Western economies are struggling to emerge from the disruption of the pandemic. With reference to the UK in this article, Van Lerven marks the backlash to government borrowing and spending necessary to support some level of economic activity and income support over the last 15 months. Debt control and reduction is the mantra as it was following the financial crisis in 2008-09. Van Lerven points out that national governments have a lot more capacity to maintain high debt positions given that interest charges are much lower than the expected growth in national income as economies recover. But maybe confidence in financing recovery belies the real underlying problem in our economic system – striving for perpetual annual economic growth rather than designing a human needs economy. – Peter Clutterbuck
“The fetishising and fearmongering around public debt gives an impression that the government’s financial position is the key barometer for measuring a countries economic welfare. The means to an end, has somehow become an ‘end’ in itself – with potentially disastrous consequences for both the economy itself, and those who live in it. […]”
