by lper100km » Sat 23 Jan 2010, 15:24:27
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('GASMON', 'L')ess odourous still is the "old" (20 or so years ago) European mix of capitalism and socialism. Gave us (UK) things like the National Health service, state (public) owned industries, energy, services, railways etc.
These have all now (except the NHS) been "sold off" to the money boys, who take the profits leaving the people to subsidise the losses (i.e. British railways, buses). So our European modern political system is now starting to stink.
Your timing is off by decades Gasmon and has little to do with the EU.
The Labour Govt of 1946 under Clement Attlee gave the UK it’s first taste of nationalized industry. In short order, the UK found the health service, the steel industry, the transportation industry – rail and road, the education system, coal mining, the electrical generation and distribution system, natural and coal gas distribution to name the most obvious were the first to become managed under the benevolent eye of the national government. For the next twenty years, as the electorate voted alternating conservative and labour governments to power, there were confusing and economically destructive periods of de-nationalisation and re-nationalisation of selective elements of this pantheon of industry.
The UK economy languished for decades under the financial weakness induced by WWII, the tax load imposed to support this ongoing mess and the rise of powerful unions effectively encouraged by their political support of the Labour Party. This was a very bad time in the UK. People were confused, angry and eventually so worn down by the constant daily fight to survive the myriad daily privations, that most sank into a kind of mindless routine just to get by. The more motivated and qualified fled the country in what became widely dubbed as the ‘brain drain’ in the inept government of Harold Wilson of the 60’s, despite severe restrictions on currency movement. The USA, Canada and Australia had jobs to offer any professionally qualified person in those years and were actively recruiting, even with paid passage.
Like it or not, Maggie Thatcher was the only leader with enough clout and guts to put an end to most of the ills that plagued this period and restore a sense of pride and purpose that had long lain fallow.
So Gasmon, I expect you are too young to have experienced all of that except maybe the past twenty years. As you say, most of the nationalized industry has reverted again to private ownership, though on a scale that can only be described as ‘national’. The difference is that they are owned by ‘stakeholders’ and shareholders instead of being managed by a government department. In a curious way, the years of nationalization created consolidated infrastructures that made their eventual disposition attractive as a business venture.
There are millions of reasons as to why centrally controlled resources and services are desireable and millions more as to why they don’t succeed to expectation. There are millions of reasons why corporate control of resources and services are desireable and millions more why they don’t succeed to expectation. Take your pick. This is not necessarily the application of some ‘ism’, but more likely rooted in the perverse nature of the individual and collective psyche. Whatever the ‘system’, the focus should be on outcomes and accountability, but of course, it never is.