Con Keating

We are as a society living longer. We are asked to believe that this makes pensions unaffordable and unsustainable in both the public and private sectors. It is simply untrue. There is a tendency for analysts to suggest that demographics and population dynamics are undeniable, absolute truths. The fact is that over history we have made many such forecasts which have missed their mark by miles – Schumpeter’s 1943 observation that “Forecasts of future populations, from those of the seventeenth century on, were practically always wrong” remains as valid today.

It is true that society is ageing, but the rate of increase of longevity is far lower than the rate of growth of output, GDP. We have, with the exception of occasional periods of recession, grown steadily wealthier, and as we grow wealthier so, by choice, we spend more, both absolutely and proportionally, on education, healthcare and retirement. If we had, in their infancy, told today’s ninety year-old that their consumption at this age would be some eight times more in real terms than a ninety year-old at that time, we would have been summarily dismissed as over-optimistic to the point of certifiable madness.

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Richard Exell

There were plenty of records in the latest employment figures: falling employment, rising unemployment and terrible times for young people. I’ve rounded up the trends for a quick video blog about the worst month since the recession, and the public sector cuts that are making things worse.

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Richard Exell

City economists have come to much the same conclusion as the IMF about the UK’s growth prospects. Every month, the Treasury publishes a round up of independent forecasts for the economy, many of which are banks and other City organisations. In today’s comparison, the average for new forecasts (that is, those published in the past month) puts UK GDP growth at 1.1% in 2011. This is the same as the revised IMF forecast; the City average forecast for 2012 is 1.7%, slightly higher than the IMF’s 1.6%. None of the forecasters expect growth to be higher than 1.8% in 2011.

These forecasts have been repeatedly revised downwards throughout the year, and the average forecast for 2011 is now more than a third off the average forecast twelve months ago:

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Owen Tudor

As the economic news continues to worsen, there is in fact no shortage of solutions to the economic problems facing the EU over Greece. Reaching the right solution (or mix thereof) does not require a fundamentally technocratic decision. The key question is not how to solve the crisis, but who will pay. So far, it looks like the people of Greece – as they are in many other European countries - are in the firing line, facing swingeing cuts to public services, 16% unemployment already, tax increases and a generation or more of stagnant or falling living standards in the form of wages or pensions. But as the possibility of default or restructuring becomes more likely, other potential losers come into the frame.

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Matt Dykes

When NHS Surrey came to award preferred bidder status for the delivery of its community health care services, which of the following organisations won the contract? Was it:

• Local NHS Foundation Trust, Surrey and Borders Partnership
• Much lauded NHS social enterprise spin out and ‘Big Society Award’ winner, Central Surrey Health
• Private provider, Assura Medical Ltd, 75% owned by the Virgin Group?

Those of you familiar with the Government’s private sector bonanza that was the Work Programme will probably have worked it out.  The award of NHS Surrey’s community health services to Assura Medical Ltd has caused a fair degree of outrage.  Clearer evidence of the privatisation by stealth of the NHS would be hard to come by.

And, of course, this is also another wake up call for those who retain faith in the Big Society and the Government’s stated intention to open up public services to social enterprises, charities and employee-led mutuals.

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Richard Exell

Today’s IMF World Economic Outlook really does make quite worrying reading. There are worrying forecasts for the global economy – the Fund is now describing the recovery as “weak and bumpy” and has cut forecast growth worldwide from 5% plus to 4%, “and even this lowered projection counts on a lot going well.”

Projections for UK growth have been cut even more sharply:

• Six months ago the IMF said that GDP growth this year would be 1.7%; this is now cut to 1.1%.
• Expected growth in 2012 has been cut back from 2.3% to 1.6%.

This follows the OECD‘s forecast that UK GDP would grow 1.4% this year and 1.8% next year. Remember that the Office for Budget Responsibility said in March that 2011 growth would be 1.7% and this would rise to 2.5% in 2012.

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Charles King

Transport Secretary Philip Hammond looks set to throw trainmaker Bombardier a lifeline with a £120m train order that would preserve hundreds of jobs at the Derby plant

It is certainly disappointing that the DFT awarded the next major train building order for the Thameslink programme to Siemens of Germany, rather than Bombardier of Derby. This follows on to the awarding of the Intercity express 2 programme to Hitachi of Japan. This decision is not only disappointing to the skilled employees working for Bombardier and their subcontractors in Derby and could possibly end train making in the UK. It is also disappointing for passengers. As a regular user of London Midland, Southern, SE & SW trains, I can say with confidence that Bombardier Electrostars are much better to ride in than Siemens Desiro stock.

I fully support the campaign by the TUC, Derby Council, MPs and others to get the Thameslink bid reopened which the coalition government has now agreed they could do, but the Prime Minister has stated in the Commons that this is unlikely. So what else could be done to assist Bombardier until the next big order for the London Crossrail programme?

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Owen Tudor

Developments in the Robin Hood Tax campaign are now happening daily, so it can be difficult to keep up to date. But the direction of travel is clear – so here’s the latest: the EU is closer than ever to agreement in October; the Financial Times has started exploring how to implement Financial Transaction Taxes (FTTs); the global union family has urged the IMF to abandon its Financial Activity Tax alternative and urge more countries to take part; and Bill Nighy has asked us all to be in his latest Robin Hood Tax video.

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Owen Tudor

The global union family has published its submission to the Autumn meetings of the international financial institutions (IMF and World Bank) and the G20 Finance Ministers meetings in Washington DC this coming weekend, and job-creating growth is top of our agenda. Although there are positive signs in some countries, the world economy as a whole is stagnant – it hasn’t recovered from the global economic crisis of recent years, and growth is either anaemic or rocky across much of the developed and developing countries.

Austerity is the name for the current right-wing approach: cutting public services, pensions and benefits to reduce public sector deficits which were incurred fighting (successfully) to prevent banks collapsing and to stave off depression; and holding down wages for ordinary workers while letting bonuses and profits rip.

Our approach combines slower fiscal consolidation, investing in job creation and skills, promoting the green economy, tax increases targeted on the rich rather than the poor, and planned debt restructuring for countries like Greece and Portugal. And we believe that – in line with ILO core labour standards – unions should be assisted to use collective bargaining to restore the value of wages and pensions.

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Richard Exell

Today’s Labour Market Report looks at the worst employment figures since the recession. Employment is down, unemployment and long-term unemployment are up, the results for young people are especially distressing. Possibly most worrying of all, after a decades-long fall in the number of women economically inactive because they are looking after their homes or family, this number has been rising most of this year.

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