1930 Calling Again

News from 1st July 1930.

Editorial: D.M. Marvin, economist for Royal Bank of Canada, says present depression caused by tight credit; points out that in spite of low rediscount rate many banks are not lending due to poor balance sheets; total credit extended by the Fed. Reserve banks fell from $1.621B last Oct. to $937M in June. Proposes Fed. Reserve banks inject $500M of reserve credit by purchasing government securities. Idea is worth considering, but must be done with care to avoid inflation.

The language of economic policy

Paul makes the good point that ‘Building Britain’s Future’, is a rather wishy-washy name for what looks to be a very interesting document – I haven’t been through it in any detail yet.

Now, Paul thinks it should have been called ‘the National Plan’.

I agree that that would be both a better name and a more general statment of intend. Let alone that it would put very clear dividing lines down.

Interestingly, on a post at Labourlist a few weeks back, I argued for a form of ‘National Plan’ but suggested the more neutral ‘Blue Print’.

In hindsight, I’m not sure why.

Today the East Coast Mainline is being nationalised. And yet the word ‘nationalise’ is not even in the BBC story. Instead we hear that it is being ‘taken into public ownership’. The same happened with the banks.

Although the Government is embarking on a fairly ambitious ‘industrial policy’ the term itself is rarely heard.

I know that the common explaination for all of this is that to use phrases like ‘National Plan’, ‘nationalise’ or ‘industrial policy’ would conjure up the images of the 1970s and all that entails. Burned deep in the New Labour mind is the notion that such ‘codewords’ must be avoided.

I think though it is time to ask – is this still true?

I was born in 1982. To me the phrases are in no way loaded. In fact I doubt anyone under 40 has any real memories of the economics of that era.

And even those in their 50s and 60s, will they really run a mile from a party using the phrase ‘nationalise’? I don’t know, but I suspect not.

The Government has been forced to ‘tack left’ on economic policy. It might be time to be honest about that.