Stand by for the next UK crash! ETA 2016

Even though the economic policies of the US and UK have been markedly different, there has recently been fair bit of talk on both sides of the Atlantic about how cuts in Govt spending have started to work and budget deficits have started to fall. But budget deficits do always rise sharply after a crash and fall afterwards. So are governments just trying to take credit for what would have happened anyway? Surely not!

Spending and taxation are largely still considered in isolation which is just bad economics.  For example one Conservative MP * recently claimed the collection of an “£100bn a year of extra tax revenue, compared to an increase of £66bn in current public spending”. There is no recognition of how  an increase of £66bn works. If it were spent on wages and salaries about a third would come back straightaway in taxes and nearly all the rest would quickly follow in a matter of months. Given that this extra £66bn creates extra economic activity, taking workers off the dole queue, then it is quite likely the government at least breaks even.

We have also seen claims that the “state deficit will have decreased by 40%” by the time of the next election and that “house prices will be up on average by 16% over the five years” . If house prices were rising because of increased personal income that could be argued to be a good thing but this is not the case at all. Incomes are still failing to keep pace with inflation. The UK economy looks to be in a sad state:

Labour Chart


It is generally known that credit bubbles are a bad thing and when they burst a recession is likely to follow. But exactly why is this the case? The best explanation you’ll get from even the BBC, who should really know better, is that a hangover usually follows in the aftermath of a party. Surely we can do slightly better than that!

The mainstream don’t at all make the connection between increased bank lending and the reduction we see in government deficits. But they should. When banks lend they create new money. It is often said they “create money out of thin air”.  That’s what banks do. They don’t take in money from depositors and lend it out to borrowers. That’s a myth. They create their own IOUs, or their own new money, and therefore increase the money supply.

This new money when spent, and respent, attracts the usual government taxes: Income tax, VAT, Corporation tax, National Insurance contributions etc etc. After its been spent and re-spent a few times there is hardly anything left in the active economy. Nearly all of it, except for perhaps some 10% or so, which is saved or spent on net imports, has gone back to government. So naturally the deficit falls! It is really little to do with any cuts in spending or increases in taxation. That spending too would have quickly returned to government in taxes in exactly the same way except it wouldn’t have left the private sector in debt.

Of course when the banks stop lending, as they always will when they start to get nervous that asset prices are getting too high, thus causing them to fall back, the amount of money available in the economy to be spent falls. Taxation receipts fall. Workers lose their jobs and apply for welfare payments. The  government deficit shoots up again.  That’s where we were just after the 2008 crash and may well be again after the 2015 election. Politicians then want to make more cuts in spending and raise more taxes to try to reduce the deficit. The recession deepens.


Tory governments are particularly susceptible to falling into the trap of creating this boom -bust cycle. We’ve seen it before under Chancellors Barber and Lawson. Even the Chinese have recently fallen prey to the idea that cheap credit can permanently boost their economic growth. They will be in just as much trouble as anyone soon, unless they realise what’s been driving their incredible growth in recent years and act now, before it is too late. Encouraging private sector lending seemingly offers a quick fix to the economy by letting the commercial banks create new money, so keeping it off the Governments books and off  the Budget deficit,  rather than directly spending it into the economy in the way Keynes or Lerner would have advocated.

It has a similar economic effect to a Keynesian stimulus for a few years but no longer than that.  It is not the right way to run the economy!



7 responses to “Stand by for the next UK crash! ETA 2016

  1. Pingback: Stand by for the next UK crash! ETA 2016 | Stev...

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  3. Lawson suffered from this in 1988 I believe and the boom bust cycle continued right through the 1990’s.It’s not on! governments playing the peoples for another term in office and all this short terms sticky plaster stuff to the economy has to stop, banks must continually lend there is simply no other way. Britain could be facing a separation come Sept 2014, yet no one is offering a solution to the problems of unemployment and forward thinking, I guess if Miliband committed to the endeavours of a job for all and a fair days pay for a fair days work then the reason for separation becomes smaller, I’m really lost to why Britain hasn’t continued to up date it’s railways and infrastructures and it’s baffling that such a nation as Britain is in fuel poverty, Reagan and Thatcher economics failed and capitalism is a venture that only keeps those at the top of the pile happy, if we don’t try and resolve this continuing decline and daft economic situation we pretty much will become an isolated Island and there isn’t any point in having a heap load of paper green backs when you need food and warmth, when? just when! will there be a harvest for this world? and the recognition that people count all people count and monies is only a paper way of committing to that count.

  4. Peter, if it spent on net imports what happens? Is this transfer between private sector and external? Say £10 billion money is created and £1 billion spent on net imports? Do the exporters have to buy govt bonds or they have to lend to private sector?

    • Yes, that £1 billion a transfer from the private sector to the external or overseas (Rest of World) sector. The key thing is that the money is saved. It isn’t spent. If it was spent by the external sector there wouldn’t be any net imports.

      So there is the question of what to do about all money that is saved whether it is by the ROW or domestically. If it is used to buy gilts (treasury bonds) then the money can just be recycled by deficit spending. But suppose it’s just saved as cash deposits? Or even saved as banknotes in a safe.

      That money is inert and isn’t doing anything. Therefore the government can safely”borrow it ” by just creating new money. The govt justs needs to keep an eye on inflation, and then back off its own spending when these hidden savings start to be spent. This will become apparant in the inflation figures.

  5. . “If house (land) prices were rising because of increased personal income that could be argued to be a good thing ”
    I would argue it is not. The house is the building/improvements. Land/location price should be taxed away at 100% and this rise given to the government to act as auto stabiliser.

  6. Pingback: Is a Happy New Year Possible for 2016? | Modern Monetary Theory: Real Economics

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