When it comes to politicians, some are good shots and some are cheap shots. These days, the successful politicians – you wouldn’t call them leaders – have relied heavily on cheap shots. The cheapest being to spread fear.
The welfare state – including universal health care and social security payments – is about removing the threat of people dying because they’re too old or sick or disabled to work, or just can’t find a job. The welfare state is a giant risk-sharing system, a massive insurance scheme. The coming federal election will be the battle of the scare campaigns, with as few substantive policies as possible.
Invariably, any plan to tackle pressing economic problems, or just make the economy work better, has pros and cons, winners and losers. Bingo. A pollie with a plan is a pollie fighting a scare campaign. Gresham’s Law says bad money drives out good. A new law says scare campaigns drive out policy reform. Or maybe B-grade pollies drive out A-grade. When it comes to standards of political behaviour, it’s always a race to the bottom.
Sue0606 1RossGittins good economic policy has not existed for the past 15 years.
1RossGittins One of the reasons I no longer vote
1RossGittins Sadly, so true. In the UK, Brexit was won by the largest scare campaign. Opposition attempts to counter fear with logic failed. In the corporate world, if people don’t hit their KPIs, they risk losing their job. Is their a way to hold politicians similarly accountable?