Liz Truss 2.0

Sunak is polling at the same level as Truss - seems that ditching her growth policies for simply more managed decline isn't particularly popular 

I do not normally talk about Truss anymore, a political failure and a has-been who wreaked disaster upon the economy but who has little relevance outside the Tory faithful. Of course those who loved the policies cannot bring themselves to acknowledge how disastrous they were so are forced to resort to unlikely conspiracies involving left wing civil servants and economists, bankers and stock market investors and big business, all working together to sabotage something that would otherwise have worked brilliantly. All to avoid recognising the unwelcome reality that unfunded tax cuts mostly for the better off are likely to be economically disastrous due to being unfunded, and unpopular for lining the pockets of those who already have most. Such policies cannot possibly be wrong because they support them with all their being, so sabotage is the only explanation they can come up with to avoid the painful acceptance that their beliefs have proven disastrous in practice. We see that even on this forum. And so they are deluding themselves to avoid having to ditch long cherished belief.

As a foe of the Conservative party I am happy to see this delusion still being propagated. I would be as delighted as her deluded supporters if Truss were back in charge of the Tories, precisely because she would lead them to electoral disaster.

I think that unfunded tax cuts spooking the markets is far more likely than any unlikely conspiracy involving such unlikely bedfellows as the left and bankers and stock market traders, lol.

But accepting the logic of that would mean having to conclude that your cherished beliefs about what would work have actually proven to be disastrous. So easier from your perspective to blame everyone else for the disaster except Truss and her policies. Because that allows you to continue to believe in them in spite of the disaster that unfolded.

It would be intellectually far more courageous to accept the reality rather than resort to unlikely conspiracies in order to avoid doing so.

We have had that idiotic argument before......tax cuts need to be funded by cutting the services they were paying for, or replacing the services they were financing with more borrowing. They are never for free as you previously argued. They come at a price somewhere. There is no such thing as a free tax cut, anymore than there is a free spending increase. Nothing is for free. But if you wish to debate that silly assertion of yours again, please leave me out of it.

As for your assertion without much in the way of evidence that a massive conspiracy destroyed Trussonomics, rather than except that Trussonomics itself was the problem. I do think you are the one who clearly needs to have a word with your subconscious.

Tax changes can indeed affect future revenues over and beyond any direct drop in revenue resulting from the cut. But the same is true of public spending and investment. Both could potentially grow the economy. But both need to be made financially viable in the shorter term or they risk tanking the economy. As Truss did. The politics also matter as much as the economics. Tax cuts that appear - and can easily be presented as being by opponents - targeted mostly towards the better off will not go down well when so many are on the breadline. Tax cuts should be aimed much more at those on low and medium incomes, if and when they become affordable. People will accept tax cuts at the top if middle and lower earners benefit more greatly. But it will tank the economy unless it can be demonstrated to be affordable.

You are now waffling in circles around my point. Spending can increase revenues but my point was not that they could't but that revenues are significantly a matter of political opinion and economic theory. What we have is a minor technicality in a minor budget, vastly overshadowed on all sides by huge amounts of borrowing, a history of economic fakery and decades of absurd, unnecessary spending. If you actually think that this tiny technicality tanked the economy, you have some gullibility issues. Of course, it's far easier to fool someone who wants to be fooled. The second part of what you wrote makes more sense - ie influential opponents of the policy used it as a lever - and they had their interests (rather than yours) in mind when they did so. I never said Truss was a clever politician to do what she did - she probably she imagined she would get support for a conservative policy from the Conservative party . A naive person with the right idea.