Friday, May 4, 2018

Matias Vernengo — The end of neoliberalism?


Not.

Naked Keynesianism
The end of neoliberalism?
Matias Vernengo | Associate Professor of Economics, Bucknell University

4 comments:

Konrad said...

I don’t care much for Mark Blyth. He never says in five words what he can say in five pages. When he speaks in person, he is even more verbose (in his annoyingly strong Scottish accent). Sometimes he sounds drunk.

Anyway the article is correct in noting that, contrary to Blyth, the era of neoliberalism is NOT over.

“In fact, in many places Neoliberalism is resurgent (certainly in Latin America; I'll have something to say on Argentina soon).”

Correct. Consider Brazil’s neoliberals. After they deposed President Dilma Rousseff in a coup (Aug 2016) they wrote austerity and neoliberalism into Brazil’s national constitution. [!!!!] They did this to ensure that if any future Brazilian government tried to reverse austerity and neoliberalism, Brazil’s courts would slap down that government as “unconstitutional.”

All Latin American nations have gone neoliberal except for Cuba, Bolivia, and Venezuela. The shift includes Argentina, which went neoliberal when the bankers installed Mauricio Macri as President (10 Dec 2015) and Ecuador, which went neoliberal when the bankers installed Lenin Moreno as President (24 May 2017). Even Nicaragua has gone neoliberal, albeit on a more gradual basis.

Neoliberalism is the constant push to widen the gap between the rich and the rest, and to privatize all public assets so that rich oligarchs own everything and everyone. Neoliberalism includes regressive taxation, gratuitous austerity, debt enslavement, economics propaganda, and many other tricks that rich oligarchs use to boost inequality, and impoverish the masses.

Kaivey said...

The Tories weren't wiped out in London, or in Great Britain. If only people knew cure they were being conned. Of course, conservatives would say that about me, but we here have a lot of insider knowledge.

The socialists get blamed for mass immigration, but the elite encouraged it to boost the economy to make themselves richer. They thought Western wages were too high. And the demand for houses was good for bankers and landlords.

I spoke to a neighbour who was a Conservative supporter until she went UKIP. She told me we won WW2 but the Germans were winning now. I asked what would happen if the Germans did win, she didn't know and looked lost, and then she said they would replace our banks in the high street with their ones. I told her that German banks invest in the local economy promoting small businesses and so they would be an asset in our high streets. She looked confused by my answer as she wasn't expecting me to praise German banks. So you see she had no idea what was so bad about being in Europe, all she had was nationalism. Today Europe is going neoliberal hell house.

Do the small businessmen know that they would have more customers if we didn't have Tory austerity. Don't they realise that the 20% VAT that the right imposed to raise money for the bankers is destroying their sales. All they hate is people on benefits. They don't realised that the biggest spongers are the ruling class who run protection rackets making Russia and China into enemies so they can sell more weapons. The bankers also launder drug money and are involved in tax avoidance making our tax higher. The benefit cheats might take a few million, but the elite steal billions.

The over 50's vote overwhelming Tory because they have bought their nice houses and have good pensions, but they could have a terrific health service for themselves and for their aging parents if they voted for alternative parties. And their children are saddled with student debt and high rents and mortgages.

A Tory colleague of mine complained like hell that he had to sell his parents house to pay for their old age care, so why did he always vote Conservative then who privatised all old aged care and shifted the cost onto the individual.

Almost everything is privatised in neoliberalism, there is no commons or public goods. Life is stifled.

Konrad said...

KAIVEY WRITES: “The Tories weren't wiped out in London, or in Great Britain. If only people knew cure they were being conned. Of course, conservatives would say that about me, but we here have a lot of insider knowledge.”

