Austerity is organised theft from the poor

The problem is the ignorant greed that serves the interests of the elites - the bankers - corrupt business and their political hirelings.

Austerity is organised theft from the poor.

Probably the most disastrous application of austerity and the mantra of balancing the Government budget was pursued by Chancellor Heinrich Bruning in Germany at the height of the great depression in 1931.

Bruning stated in 1931: “I will do my utmost to prevent any inflationary measures of any kind – because it is my opinion the honest balance of the German economy has to be recreated. Any attempt and any request for inflationary measures only can have the goal in mind to foil the process of establishing a clear balance!”

In the midst of the downturn, as unemployment continued to rise, Bruning cut wages, pensions, public assistance and raised taxes, increasing misery among both those in work and those out of work.

The backlash against these measures was so intense he suspended parliamentary democracy and ruled by emergency decree.

After just two years of these austerity measures, Germany’s economy had completely collapsed - unemployment doubled between 1931 and 1932. Bruning was forced out of office and Hitler put together a right-wing coalition in 1933

This was a direct creation of the austerity and eventually led to the Second World War.

Austerity has failed repeatedly from the earliest use by US president Herbert Hoover who had turned the 1929 stock market crash into the Great Depression of 1932.

Our present austerity programme pursued by Chancellor George Osborne is already showing disastrous results – many sections of the population are suffering, mostly the poor and disabled but the middle classes are increasingly in trouble.

If this programme is to be continued with, then the outcome will be the same as it always has been previously - catastrophic collapse.

It’s not just this country that is pursuing this madness, it’s effectively global. America and Europe are suffering the same problems.

The only sane answer is a rescheduling or cancellation of debt on a global scale – a restructuring of global trade that is equitable and fair to all.

The alternative to this is another great global conflict as each nation fights for domination. Such a war would inevitably be fought with nuclear weapons and lead to the total destruction of all nations.

Chris Johnson

Waterside, Colne