Research UKBusiness has to change its accounting for the climate crisis and Mark Carney needs to go further than he’s suggesting is necessaryLabour needs to drop the Green Industrial Revolution: we need a Green New Deal, and they’re nothing like the same thingRichard Murphy | Professor of Practice in International Political Economy at City University, London; Director of Tax Research UK; non-executive...

As I type this (Sunday), I am heading to Brighton, England from Edinburgh. We had two sessions in Edinburgh yesterday (Saturday) and it was great to share ideas with some really committed people. We had to dodge a Hollywood closure of the streets (‘Fast and Furious 9 had commandeered the inner city to film a car or two swerving out of control or whatever, and I hope the city received heaps for the inconvenience to its citizens. But, with the direction now south, and tomorrow’s two events...

Jeremy Corbyn represents the only realistic chance the people of England and Wales have been given in decades, to escape from the neo-liberal economics that have impoverished vast swathes of the population. But he leads a parliamentary party which is almost entirely comprised of hardline neo-liberal adherents.The majority of the parliamentary Labour party are the people who brought in academy schools, high student tuition fees, PFI, who introduced more privatisation into the health service...

It is Wednesday and only a relatively short blog post. Yes, some more on that Fiscal Rule that seems to be causing people to lose sleep (not me). First, we had the Duck Test debate about the British Labour Party Fiscal Credibility Rule. Those promoting the Rule have been at lengths to deny its neoliberal framing, language and concepts. Not an easy task when the Rule talks about a currency-issuing government wanting to avoid “putting the rent on the credit card month after month”. Sounds...

The week before last, Thomas Fazi and I had a response to a recent British attack on Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) published in The Tribune magazine (June 5, 2019) – For MMT. In effect, there were two quite separate topics that needed to be discussed: (a) the misrepresentation of MMT; and (b) the issues pertaining to British Labour Party policy proposals. The article we were responding to – Against MMT – written by a former Labour Party advisor, was not really about MMT at all, as you will...

In Part I, I considered an Australian-based attack on MMT from a Labour Party stooge. In this Part, I shift to Britain to address the recent article by a Northern Labour MP – Jonathan Reynolds – who is apparently, if his arrogance is to be believed, the Labour Party spokesperson on matters economic. For the title of his recent article (June 4, 2019) was – Why Labour doesn’t support Modern Monetary Theory – which begs the question as to who actually doesn’t support MMT – all of Labour?...

It appears that the Brexit process in Britain will now stall. My understanding of the Referendum was the majority of British people who voted wanted to leave the EU and that the politicians from all sides of politics unambiguously stated they would honour the outcome, whichever way the vote fell. That is what democracies are about. A lot of people are disappointed by vote outcomes. They have to grin and bear it. But in the case of the Brexit vote, the Remainers have never accepted the...

Richard Murphy reports another hit job on MMT and him as well along with the progressive wing of the Labour Party that supports MMT. The attack is stepping up. And, my friends, in this story you have a history of this entire movement. First they ignore you. Then they ridicule you. And then they attack you and want to burn you. And then they build monuments to you. And that, is what is going to happen to the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America. — Nicholas Klein, 1914 (This quote or a...

Analysis from the left mostly about British politics but inclusive of all aspects of neoliberalism as the policy, strategy and tactics of elite power. Says "long read," but it is not that long. Worth a read even if you are not British since it is also an analysis of elite power as it relates to national politics and neoliberal globalization. Let's hope Cook is correct in seeing the wave cresting. The question then becomes will the breaking of the wave result in world war as the elite...

Eric Lonergan has recently written a post about the fiscal rules debate that has cropped up around the U.K. Labour Party's adoption of such a rule. As usual, his post covers a lot of territory -- if I were to attempt to cover all the points he raised when following my preferred writing style, it would be a 10 part article. Meanwhile, I am supposed to be working on finishing off my breakeven inflation book, as well as dealing with other projects. As a result, I just want to respond to a...