Imagine a world in which Britain had not fetishised the deregulation of finance and not carelessly privatised its utilities as PLCs with “light touch” regulation. Then imagine it had not chosen to cut its post-financial crisis deficit solely by public spending cuts of unparalleled severity. The University of Warwick’s Thiemo Fetzer looked at the geography of public spending cuts between 2010 and 2016, which fell disproportionately hard on places already suffering acute social distress, with the growth of Ukip and Leave votes. Worse, they fanned it, blaming public spending rather than the operation of markets for the crisis. There had been no focus on their shareholding structures, so the privatised water companies might create long-term shareholders of whom the state might be one.

Source: The Guardian October 14, 2018 07:52 UTC