BBC Blog Network

User Profile

John Monro

Listed below are comments made by John Monro between Saturday, 13th September 2008 and Friday, 23rd January 2009.

«Newer
Older»

Recession Greatest Hits 7:27pm on 23 Jan 2009 Hello Stephanie,

In an earlier blog you state it is astonishing that "no-one" saw this recession coming - I think our Queen murmured an embarrassing question about this. By "no-one" of course you mean the multitude of media commentators, bankers, businessmen and politicians in the "mainstream" of economic and political life. You later admit some "no-ones" did see this coming. Who were these others? People like me for instance? (See my own internet blog for this, starting some three years ago. See also my posting on the "Anglo-Saxon Syndrome", aka ASS.)

So this begs the question, why did "no-one" see it coming? Because without answering this, all prognostications from "every-one" about the future of this recession are meaningless. It's like a doctor prognosticating the progress of his patient's serious relapse without bothering to investigate a diagnosis. So Chris Giles's "stab at the answer", which I can't read because I don't subscribe to the FT (interesting you direct readers to a resource most won't be able to make use of), is almost certainly wrong, because I'd wager Chris was another "every-one" who missed the diagnosis - he too wasn't paying attention.

I don't wish to take up too much of your space, but the ultimate cause of this recession is environmental. It was the huge hike in oil and many other vital raw material prices that truly punctured the bubble. Of course criminal malfeasance in the financial sector, aided by a criminal naivety in the political and economic arena, did its bit.

For a very brief moment at the end of 2007, and the beginning of 2008, we saw what a resource constrained world looked like, and again, "no-one" saw it. But that doesn't mean it didn't happen, I saw it and so did others, because we have been paying attention, and it was not a pretty sight. This event was in fact a dress rehearsal for the Club of Rome's "Limits to Growth". Oil in particular, "peak oil", is what is going to ensure that this "recession" is like nothing that has ever happened to us before, so trying to prognosticate the future course of this "recession" on the basis of previous recessions is futile.

This "recession" is in fact a much more profound and revolutionary economic, political and social event than you and "every-one" else understand. You are still not paying attention, and until you do, we have no hope of getting ourselves out of it.

I have (some) answers but I have gone on long enough, if you visit my blog you can peruse them at your leisure, but what I can say is that none of these answers is yet to be heard from "anyone" else.

Best wishes from this "no-one", and good luck for 2009, we're all going to need it.

John Monro, Wellington, New Zealand
Meltdown Monday 08:55am on 15 Sep 2008 You certainly predicted this event 24 hours before it happened but, you know, Lehman's demise didn't happen yesterday, it has been happening over the last few years, with the explosion of derivative debt and the sheer criminal behaviour of too many people, aided and abetted by an incompetent and corrupt US administration. The alarm bells should have been ringing at least five years ago, but as long as everything seemed to be skating along nicely, no-one noticed that, just as in the Arctic, the ice was becoming dangerously thin. There were some old fashioned and much derided economists sounding the warning signals, just like the climate scientists, but I'm afraid far too many people were too busy enjoying the good times. Too late now. We should have dealt with all this long ago, and to be honest I'm not that impressed with a 24 hour warning. However, to be fair, I haven't read this blog previously, perhaps you were predicting this collapse some time ago, but if you were, then the vast majority of your colleagues weren't.
No place like home 10:05pm on 13 Sep 2008 I think the question should be, "Was what is happening predictable, and was it avoidable?" I think the answer is yes to both questions. Many conservative (with a small "c") commentators and economists were highly and vocally concerned about this housing bubble and the explosion of credit, fuelled by greedy banks, finance companies, speculators, a corrupt and incompetent management of two giant mortgage suppliers, pork-barrel politics and kick-backs, and grossly inadequate monetary controls and an incompetent government and Federal Reserve. Some people posting seems quite happy to blame the house buyers, but that isn't helpful, because this housing bubble is now threatening the entire world economy. In other words, the healthy functioning of a national economy isn't just the province of the "market", but of government through effective regulation, with a long-term and sustainable strategy for the whole economy. The "credit crunch" (actually a solvency crunch) is a prime example of the absurdity that the "market" is the final arbiter of our national and international economies, and those very companies and executives who keep repeating ad-infinitum "keep government out of business" are the very ones now begging and screaming for government help to save them. And because bank and financial market failure could bring down the entire economy we are saving them, the rats are leaving with their multi-million dollar bonuses and retiring to the Bahamas, whilst the taxpayer, the ordinary citizen, the majority of them actually relatively poor, pick up the bill, hundreds of billions of dollars, trillions even, which could have gone instead to a health system in the USA that might actually work, or a railway system that might actually deliver a service or a renewable energy strategy that might begin to save our planet.

«Newer
Older»

^ Back to top

BBC MMVI

The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites

BBC.co.uk

BBC Blog Network

Find and talk to the BBC's bloggers.

User Profile

John Monro