Free beer and fags
£150 billion borrowed to help with fuel bills, no windfall taxes, tens of billions more to help business for a few months (a scheme that will doubtless have to be extended) and where does all the money come from?
Well, obviously tax cuts for the rich.
The three great lies that have let the right loot whole economies for the benefit of the rich are now being tried again.
Tax cuts pay for themselves, a deliberate misrepresentation of the Laffer Curve, which has been proved wrong time and time again.
Trickle down economics, the farcical idea that already rich people will work harder and spend more if you give them tax cuts and that the poor will eventually gratefully receive a few pence.
And a rising tide lifts all boats, except the gin palace with two helipads always seems to float higher than the dingy with a broken outboard motor.
Liz Truss and her Chancellor are now set on an irreversible journey to double down on all this stuff.
Huge tax cuts for the wealthy is “fair” now, City bonuses must be unlimited, stamp duty will revitalise the housing market, where prices have soared for years, and redistribution of wealth is immoral.
All to encourage and nurture growth, when not a single one of these policies is likely to have an even measurable influence on growth and may actually strangle it.
The markets have already signalled that they are getting very nervous about the finances and prospects of the UK.
Government stupidity won’t help, borrowing billions won’t help and ploughing ahead with fantasy Tinker Bell economics won’t help.
Doubtless the PM hopes to have a general election, riding high on a free beer and fags manifesto. Given the state of the British media it might work, but the UK economy is now a house of cards.
It will fall.
Economics, trade and Brexit, not necessarily in that order but the dog always comes first.