Just not getting it

I suppose that LinkedIn has become my last real social media outlet.

The last post that I wrote on this blog "On the job market and job security" which I first wrote on there produced a number of comments.

The American readers of the piece seemed to support the implications of what I was saying -  encouraging (love that word) company loyalty and flexibility within the organisation and returning to a time when all the people working for the organisation were in it together, and looking to long-term objectives rather than short-term gain (so riding the curve in any downturn, which should probably be temporary in the long-scale view, 12 months over 12 years is not actually a long time).

One British correspondent though (theoretically an entrepreneur or a company director or both) took umbrage at what I had to say, accused me of misrepresenting Thatcher (no I didn't - he just did not look deeply enough into what I was saying, I suppose that I should not be surprised) and then went onto endorse her position. Detect summat of an inconsistency here? She didn't actually say that, but I agree with it anyway? Huh?

His view on job creation though was simplistic, and static, not intelligently thought-through and dynamic. Success was simply job creation, not job creation along with job security.

Fine. Consider an absurd but possible version of this thinking.

Let us say that you create 5 million jobs. All of which are due to last three months and finish with no hope of renewal. Great idea? It gives the economy a quick boost. And then?

And then?

Well it was job creation. No security.

We live in the "consumer society", so much of the economy is built on what people purchase and can afford to purchase.

Would you take out a 25-year mortgage on that principle? Would you buy a new car, a new refrigerator, a new wardrobe or outfit on that basis?

A new outfit may be affordable, for the rest you would probably do what I would do. Pay off the outstanding bills, and put the rest in the bank to cover what happens when the three month period has run its course.

Profligate, frivolous spending? Well if you have no sense or a ridiculous propensity for unreal optimism, then you might indulge yourself. Don't ask me to pay your accommodation for you in three months time though!

Americans have this annoying habit of producing generalised tags for different generations (well, you know what I think of stereotypes by now). So now we have the "Millennials". Interestingly generally absurd generalisations aside, I noted an article upon this group on LinkedIn the other day. One thing that I noted was a sane and sensible attitude to debt. You do not take out a mortgage and just hope that you can pay it off. You do not load yourself down with debt that you cannot pay. You complain about the ridiculous level of debt needed to get you through college.

Brilliant! Sounds like I am an ageing Millennial!

Common-sense attitudes. As a lot of these young people have experienced 2008 and learned its lessons (you wish their parents and grandparents would!), these attitudes are also not surprising.

And they also value job security!

Common-sense again prevails.

But you cannot have an economy that, blah, blah, blah .....

Blah, blah, blah, Wahnsinn!!!!

We have a mess. We have people like Thatcher and Bush who caused it. The approach worked only for the top few percent, the rest of us got stuck with debt, unemployment, insecurity and the ever imminent threat of poverty.

The model did not work, we need to find summat where more sense prevails and common and lasting prosperity can be created. Yes we need to slash government debt, of course, and we need to cut the dependency upon government handouts. And for that matter we need to slash private debt burdens as well!

Which means that we need to take a new approach or adapt an old one. We need a dynamic, comprehensive, inclusive approach to building an economy and the job creation that is attached to it. Not the old static, monetary-based solutions.

And for those who accuse me of proposing Marx and Engels style solutions, let me correct you. There is a model out there that could be used and adapted for the current era. A model that created a dynamic, vibrant economy that raised living standards across the board long-term, kept debt low and provided good-paying jobs and low unemployment. German names again, but not Marx and Engels - but rather Adenauer and Erhard! Check out what they achieved in the 1950s and 60s. Check out the model, adapt and apply!