[OPE] Austerity is no Surprise

This extract comes from The Confiscation of Economic Prosperity.It
serves as a reminder that this crazy demand for austerity should not
come as a surprise.

Besides, the problem is not the size of the deficit but the policy
changes that the right wing can engineer by stoking fears about the
disaster that deficits can create.The idea is that with the government
facing seemingly unmanageable deficits, the public will be stampeded
into a wholesale slashing of government spending.

As a result, regulatory policies that inconvenience the corporate sector
as well as social programs that might benefit ordinary people will
disappear.The right wing gleefully refers to this situation as the
starve-the-beast strategy -- by depriving the government of adequate
revenue, its regulatory powers will necessarily shrink.

Traditionally, Republicans represented themselves as the party of fiscal
sobriety, insisting that balanced budgets were essential to solid
economic performance.In the 1980s, a new strategy began to
emerge.Conservatives began to welcome huge deficits.

  More at:

http://michaelperelman.wordpress.com/2011/03/23/austerity-is-no-surprise/

-- 
Michael Perelman
Economics Department
California State University
michael dot perelman at gmail.com
Chico, CA 95929
530-898-5321
fax 530-898-5901
www.michaelperelman.wordpress.com

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Received on Wed Mar 23 17:03:22 2011