George Osborne given stark warning on cuts' impact (Will = 10% drop in UK family living standards)

[Turborama]

Source: The Guardian

Larry Elliott, economics editor | Monday September 12 2011

George Osborne's austerity programme will cut the living standards of Britain's families by more than 10% over the next three years as those on the lowest incomes suffer most from the tax increases and spending cuts designed to reduce the budget deficit.

A study from the Institute for Fiscal Studies, the UK's leading experts on the public finances, concludes that the chancellor's strategy will result in greater inequality and rising child poverty, throwing into reverse progress made in the final years of the last Labour government.

The bleak picture painted by the IFS will be used by opponents of the chancellor's austerity measures to call for a plan B to generate faster economic growth. There is likely to be further pressure on Osborne on Monday as the head of his independent commission on banking, Sir John Vickers, outlines measures for banking reform.

The IFS analysis, included in a new international study into the impact of the "Great Recession" of 2008-09 on 21 wealthy countries, says the most severe downturn since the interwar years will "cast a very long shadow in the UK", with the poorest 30% of households especially hard hit.

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2011/sep/12/george-osborne-warning-cuts-impact

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At the time of posting there are some very good comments below the article (it's only a matter of time before the inevitable arrival of a swarm of reich wing trolls).

[Lorien]

1. Call it what it is; a class war being waged by the wealthiest 1%

The answer is simple (Iceland did it) but won't be undertaken by world leaders who are wrapped around the fingers of the banksters and oligarchs.

[defendandprotect]

4. +1 --

[xchrom]

2. Recommend

[caseymoz]

3. This is the exact policy the Weimar Republic chose in 1931.

Chancellor Heinrich Bruning invoked emergency powers to impose austerity measures over the objections of both the Reichstag and his own Center Party. The results: he discredited the Center Party, the only moderate party left in Germany. By 1933 members of the Center Party were abandoning it for the Nazi Party. Bruning became known as "the hunger chancellor."

We all know how it ended. Fact is, Bruning was not a fascist. He hated the Nazis, but he really believed austerity was the way to go.

Britain has far less excuse. They don't have onerous war reparations to pay.

[dipsydoodle]

7. We don't have onerous war reparations to pay

but are subject to the world wide financial crisis originating in the US 4 years ago, same as everyone else, and 12 plus years of New Labour's overspending too.

[caseymoz]

8. That's analoguous to the fact that Germany was in the Great Depression.

I failed to mention that. On top of that, it had the war reparations. Things were worse in Germany, but that's not to say the government can't make them that bad in Britain, too.

The US is imposing austerity, too, forcing it down people's throats. My point is, it never works, never has worked. Some academics seem to think that if they try it enough, it will finally work. It's popular with the wealthy because they can collect interest on governmental bonds while paying less taxes, in other words, become richer while everyone else languishes. It has always damaged economies and increased suffering, sometimes with calamitous results.

[autorank]

5. k*r Elect a Conservative government in the UK and this is what you get - thanks Clegg

Tiny Clegg, the Liberal Democrat who chose to make a coalition government with the Conservatives should be deposed right away.
His own party should do it. That would position an election soon.

With Murdoch out of the picture, there might actually be a fair election. Labour needs to come back. Not the Blair "New Labour"
but real Labour. Then that government should f'ing indict Blair for war crimes.

[onehandle]

6. George Osborne = Paul Ryan. nt