Lord Hutton’s report last week recommending changes to the public pension system is part of an assault on all our pensions – private, public and state. This is an element of the generalised assault on all our living standards as result of the billions of pounds that have been spent on bailing out the financial [...]
The cry that goes out whenever a fair tax redistribution system is suggested that if one was implemented the rich would leave the country in droves. The implication being that we either could not function without them and that our economy and our society would crumble. Is this really the case? The facts would point [...]
One of the central policies put forward by the Coalition government is that workers in the public and private sectors should be prepared to take wage cuts and freezes and put up with low wages for the good of their companies and the economy in general. Does this make any economic sense and is such [...]
The respected research body the non-political Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has proved what we all knew intuitively: the cuts announced in the emergency budget will hit the poorest hardest. This is their conclusion in their report issued at the end of August 2010 on the effects of the emergency budget. The only thing progressive [...]
The Coalition’s economic policies are the most right wing liberal capitalist policies of any of the world’s major governments. They wish to transform a structurally weak UK economy based on credit, an unregulated financial system and public services supported by a structural spending deficit into a power house free enterprise economy based on a dynamic [...]
As a party the Scottish Socialist Party (SSP) is not only opposed to the cuts but says there is no need for cuts. Unlike other parties who are opposed to the cuts but are quite willing to implement them directly and indirectly because they have no alternative framework for running the economy. Our alternative framework [...]
Our ability to plan for a reasonable retirement is under severe attack. But why this is happening? There are three main types of pensions: private pensions received by those who worked for private corporations, public pensions for those employed in the state sector and retirement pensions paid by the state to those over a certain [...]
Recently large numbers have been thrown around for the amount of tax that is lost from tax avoidance. The figure which I have most often seen quoted is £130 billion form the PCS. This turns out to be the historic cumulative total for tax which is uncollected, evaded (illegal) and avoided (legal (sic)). The danger [...]
The agreement between the Conservatives and the Lib Dems marks the first coalition government since 1931. The situation in both cases was very familiar. Capitalism is struggling with a severe economic and financial crisis that the wealthy, rich and bankers want to make the bulk of the population – the working class and the poor [...]
The European Commission (EC), European Central Bank (ECB) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have put together a 750 Euro billion bail out package to try and avert what would be the second leg of the great financial crisis and a double dip recession which could lead to a depression world wide. The package was [...]
