Sunday 29 April 2012

Osborne explains ticketty boo economics

Osborne to missus:
I think I've cracked it, dear. Look, you see, people go to work and earn money. And most of them pay taxes. Then we in government we spend those taxes. Now, this is the thing: what if we just stopped doing that? Eh? What if we said, OK, you people we're going to stop spending money on everything apart from the army, bombs, prisons and the police? You can keep all that money we were taking away from you? And then, here's the good bit, they wouldn't actually keep it, dear. They would rush out and spend it. This would make all our kinds of people do things like make nice things for them, or lend them even more money and soon the whole place will be purring away like one great big beautiful steam engine, chuff chuff chuff, ticketty boo, ticketty boo, ticketty boo. Even schools and hospitals and all that. Our kind of people can run them. All the people with more money will just spend their money at the schools for their children and at the hospital for when they break a leg. You see? There'd be so much money. Everyone would  have money. Now, of course, there would be a lot of competition. Competition is really good,  you know dear. All our friends compete against each other to deliver up the best crisps, the best armchairs, the best hospitals until you get the best. And here's a good thing, as they compete, they get lean and efficient. I love that, lean and efficient. This means getting rid of all those silly extra people who don't do things. Jobsworths. And you make sure that you pay people as little as possible, dear. You have to do that. Now, I know this leads to a little probby because even though we've cut their taxes, this does mean that they might just possibly have less to spend. They might not be able to afford to buy the best hospitals. But that's fair enough. We must reward those who are good at what they do. And that'll be the rich people. So they can have the best hospitals and the best schools. People like us, dear. It's good, isn't it? See how it's all going to work out? Lovely lovely lovely. I feel like skipping.