When you say, “You couldn’t have a better recipe for rising crime and social decay than ripping the industrial heart out of a community and then leaving it to rot”, what exactly do you mean? That subsidies to uneconomic businesses should have continued to be paid? That government should have created more work experience schemes? Both?

Does Bishop Hill think we should remove all of the subsidies to farmers? Of course, it would devastate rural communities, impoverish or wipe out our hill farmers, and lead to us having to import the food from abroad, but hey, why not, they’re ‘uneconomic businesses’ aren’t they?

On reading this reheated Ben Elton 80s routine, it seems very clear that you desperately need a lecture from David Cameron

Admiral, how is your discount insurance business going?

At least he’s only going back two decades, Admiral. Cameron’s resurrection of Samuel Smiles and notions of the undeserving poor is taking us back at least a century and a half.

“You couldn’t have a better recipe for rising crime and social decay than ripping the industrial heart out of a community and then leaving it to rot.”

Hence the vast amount of crime and social decay in Sheffield, Wearside, Tyneside, the Valleys during the 20s and 30s ?

and socialists then didn’t use the f word in their literature either. But then, they were socialists.

No, you probably don’t need a lecture from Mr. Cameron. A few economics lectures wouldn’t go amiss, mind.

“Does Bishop Hill think we should remove all of the subsidies to farmers? Of course, it would devastate rural communities, impoverish or wipe out our hill farmers, and lead to us having to import the food from abroad, but hey, why not, they’re ‘uneconomic businesses’ aren’t they?”

Actually, I am not sure if there is any intrinsic reason why the UK couldn’t have a productive, unsubsidised agricultural industry. It is rather difficult to tell while the CAP is in operation. But I don’t believe we should support unproductive farmers. The difficulty is the flashpoint of bringing a whole sector off subsidies.

I don’t hold Thatcher entirely responsibile for what happened: when faced with militant unions who would rather have impoverished the whole of the UK than accept economic reality, it was always going to be a catastrophe of one sort or another. The North was a victim of trade unionism rather than Thatcherism because the unions encouraged the peope to embrace the original immorality: the belief that you could earn a living by expropriating other people’s property so long as it was the government that was doing it.

Oh look right on cue: http://www.adamsmith.org/blog/economics/sharecropping-gets-a-makeover-200807131695/

See, by subsidising industries, we never learn what solutions would have emerged from the market.

when faced with militant unions who would rather have impoverished the whole of the UK than accept economic reality

Sorry, not gonna buy this. The trade union movement has been the saviour of capitalism, and the biggest anti-poverty programme in history. In that respect I think I’d more likely to take them as looking out for the interests of ordinary workers than Margaret Thatcher.

Though I don’t agree with CAP of course. One could also argue that if the proper cost of internationally transported food was taken into account (with tax on aviation fuel and the cost of pollution taken into account), then local farming would be a lot more competitive.

Well I am not going to push the point since I am not a Tory by tribe or belief.

On the food import front, I am very sceptical that a government system would be capable of working that out as it is rather more complicated than many imagine and the system would tend to be exposed to lobbying and special interests: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1553456/Greener-by-miles.html

I imagine that the market price is probably one of the better measures of carbon used, however. After all, doing something to a good (whether its growing it, packing it or transporting it) tends to produce carbon and it also tends to cost resources and labour at the same time. So I imagine the more cost-efficient producers will also tend, on average, to be the more carbon-efficient.

“The trade union movement has been the saviour of capitalism, and the biggest anti-poverty programme in history.”

Do you really believe this? Like… really?

Bob

“Does Bishop Hill think we should remove all of the subsidies to farmers? Of course, it would devastate rural communities, impoverish or wipe out our hill farmers, and lead to us having to import the food from abroad, but hey, why not, they’re ‘uneconomic businesses’ aren’t they?”

Yes, I do (and I say this as someone who lives in a rural area and who knows hill farmers).

Would it devastate farming communities? This was not the experience of New Zealand. Farming there prospered after subsidies were done away with.

The question you need to answer, Bob, is if you are not going to allow the market to decide what businesses are closed and when, how do you decide? When they can no longer afford a sufficient contribution to party coffers? When they no longer contribute enough votes? Or perhaps we should never close down any business ever? Just keep feeding them subsidies – we could still have a coal mining industry and a shipbuilding industry, and what about an arrowmaking industry, a woad rendering industry, and hey, even a mammoth processing industry.

Industries come and go. That’s just a fact of life (except for politicians).

I don’t buy the idea that there are saviours or messiahs for anything, let alone a nebulous process concept like ‘capitalism’. Just like I don’t buy the idea of flat inequality underpinning the descriptions of ‘The North’ as a universal victim.

Let’s get some differential perspective here peeps – all distortions lead to systemic problems.

Would it devastate farming communities? This was not the experience of New Zealand. Farming there prospered after subsidies were done away with.

Sure, but every country’s experience is different. NZ is hardly like the rest of the world. I think a cost benefit analysis could be done, and see whether the subsidies would be outweighed by: lower pollution; tax income; cost of re-training local people; the multiplier effect of their jobs being lost; how much you want to rely on imported food (more susceptible to curreny fluctuations and demand from China) etc. I’m not saying all industries / farmers should be subsidised – only that a cost benefit analysis could be made based on factors other than just simply the cost price.

