Hang on...

Graham_Devon

Why are we printing money now?

The recession was officially called end of last quarter. We havent even seen 2 quarters of negative growth yet, not officially. We haven't seen deflation, not officially. We haven't seen a total fall in house sales, only 40% fall. We haven't even officially hit 2 million unemployed.

So why are we, already, throwing our last dice and starting QE?

We have been through recessions in the 70's and 90's, right? I'm not pretending to have been around in the 70's and the 90's I was more interested in playing sonic on my sega master system. Why is it, we seemed to get through them, but we are not allowed to see growth fall now?

Just how political is this? We didn't do this in the 70's or 90's, so why now, why so quick in relative terms?

I mean, come on, house prices have only fallen just under 18%.

I'm getting the feeling we, the nation has been forced into funding a MASSIVE labour bailout.

Is it just me?

mewbie_2

Much as I'd like to agree - are other nations doing the same thing. And they aren't all Labour governments? Or are the other nations throwing actual real money at the problem, rather than magic money?

cocktail

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Why are we printing money now?

The recession was officially called end of last quarter. We havent even seen 2 quarters of negative growth yet, not officially. We haven't seen deflation, not officially. We haven't seen a total fall in house sales, only 40% fall. We haven't even officially hit 2 million unemployed.

So why are we, already, throwing our last dice and starting QE?

We have been through recessions in the 70's and 90's, right? I'm not pretending to have been around in the 70's and the 90's I was more interested in playing sonic on my sega master system. Why is it, we seemed to get through them, but we are not allowed to see growth fall now?

Just how political is this? We didn't do this in the 70's or 90's, so why now, why so quick in relative terms?

I mean, come on, house prices have only fallen just under 18%.

I'm getting the feeling we, the nation has been forced into funding a MASSIVE labour bailout.

Is it just me?

oops! could be something u and the rest don't know.

lukekelly_2

Your answer is the fear of deflation.

For all their sins when politicians do something deeply unpopular it's normally because they think it's a good idea. As quantitative easing is very unpopular (but recommended at the moment by many economists) there's a good chance they really believe that's it's the best move for the British economy. The time to worry is when they start introducing popular measures, that's when they're thinking of electoral survival and that's when they do the truly stupid things.

Graham_Devon

mewbie wrote: »

Much as I'd like to agree - are other nations doing the same thing. And they aren't all Labour governments? Or are the other nations throwing actual real money at the problem, rather than magic money?

Good point, and I'm not sure.

Hopefully this thread will clear things up.

Obama is our equivalent of labour though, and he's gone all out to the route of complete disaster.

I'm not too clue'd up about the other countries, so would be good if someone could clarify that.

Just all seems extremely soon to return to growth...or indeed, use massive measures such as this to attempt to artificically create growth....this HAS to happen, surely, we can't just keep growing and growing.

1echidna

The difference with this one is the parlous state of the banks which 'oil' the wheels of our economy.

tomterm8

Um, the difference is in reality we are in deflation (since most money in the economy is actually credit, and credit is shrinking fast) and the world in a very severe recession. Some commentators are saying the world will get a quarter of negative growth which is unprecidented in modern times.

This isn't a labour bailout, new labour knows it is dead. It has already lost the next election. If things go down as I expect, I doubt it will even exist in ten years time.

Andrew_McP

Fear. Simple as that. Many governments are doing the same sort of thing because they know the alternative to this normally suicidal strategy is something even worse. Complete economic collapse.

That sounds melodramatic, but that doesn't mean it's not true. All credit based societies have failed in the past. Even the ancient Babylonians appreciated that. But everyone in power is now hoping that "this time it's different", because now we have computers and clever people and economists with Nobel prizes and stuff. It's the 21st century and mankind has triumphed over the forces of economic common sense!

Yea, right. :rolleyes:

Wish them luck. They'll need it, because -- as always with computerised systems -- garbage in still equals garbage out. We've had a decade or so of garbage credit going into the economic system. Now that garbage is coming out. It could take a while to reboot and debug the system.

Andrew McP

StevieJ

lukekelly wrote: »

Your answer is the fear of deflation.

For all their sins when politicians do something deeply unpopular it's normally because they think it's a good idea. As quantitative easing is very unpopular (but recommended at the moment by many economists) there's a good chance they really believe that's it's the best move for the British economy. The time to worry is when they start introducing popular measures, that's when they're thinking of electoral survival and that's when they do the truly stupid things.

The time to worry is when they start listening to that Devon guy :eek:

JonnyBravo

Graham_Devon wrote: »

The recession was officially called end of last quarter. We havent even seen 2 quarters of negative growth yet, not officially. We haven't seen deflation, not officially. We haven't seen a total fall in house sales, only 40% fall. We haven't even officially hit 2 million unemployed.

So you think those things aren't going to happen???

Of course you do. And so does everyone else.
Once we've agreed that the only thing you have to agree is the course of action to take.

So is your question/problem more around the fact that you don't agree with the course of action rather than the timing?

StevieJ

JonnyBravo wrote: »

So you think those things aren't going to happen???

Of course you do. And so does everyone else.
Once we've agreed that the only thing you have to agree is the course of action to take.

So is your question/problem more around the fact that you don't agree with the course of action rather than the timing?

Is it me or does he spout some illogical stuff?
The recession was officially called end of last quarter
Followed by
We havent even seen 2 quarters of negative growth yet