Process
Status Items Output None Questions None Claims None Highlights Done See section below
Highlights
id796510972
We often talk about austerity in terms of cuts to public spending, but that is just one side of the coin. By starving public services of resources, the government manufactured a convenient excuse for their privatization. We saw this most acutely with the National Health Service (NHS): an underfunded public service does not just cause satisfaction to plummet, but the belief in the principle of public health care itself.
✏️ The truth behind austerity. First, cutting funding to public services causes the service quality to drop, satisfaction to drop, and the overall belief in the principle of public service to drop. This leads to the “natural” and intended next step: privatization. 🔗 View Highlight
id796511070
Austerity was never about saving money (the UK’s debt pile increased every single year under the Tories). It was about transferring money from the poorest to the richest. Between 2010 and 2018, aggregate wealth in the UK grew by £5.68 trillion. Ninety-four percent went to the richest 50 percent of households; 6 percent went to the poorest 50 percent. As child poverty was heading toward its highest levels since 2007, Britain’s billionaires more than doubled their wealth.
✏️ And the intent of privatization is not inherently about providing a better quality service, but about transferring money from the poorest to the richest. 🔗 View Highlight
id796511220
The government knows that there is a range of choices available to them. It could introduce wealth taxes to raise upward of £10 billion. It could stop wasting public money on private contracts. It could launch a fundamental redistribution of power by bringing water and energy into full public ownership. Instead, it has opted to take resources away from people who were promised things would change. There is plenty of money, it’s just in the wrong hands
✏️ As I’ve read over and over again… there are choices. When government says it has no choice but to use austerity, they’re lying. They have a choice, they just don’t want to hurt the people with power and money. 🔗 View Highlight
id796511428
A universal system of welfare reduces the stigma attached to those who rely on it, and removes barriers for those who find it difficult to apply (both are reasons why the take-up of means-tested payments is so low).