Ed Balls... Jesus wept

Graham_Devon

Mr Balls' ideas include a VAT cut, a 3p income tax cut for a year, bringing forward the planned personal allowance rise to £10,000 and higher tax credits.

And yes, he does state we should borrow to fund all this.

What does he go on to attack? Higher government borrowing. Buffoon.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-17087726

CLAPTON

You don't hold the view that the economy, jobs, etc are suffering from a lack of aggregate demand?

You think maybe there is too much or it's just about right?

sheffield_lad

What an idiot Balls is, borrow borrow borrow, left to him his other brainwave would be lets create more public (sick note), sector jobs!

Of course there needs to be growth but not at the expense of getting the deficit down grrrrr maybe we will have a Greece moment where we realise in the last few decades we have become lazy workers who enjoy the benefits of time off for sickness and maternity leave, where productivity is held back as the unions don't want the bosses to raise the work ethic. Where hard work is not rewarded for fear of upsetting the one's who have 'issues' bless.

No wonder the far east are on the rise yes low wages but a fantastic work ethic which has been missing in some (public sector), and other areas of our country.

It's time 'some' actually worked for their money which is different to just turning up.

Generali

CLAPTON wrote: »

You don't hold the view that the economy, jobs, etc are suffering from a lack of aggregate demand?

You think maybe there is too much or it's just about right?

Say's Law states that supply creates its own demand.

Increasing public borrowing will just make the problem of debt rationing worse.

Graham_Devon

CLAPTON wrote: »

You don't hold the view that the economy, jobs, etc are suffering from a lack of aggregate demand?

You think maybe there is too much or it's just about right?

I do hold that view.

But I don't hold the view that creating more debt to solve a lack of aggregate demand due to debt problems is the way forward.

But that wasn't really the point of the thread. The point was, how can you suggest the way forward is to increase borrowing, and then go on to attack increased borrowing?

Ilya_Ilyich

Well we can borrow incredibly cheaply at the moment - e.g. 2.19% on 10yr gilts. Do you feel that investing in policies designed to stimulate economic growth wouldn't be able to deliver a return of over 2.2%?

e: Why does goverment-held debt cause low aggregate consumer demand?

chewmylegoff

Labour tried the "VAT cut magic" before. If it had worked, Balls could trot out some actual evidence to demonstrate that it had boosted the economy. I seem to remember reading some stuff a while ago which indicated that labour cutting VAT to 15% had no noticeable impact on consumer spending - presumably that's why he isn't backing his argument up with actual figures.

It's a shame that Labour didn't keep Darling on as shadow chancellor, in my view, he was one of a very small number of politicians who have gone a decent job in recent years.

sheffield_lad

Ilya_Ilyich wrote: »

Well we can borrow incredibly cheaply at the moment - e.g. 2.19% on 10yr gilts. Do you feel that investing in policies designed to stimulate economic growth wouldn't be able to deliver a return of over 2.2%?

e: Why does goverment-held debt cause low aggregate consumer demand?

ummm, but we are nowhere near paying the one trillion, repeat 1 trillion back! Getting control of the nations credit card has to be the first move. Maybe when we have that level IE we don't run a deficit we can think of stimulating growth but when are we going to pay it all back?

RUN_RABBIT_RUN

Graham_Devon wrote: »

.

a cretin of the highest order

i dont know how he can show his face to be honest

CLAPTON

Generali wrote: »

Say's Law states that supply creates its own demand.

Increasing public borrowing will just make the problem of debt rationing worse.

Says' Law isn't, as you know a 'law'.
Simply an empirical relationship that did, at one time show a correlation.
But here are lots and lots of things that 'correlate' but are not causally related.

Do you think it is working in Ireland and Greece?

Do you think there is a lack of aggregate demand?

CLAPTON

Graham_Devon wrote: »

I do hold that view.

But I don't hold the view that creating more debt to solve a lack of aggregate demand due to debt problems is the way forward.

But that wasn't really the point of the thread. The point was, how can you suggest the way forward is to increase borrowing, and then go on to attack increased borrowing?

Tell us what he really said.