Bemused southern Remainers like me, about to be befuddled by the Hartlepool poll result, need constant reminders that there are lots of people who really, genuinely, honestly think that the Government did them a massive favour by pushing through Brexit ...
.... rather than, say, that a bunch of wilfully self-destructive people perversely chose to vote against their own interests to punish remote, elite others from the privileged south in an irrational spasm of cultural spite and are still somehow enjoying their vandalism
Why they still think Brexit is helping them is still beyond me, but that they do is surely undeniable
"Believe in the good faith of people whose opinions you find incomprehensible" is my sanctimonious self-advice of the day
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OK, long overdue, overlong thread thinking about Rachel's fundamental question here. My first reaction was to see what I have learned from the responses to my original tweet; is the answer necessarily "more business investment"? 1/18
1st obvious point: not necessarily. Biz inv can be wasted. More formally, it depends on your on marginal productivity of capital, depreciation, etc. Here a chart from a toy model where you pass quite soon the point at which more saving into capital no longer> higher wages 2/
Also very striking: we have a governance system that automatically disincentivizes learning. A consequence of centralisation
"It's a core-periphery problem, not a cities-towns-rural problem. In the core, the cities, towns and rural areas are all doing well - in the periphery, none of them".
McCann identifies a clear flaw in how we are misdiagnosing the problem
But also, there are cancelled urgent operations in the NHS. Does he think they do this for fun? 2/
Second, this bit that argues "well the lockdown won't make any difference". Again bizarre, because a. it makes an argument for a tougher lockdown, and b. clearly it does make a difference. Before, the schools were going to open. Now they are not. Contacts are reduced 3/
First, you need to pick your moment - but the moment can last years. Peter Mandelson and @vincecable each recognised that post Financial Crisis was the time to build the case for intervention that changes the way the economy works. Now is another such time 2/
Let's face it: Johnson has always sounded like someone who ought to like Industrial Strategy, even if his "boosterish can-do-ism" largely focuses on concerns that other politicians going back to @Ed_Miliband have expressed 3/
OK, I have tried to model this more, and the bottom line is: without a test and trace system that absolutely jumps on rising cases when the number of cases is really low, the government has a really hard task. Brace for some ugly graphs: 1/
This models a Spring surge, harsh measures in April-May that crush the virus infection down, and leads to loosening in June and July.
Basically, the R rate rises fast when lockdowns end in June - but you can hardly see it .... Table shows measures (low = restrictive) 2/
and so further lockdowns etc are *politically impossible* at the point they may stop it rising. Imagine - 3 months of almost no cases, not many deaths - but the exponential force is building, and then BANG 3/