We see this all the time in the financial industries too – when the govt guarantees that certain banks such as Northern Rock etc are not going to collapse. Would have loved to see what the Tories would have done if it collapsed on their watch.

“lower pollution; tax income; cost of re-training local people; the multiplier effect of their jobs being lost; how much you want to rely on imported food (more susceptible to curreny fluctuations and demand from China) etc”

Lower pollution – Despite the gut reaction, the only reports I’ve seen found that importing food is either similarly environmentally damaging, or less so. The vast majority of the pollution in “farm to table” comes from people driving to the store; production and pre-retailer transport plays a small part.

Tax income – Would it be a net loss? In the short term, most farmers would overhaul their businesses, or find new jobs. In the long term, people who would otherwise have gone into farming would take other paths. I haven’t a study to hand, but I’d say, if anything, the average tax income would increase as people move into more profitable careers.

Retraining costs – Short term, quite small; long-term, utterly negligible, and quite possibly positive if the new careers are more economically efficient.

Imported food – A rather insignificant point. For one, we already rely on imports for much of our food. For another, being “self-sufficient” is not necessarily any safer. I shouldn’t have to tell anyone from the British Isles about the problems of relying on domestic production. If anything, admittedly barring the unlikely event of a third world war, relying on imports would make our food supply safer.

You also seem to have neglected to provide a list of the advantages of removing the subsidies. Why is that?

Sunny

You are arguing for central planning of the economy, right? The judgement of a bureaucrat in Whitehall, who knows nothing of the industry and doesn’t have access to the relevant information and has no stake in the decision, should replace the judgement of somebody who does?

…predicated on us buying more and more of that which we do not need

is the most revealing part of this rant.

I mean, how dare people buy stuff which I have decided they don’t need.

Central planning madness in a nutshell.

Sean is, obviously, 100% correct.

Cameron and the rest of his fetid Eton-clique lecturing us on the virtues of civic responsibility…….there’s just not enough vomit in the world. I just hope that when this toad squats into power, as he surely will, he screws up as swiftly as his Bullingdon club pal in the capital.

“deprived city licked to a splinter by the economic policies pursued by his party in the 1980s” ?

Glasgow is not deprived. It is rich. The problem is that it doesn’t know it. Ship the feckless layabouts complaining about life on the dole off to Calcutta or Shanghai and see how well they fare winging about being so poor they don’t have cable.

synergy6: In the short term, most farmers would overhaul their businesses, or find new jobs. In the long term, people who would otherwise have gone into farming would take other paths.

Given the number of long-term employed in many communities where whole industries have been decimated, I don’t really buy its that easy. Besides, having someone who enjoys farming go into stacking shelves for Tesco is not exactly my view of good distribution. If there was evidence of other industries growing strongly and there being a labour shortage, I’d then say it would be a good trade-off.

You also seem to have neglected to provide a list of the advantages of removing the subsidies. Why is that?

You’re welcome to provide them. I wasn’t listing advantages/disadvantages per se – merely pointing out that a cost/benefit analysis taking several different factors rather than just cost should be made.

Bishop Hill:
The judgement of a bureaucrat in Whitehall, who knows nothing of the industry and doesn’t have access to the relevant information and has no stake in the decision, should replace the judgement of somebody who does?

Nope – I’d like to have local councils do the cost/benefit analysis and make a decision. As they do with saving banks for example, or thinking about lending to corps who want subsidies to stay in places. There’s no reason why only someone from Whitehall can do local cost/benefit analysis.

Central planning madness in a nutshell.

I’m sorry – who said anything about central planning? Creating strawmen doesn’t an argument make.

“Besides, having someone who enjoys farming go into stacking shelves for Tesco is not exactly my view of good distribution.”

Well I “enjoy” watching TV and playing video games. Perhaps the government should pay me to be a TV critic and games reviewer. That would be MY idea of a good distribution but I don’t think it would be anyone else’s.

Sunny, you’ve fallen into the libertarian trap which associates ‘central planning’ with the soviet system.

Some measure of a central plan is essential to the existence and coherence of government, though I’d prefer to call it organisation and coordination rather than ‘central’ planning.

Planning is a different area altogether in which failure to plan adequately is what has lead to much of the inbalance between different regions – Glasgow East provides a useful example for how central government attempts to compensate for this failure over a period longer than half a century, but instead created a collection of social segregations based around geographic access to services.

“Given the number of long-term employed in many communities where whole industries have been decimated, I don’t really buy its that easy.”

I didn’t say it was easy. But it’s an inevitable shift, however long it takes some people to realise it. Perhaps the next Conservative government will plan the agricultural revolution better than the extraction one. This is a blog, not Westminster, so “it’s hard” is not a valid rejection of a plan.

“Besides, having someone who enjoys farming go into stacking shelves for Tesco is not exactly my view of good distribution. ”

What was that about strawmen? I don’t remember mentioning Tescos, or packing shelves at all. Why would you assume that’s all an ex-farmer would be capable of?