Protests over living costs and housing are spreading across the continent. The grievance is the same everywhere: the deal that hard work buys a home and a future is off
💯 agree with this article. Neo Liberalism was always going to be a 'race to the bottom' for ordinary people. Meanwhile wealth has drifted upwards and resulted in asset hoarding ,driving up the cost for everyone else.Even the average consumer is now forced to gamble with energy tariffs in our crazy privatised market.
I think that claiming the origins of current problems are the result of neoliberalism and privatisation of utilities and some public services is too simplistic. Neoliberalism while broadly pursued throughout the world manifests itself in different ways in each country.
For instance the social market economy operated highly successfully in Germany for many years but is now failing. At least since1979 the UK in contrast sought to operate a much more free market approach, particularly with regard to labour relations. France sat somewhere between these two extremes.
The UK is almost unique in Europe in having privatised so many public utilities and services, but even the public utilities that continued to operate in Scotland and Wales have been characterised by inadequate investment and poor services. Moreover Germany's crumbling infrastructure has little to do with neoliberalism but rather ordoliberalism, and in particular the debt break that almost all politicians across the political spectrum supported. Similarly, its ruthless pursuit of mercantilsm worked well for decades but has now come unstuck.
💯 agree with this article. Neo Liberalism was always going to be a 'race to the bottom' for ordinary people. Meanwhile wealth has drifted upwards and resulted in asset hoarding ,driving up the cost for everyone else.Even the average consumer is now forced to gamble with energy tariffs in our crazy privatised market.
I think that claiming the origins of current problems are the result of neoliberalism and privatisation of utilities and some public services is too simplistic. Neoliberalism while broadly pursued throughout the world manifests itself in different ways in each country.
For instance the social market economy operated highly successfully in Germany for many years but is now failing. At least since1979 the UK in contrast sought to operate a much more free market approach, particularly with regard to labour relations. France sat somewhere between these two extremes.
The UK is almost unique in Europe in having privatised so many public utilities and services, but even the public utilities that continued to operate in Scotland and Wales have been characterised by inadequate investment and poor services. Moreover Germany's crumbling infrastructure has little to do with neoliberalism but rather ordoliberalism, and in particular the debt break that almost all politicians across the political spectrum supported. Similarly, its ruthless pursuit of mercantilsm worked well for decades but has now come unstuck.