Sunday 27 January 2013

Inflation and the ordinary man...and woman, for that matter

****

The Canadian superstar who is arriving to take over as boss of the Bank of England is dropping some hints about inflation:

...although price stability was central, there were “tolerances” concerning the speed with which inflation would be brought down if the economy was struggling. 

I'm guessing this is posh banker code for carrying on doing what the Bank and the government have been doing - ignoring inflation targeting. There's a really good reason for this, of course, as inflation is a sweet, back-door way of reducing debt. Let's call above trend inflation what it is (especially when it is deliberate as is the case here at the moment), a tax.

Perhaps instead of trying to blind us with banker bollocks, the government should say it's going to do something about the cost of living? Rather than listening to grandees in fancy Swiss ski resorts, maybe the government should come down the pub with me and talk to the people - people with jobs and mortgages - who are being screwed by these policies. People who say things like this:

 "It's all gone wrong - tits up, hasn't it" Says Lewis. In response to my request for clarity he continues, "the economy, the government. Everything has gone up, bread's like 50% more expensive and look at diesel. People can't afford stuff - come March there'll be a real mess. We've got to get prices down."

And I'm sure that I could introduce our lords and masters to a few others with the same problem. Yet the government, stuck in a nonsense of its own making, isn't listening. Or is listening to international banks with huge, dodgy debts.

....

No comments: