Thread by @mac_puck

@jdportes
They are at it again.
Tories & Tory newspapers saying "Covid means grandchildren paying our debts"

I think you should do a thread on the actual numbers.

Eg. "The GFC cost the Gov £1.16Tn (2009 money) that's why we needed Austerity and homelessness and foodbanks"...

But then you dig a bit nao.org.uk/highlights/tax…
and find out the £1.16Tn was mostly guarantees that never got called. The maximum cash outlay was £130Bn. Of which only £20Bn was still outstanding in 2019. Which costs the taxpayer around £150M a year at present 15yr gilt rates.

How much of the Chancellor's £330Bn is, likewise, loan guarantees to allow banks to lend to businesses rather than treasury cash?

OK, I get that tax revenue will drop massively during lockdown, but many economists expect a v-shaped recovery. The Covid shock may ultimately...

… turn out to be like a pee-stop in a marathon, whereas Brexit is like running the whole race in wellies.

As a SME owner myself I am not enamoured with the prospect of taking on a level of debt the bank wouldn't normally approve without being underwritten by the gov, but...

even if UK business assumes the whole £330Bn of debt, which is equal to about 15% of GDP, the last figures I saw are that it is already carrying debt equal to about 83% of GDP so, yes, it is an issue, but not a generational issue (such as Brexit).

So I think you should do a thread to debunk this latest mythology and stop it taking hold and being used to justify even more unnecessary hardship than the last 10 years of economically illiterate Tory Austerity.

The Tories are definitely at it again.