A revealing week in the media

Yesterday the Sunday Herald came out in support of a yes vote; not an endorsement of the SNP but a positive choice for independence. As referendum day looms ever closer, I suspect more of those who possess powerful voices to nail their colours to the mast. The cohort who, like me, remains open-minded also faces the crux of decision. I wrote in my first post that I felt an inclination toward yes; well this week that inclination became slightly stronger. I’ve yet to graze my shins with the macroeconomic analysis but the ideological chasm is beginning to look beyond reconciliation.

French economist Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century is sending political shockwaves into the heart of the establishment. Right-wing commentators are digging in. The idea that extreme inequality is an essential and laudable element of capitalist society is under credible scrutiny for the first time in a generation; and those who benefit from the status quo don’t like it one bit. I managed to engage Daily Telegraph columnist, Allister Heath, into a twitter exchange about Piketty’s theory. Heath uses data showing a steady wage share to justify the equity of capitalism. However, a rising arithmetic mean can mask positively skewed data with the median failing to keep up. Just because the extortionate pay rises of the richest lift the average, it doesn’t follow that the majority are better off. Remember the old adage: Lies, damn lies and statistics.

Coincidently, I stumbled across an article by the same journalist railing against the proposed Lib Dem mansion tax. I am a passionate believer that taxing income more than wealth is disproportionate and stifles social mobility. To read Heath’s article on council tax felt like travelling back in time to the ideological debate over Poll tax. Here is the pertinent and – I think - quite shocking quotation:

One of Alexander’s arguments in favour of his plan is that it is wrong that somebody in a £700,000 home should pay the same council tax as someone living in a house worth £7m or £17m, or even £70m. But why? Houses don’t pay taxes, people do - and the point of council taxes is to finance local services, not to redistribute wealth.

So it follows that it is only right for five people on the minimum wage, sharing an HMO flat in the east end of Glasgow, to pay more than a couple living in a grand villa in leafy G12. Wasn’t it this kind of ultra Thatcherite divisiveness that caused the Poll tax riots?  Regressive taxes – where the poorest pay a greater proportion – are not conducive to an equitable society and to see them exalted in the mainstream media in 2014 is incredibly sad. Depressing but perhaps not surprising; last week a poll found that the Tories lead in the south of England while Labour are ahead in the north.

Ed Miliband told Andrew Marr yesterday that a Labour government could deliver a more just society for the whole of the UK. This is essentially the Labour argument to vote no: That there should be unity among the left to beat the Tories. But should we take the risk given the apparent popularity of the party of vested interests? Call me a cynic, but I’m not surprised that Douglas Alexander and others who stand to gain from high office are so keen to play the Labour solidarity card: Their careers depend on the union.

 

An independent Scotland would set a challenge for any right wing party: A fresh set of ideas that are commensurate with values in Scotland, not the conservative Home Counties. Capitalism can work, but it needs regulation, as the financial disasters over the last century have demonstrated. After the chilling coverage this week, the prospect of a blank canvas for Scotland does sound appealing.