Left to their own devices, firms will almost always try to takeover other firms or force them out of business. But every takeover reduces competition and choice, which is supposed to be the whole point of the free market in the first place.
Many British firms are just investment vehicles with nothing inside. Maximising profits alone cannot provide businesses or anyone else with a meaningful purpose.
Paul Mason: is capitalism dead?
“We don’t want to switch capitalism off yet, but maybe we can replace it with something better.” Channel […]
The French work smarter and have a more productive workforce than Britain. But there’s a sting in the tail: fewer jobs for young and old alike.
In this excellent series of podcasts from the New Economics Foundation (NEF), Kirsty Styles and her guests introduce neoliberal ideas, explore how they affect our lives and look at some of the challenges to this dominant way of thinking. These are the ideas that rule the world, so it’s worth taking a few minutes now and then to try to understand them!
From: New Economics Foundation (NEF)
Simon Wren Lewis: Labour & the deficit
“…Osborne, by going for an unnecessarily rapid reduction in debt by means of increasing poverty, has thrown a potential lifeline to Labour. Unfortunately, Labour appear to be swimming away from it…”
From Mainly Macro
They don’t really “own” firms, they provide a minority of the capital and they don’t care much about what happens to them. So why do shareholders call the shots?
Good work from Richard Murphy at Tax Research UK in exposing the real data behind George Osborne’s “personal tax statement”.
Economics happens to real people. Meet Focus E15 — the young London mums at the sharp end of our housing market failure.
Actually, it is. When people try to complicate something very simple, it’s usually because they don’t want to see what’s staring them in the face.