What did we think of Martin Durkin's documentary last night?

Interesting programme, I'm watching it (recorded) as I type. Don't agree with a lot of it, it's very one-sided, and full of the nastiest stereotypes about fat-arsed, lazy, public sector workers. But there are definitely points I am going to have to go away and think about. The tax thing for instance. But after reading this thread I'll have to do bit of checking on their figures.

the WORSE part of the programme though is that out of all of the silly little actor scenes I have only seen two female characters. A "nanny" in a frilly apron and a "nurse" in a very very short pink outfit. Apparently there are no females worth being interviewed (recording cut off the end). Gross stereotyping of women, anyone? Haven't seen a documentary with so few female "characters" since that ridiculous "great climate change swindle" C4 documentary, which ONLY had women in bikinis on beaches in it.

jollydiane - I'm not sure where you (or the programme!) got that figure from. Looking at the Office for National Statistics, in 2010 there were 23.1 million employees in the private sector (80% of all employees) and 6 million in the public sector. Link here (downloadable excel table).

If you think about teachers, dustbin men, firemen, etc etc, it doesn't seem unreasonable to me that there are 2 public sector workers out of every 10 employees.

The programme made me stop and think. I was and how many public sector workers there are. What do they all do? Can it be true that there are only 2 million front line staff and 7 million public sector workers. Perhaps we do need those cuts after all.

I found myself agreeing with it far more than I expected. Private sector workers cannot keep paying for the public sector. Simples.

Takver

As I said the programme was far too simplistic but I don't think those numbers you linked disprove the point. Countries with high economic growth and productivity tend to have lower numbers. Particularly, some of fast improving emerging markets.

Europe is definately not a metric for success! With the exception of the export dynamo that is Germany, the rest of Europe is pretty screwed from a debt perspective. Ireland, Greece, Spain, Italy, France, Belgium all have dreadful debt problems (despite France's problems being well hidden due to some cunning accounting tricks).

I agree some of the Scandis have found a very good balance between high public spending and growth. Perhaps we can learn form them but it seems easier for smaller countries to achieve that balance than larger ones. Hence why I think Hong Kong is not useful as a comparative.

For me the problem with a large public sector is that it creates a huge cost overhead for the UK. Globalization means we have to compete with much cheaper but increasingly well educated economies, who have a much smaller public sector. Take the BRIC economies who average closer to 20%. The public sector creates a much nicer place to live than these countries (I don't want to work in China!) but if the cost drives companies and jobs overseas our standard of living will still fall, unemployment will rise and we will find it impossible to pay for public services we want.

I enjoyed the programme. I thought it was very entertaining and showed a radically different viewpoint than is usually broadcast by the media. Totally simplistic and incredibly biased of course, but very thought provoking.

I am slightly terrified of £4800000000000 isn't that too many zeros?

I agree with what siasi said.

I seem to link to this table a lot. Its for 2006, so not quite up-to-date, but things haven't changed drastically. UK public sector spending as a % of GDP is pretty much around the average for Europe - lower than the Scands of course, lower than Austria, Belgium, Spain, Portugal - a bit higher than Germany.

Of course in all countries with a welfare system public sector spending will go up as a percentage of GDP in a recession.

The trouble with simplistic economics, Siasi, is that too often the devil is in the detail.

In the same way it is easy from the left to look at Sweden, for example, and say "Why don't we just copy them"; yet they start from a completely different historical context. Even in the late 18th C (when Britain was substantially industrialised, and Sweden was pretty much a self sufficient peasant economy) literacy rates in Sweden were far higher than in the UK.

There was another thread on this documentary ...

I thought it was too simplistic but still provided an awful lot of info that most people in the public either don't know or just won't accept.

It was inexcusable how many MPs clearly didn't know the difference between the national debt and deficit. It also mentioned that the debt was far higher than realized once we take into account all the unfunded state and public sector final salary pensions. Our unborn children are already debt slaves.

It also explained the "broken window fallacy" of why an ever increasing public sector (53% of GDP and 70%+ in some parts of UK!) actually makes everybody poorer and is simply unsustainable.

However, its solutions of cuttng tax and creating more manufacturing industry were very simplistic. Also Hong Kong may not be a very useful comparable to the UK.

hobbgoblin - I think you have to accept that there is not a simple answer. In some situations, substantial government intervention and relatively high taxes has been extremely successful (think Germany).

When the UK tried to copy this in the 70s (remember 'picking winners' and Neddy?) it was, shall we say, not so successful.

One thing that, IMO, is critical is providing a good business environment; which includes amongst other things a well educated population, good technical schools and colleges, absence of excessively restrictive regulation (though what is excessive can be long debated), a favourable macroeconomic environment, including avoiding an overvalued currency, good access to capital at reasonable rates (the Landesbanks in Germany are a good example) and many other things.

It is also of course very important to remember that GDP is not a measure of economic welfare ('bads' as well as 'goods' contribute to GDP).

hobbgoblin- its a combination of various factors such as wage rates/regulations/expertise/natural resources etc.

Private enterprise is the only way to raise GDP. The Government has a crucial role in creating the right environment (eg educating people/providing quality infrastructure etc) to allow companies and the private sector to grow and increase GDP but the private sector is the main driver of economic growth.

Trade and exporting is good hobbgoblin because it allows greater use of economys of scale and comparitive advantage. The reason that we don't produce all the goods we use in this country and import some from other countries is that other countries can produce some goods for the use of less resources then we can as they have a comparitive advantage in the production of some goods.

sorry - basket case with regard to manufacturing, not in toto! (ducks head before half American DH reads comment)

I didn't watch the documentary, I'm afraid.

But from the comments here, it would appear to pose an interesting question: why are the most successful manufacturing economies now and in the recent past (ie last century) those that have a substantial degree of government intervention, and relatively high levels of taxation?

That is to say: Germany, the Scandinavian countries, China (clearly very different political context, of course, and perhaps more directly comparable with the Industrial revolution era in Britain, particularly with reference to availability of capital & labour, so perhaps we should discount that one), Japan.

The one country that follows the programme that appears to be set out, if I am correct, is the United States, which frankly is something of a basket case.

thb i only watched about 5 minutes before i got too angry with the manipulation of facts

I don't agree that the whole premise was wrong, the Government has spent too much and the national debt is way too high. I agree the reminiscing about the 19th century did demonstrate large levels of ignorance of the economic conditions of that period and they also ignorec the fact that some Government spending is essential to give the private sector the right conditions in order to generate growth.

i thought the whole premise was shite. the idea that the ne will magically regenerate if you take away big government. no it won't. the only reason it had a brief flurry or prosperity was due to the british empire and the worlds reliance on the sea for export.

we no longer have an empire and even if the sea was still playing any role in exporting stuff there is nothing to export anymore.

the real issue is the over-reliance on the finance sector to magic money like rumple fucking stiltskin.

I though it made some interesting points and the section where MPs didn't know the difference between the national debt and budget deficit was very worrying.
It did make a lot of crude generalisations some of which I don't think are true but it was an interesting watch.