So here we have it, UK’s much-praised Chancellor is urging us to “eat out to help out”. Recognition of the absurdity of this formula requires a certain naivety, we being so brainwashed into thinking economic orthodoxy to be a law of nature. We need to see the world more like the boy in Andersen’s “Emperor’s New Clothes” tale.
To that end, here are some naïve questions:
1). At what point in the digestive process do I start helping out? At what point do the new riches emerge?
2). If I’m sick afterwards, will I have succeeded in helping out, or do I have to keep down the food for a longer period of time for this to work? How long before it’s OK to poo?
3). How many meals successfully consumed are needed to economically offset the costs of each additional Covid-19 case resulting from the initiative? Can it be measured in calories?
So what is the rationale? “This is a consumption-driven economy” Sunak apparently told the Times newspaper. So the NHS will sort out the medical problem and we’ll all eat our way to solving the economic one.
I’ll try again.
Imagine there’s no money, just an agreement between friends that we all do stuff to help each other. Imagine our consumption patterns under this arrangement were the same as before the pandemic.
Then the pandemic hits.
So we ask some people to stop working if their work is nonessential. Tell me why anyone needs to starve or to abandon for good the enterprises they were previously employed in? Why would anyone lose their home? Why must we lose more than just the nonessential work?
So my real (non-flippant) questions are:
1). Isn’t being a consumption-driven economy something we might want to change rather than encourage?
2). Given that we consume more than is ecologically sustainable in many sectors and that the consequences of this consumption endangers our future, why is there so little thought given to making nonessential consumption unessential to the economy?
Asset Based Taxation (ABT) is, at least, a thought in this direction. Please take the time to read the Seven Roads document if you haven’t already and give me your feedback.
Seven Roads to Asset Based Taxation