We don’t need false optimism, we need radically new ideas.
As quickly as he bumbled into Downing Street, Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson™ was talking about ‘optimism’ and ‘a can do attitude’. It would have been a joyous moment — if we believed him. In reality, the right-wing disaster capitalists see the Brexit crisis as a business opportunity. It’s an opportunity to expand on the low tax, low regulation economy that we have been building since Thatcher. This government is out of touch with the radical changes our economic system needs to survive the coming decades on this planet.
Prominent members of Boris’ cabinet were co-authors on a 2012 book ‘Britannia Unchained’. This book illustrated how Britain could prosper by slashing regulations and transforming into a laissez-faire economy. They argue by cutting workers rights, reducing tax for the wealthy and slashing regulation and investment Britain can compete in the global marketplace. These ideas will plunge us into the economical abyss. To face the challenges ahead, we need bold ideas that push us forward–not back.
We are now entering into a new industrial revolution. In the early 20th century, fossil fuels helped shaped the US, UK and Europe into the biggest economies on Earth. Now we’re well into the 21st century and we face an existential threat to the way we organise, power and move economic life on this planet. We need to utilise to the new technological paradigms if we are going to get out in one piece. How do we do this? Let’s look to history.
The post-war economy, dubbed the ‘Golden Age of Capitalism’, saw huge growth in the face of adversity. The creation of the welfare state, government investment in industry and high taxes on wealth helped Britain bounce back from the post war slump. Out of a crisis, bold ideas helped create a utopia. There was a ‘consensus’ that reached across party lines to deliver radical ideas on the basis of pragmatism and the ‘overall good’. We need that now.
To meet our carbon-neutral deadline of 2050, we must transform our entire economic system. Proposals like the Green New Deal or Labour’s Green Industrial Revolution provide a kickstart to transforming our economy into a highly skilled, highly efficient green economy. Millions of skilled jobs will be needed to create new infrastructure and tools that will power economic life in a green way. Without investment in education or industry, this cannot hope to happen quick enough.
If we’re going to change an economy, it’s going to take money. In our current system, we often see tax as a negative. A burden to wealth creators who work to grow the economy. This isn’t strictly true. We need to change our thinking. Huge amounts of wealth is created by already owning wealth. Corporations and wealthy individuals who create nothing new, but move money around. Sectors like finance, pharmaceutical and real estate often use corporate regulation and public-funded research to line their own pockets. This doesn’t create new wealth, but takes it directly from the rest of us. The GDP may grow but wages often stay stagnant or decline. Ramping up taxes on wealth and assets, like land and profits, can help generate billions that can be reinvested into the public economy.
Universal Basic Income (UBI) guarantees an income to every single citizen. This is a logical extension of Bevridge’s welfare state. Another way to describe it is ‘venture capital for the people’. Freeing the entire population from their basic needs gives them huge mobility. This allows them to start new companies, look after their elderly family members or go back to university. This is a huge investment in our population. It will also make us all happier, freer and more secure.
Johnson’s cabinet members have spoken about attacking working rights ‘to keep Britain competitive’. When in reality, it will do the opposite. Working rights are responsible for our wages, working hours and autonomy. In-work poverty costs the taxpayer millions. Benefits subsidise poor wages, making the wealthy even richer. Studies have shown that a shorter working week and improved autonomy can increase productivity and health amongst workers. These are all benefits that can help spur sustainable growth and improve the lives of millions of people.
This all sounds great, right? So why isn’t the government talking about these ideas? These ideas aren’t a case of left or right. Labour or Tory. They are ideas that are pragmatic and necessary. Cynics will say this is ‘way too radical ’ — which is true. But all great changes in human history, from democracy to the abolition of slavery, were ‘radical’ once. Until they happened. Ideas are born on the fringes and grow into the centre, where they become ‘normal’.
But there is another problem. We could adopt ideas like a green economy, UBI, workplace autonomy tomorrow. We have the means and the money. It’s not ‘politically’ viable. Political discourse says we can only tinker around with the existing system. The so called ‘moderates’ dismiss anything radically different. However there is nothing ‘moderate’ about our current system.
The idea that we can continue in a carbon-based economy where all profit flows to a tiny group of people is absurd. It’s a sad state of affairs when we look at the ecological challenges and say ‘We’ve already done the best we can do’. It’s also not true. Our current system is unable to deal effectively with the change that the climate crisis will bring. We cannot be radical enough. Yet, we’re moving in the opposite direction. Under Boris, we are burying our heads in the sand and putting the broken system into overdrive.
We don’t need to ‘take back control’ — we need to cooperate with our neighbours. We don’t need to ‘return to the middle ground’ but embrace new, radical ideas that put sustainability first. We don’t need to bury our heads in the sand of blind optimism. We need to start to think differently.
We’ve made great social and economic advancements in the least 100 years. But we are capable of so much more. Under the current, crumbling system things cannot continue to get better. In the face of an existential ecological catastrophe, we need the courage and the imagination to change our society. There is nothing natural or inherent about how we’ve organised ourselves. If history has taught us anything, it’s that everything can change in a moment.