In my opinion there is one of two possible explanations for why Thursday’s election results…

Possibility One: The Tories rigged the election count. The Skripal poisoning hoax didn’t help the Tories, nor the Douma gassing hoax, nor the incessant attacks by Jewish militants on Labour. Nothing worked. The Tories were plagued by scandals, and were headed for a major defeat. So they rigged the election, using the standard “49-51” trick, in which they got just enough “votes” to get a slight but commanding majority. If the (rigged) vote showed 80-to-20 in favor of the Tories, the masses would not accept it. This is a common trick in the USA too. Rich oligarchs select their puppet, and then fix the election so that their puppet “wins” 51% of the votes. Welcome to “Democracy.”

Possibility Two: The Tories did not rig the election count. Instead, average Britons turned against Labour because average Britons are tired of political correctness and Social Justice Warrior crap (e.g. militant feminists, “trans-rights” mutants, etc. etc.)

I lean toward explanation #1, because everyone is shocked that the Tories survived despite the Windrush scandal, despite Rudd having to resign because she was caught lying, and so on.

Meanwhile the corporate media outlets are claiming that the reason why Labour made no gains is that the party is “anti-Semitic.” It all sounds like bullshyte.

KAIVEY WRITES: “The socialists get blamed for mass immigration, but the elite encouraged it to boost the economy to make themselves richer. They thought Western wages were too high. And the demand for houses was good for bankers and landlords.”

Another advantage of mass immigration is that it keeps the lower classes divided along racial lines, rather than uniting against their rich masters.

By the way, I’ve been in inner London. Not many white people there. The non-whites of inner London all seem very unhappy. At least, that was my impression.

No one goes to London unless he works there. If I am living in the Midlands, for example, and I announce that, “Tomorrow I must go to London,” everyone will ask me, “WHY????” No one goes to London unless he has no choice.

KAIVEY WRITES: “I spoke to a neighbour who was a Conservative supporter until she went UKIP.”

The UKIP lost so many seats in Thursday’s election that the party is now extinct.

KAIVEY WRITES: She told me we won WW2 but the Germans were winning now. I asked what would happen if the Germans did win, she didn't know and looked lost, and then she said they would replace our banks in the high street with their ones. I told her that German banks invest in the local economy promoting small businesses and so they would be an asset in our high streets. She looked confused by my answer as she wasn't expecting me to praise German banks. So you see she had no idea what was so bad about being in Europe, all she had was nationalism. Today Europe is going neoliberal hell house.”

The Germans, the Neoliberals, and the Brussels bureaucrats are winning. Elderly Britons can’t believe what’s happened to the UK. Their only hope in life is that they will die before things become even worse.

CONTINUED BELOW

Konrad said...

CONTINUED…

KAIVEY WRITES: “Do the small businessmen know that they would have more customers if we didn't have Tory austerity? Don't they realise that the 20% VAT that the right imposed to raise money for the bankers is destroying their sales? All they hate is people on benefits. They don't realise that the biggest spongers are the ruling class who run protection rackets making Russia and China into enemies so they can sell more weapons. The bankers also launder drug money and are involved in tax avoidance making our tax higher. The benefit cheats might take a few million, but the elite steal billions.”

All true. All correct. In the UK and USA the peasants are their own worst enemies. They are okay with big companies getting millions of pounds a month in corporate subsidies, but they explode in anger when they see an average person collecting a few pence in benefits.

KAIVEY WRITES: The over 50's vote overwhelmingly Tory because they have bought their nice houses and have good pensions, but they could have a terrific health service for themselves and for their aging parents if they voted for alternative parties. And their children are saddled with student debt and high rents and mortgages. A Tory colleague of mine complained like hell that he had to sell his parents’ house to pay for their old age care, so why did he always vote Conservative then who privatised all old aged care and shifted the cost onto the individual. Almost everything is privatised in neoliberalism, there is no commons or public goods. Life is stifled.”

Privatization is the essence of neoliberalism. Privatization reduces everything and everyone to being the property of a few oligarchs.

Rumor has it that Maggie Thatcher is in hell, and is working to privatize hell’s operations.