Austerity

Question 1

How did austerity manifest at different scales?

Answer 1

• A global financial crisis which emerged in banks
• National debt created by bailouts
• Local consequences through debt downloaded onto council spending and household debt

Question 2

What caused, in the simplest sense, the 2008 crisis?

Answer 2

Household debt rising with substantial optimism in markets

Question 3

What is moral risk?

Answer 3

• When private debt and finance becomes public finance.

- The state always intervenes in markets to ensure that there is not a massive catastrophe

Question 4

What was the philosophy behind the coalition government’s response to the financial crisis?

Answer 4

Individualism to “chip in to help out”

Some had to chip in much more than others

Question 5

When was welfare reformed most extensively after the financial crash?

Answer 5

2012 welfare act

Question 6

How did the 2012 welfare act introduce more discipline?

Answer 6

More conditions, stigmatised benefits and created a new poor law to try and “fix” people in a less clear way to the workhouse

Question 7

Why did austerity hit urban and peripheral areas more?

Answer 7

• More poor people to begin with, and larger populations
• Less revenue from council tax
• Higher pre-existing expenditure

(opposite for the home counties

Question 8

When was universal credit introduced?

Answer 8

2014

Question 9

Why is universal credit dangerous?

Answer 9

It has precarity built in before you get the first cheque

Because it assesses incomes with one single, one-time metric each month which might not be representative of actual average incomes…

Question 10

What local safety nets were cut during austerity? What’s the issue?

Answer 10

• Sure start centres
• Basic services
• Youth centres

GENERATIONAL EFFECTS

Question 11

How did the government add insult to injury for local government cuts?

Answer 11

Local governments could not draw on emergency funds because no funds were ring-fenced after 2015

Question 12

How did austerity have an aesthetic affect?

Answer 12

More betting shops etc

Discourages more affluent people from moving to areas worst effected

Question 13

What is the implication of the state becoming a debt collector for the first time during austerity?

Answer 13

Uni Credit can be deducted from households because of gov debt

Question 14

Were the effects of austerity all social and economic?

Answer 14

• No, also legal reforms

- Legal aid lost, so cannot contest state on matters so easily

Question 15

What is the issue with austerity when it comes to asset based approaches?

Answer 15

Being poor is expensive, so cannot get assets

Question 16

What is a good way of summarising the political economy of austerity?

Answer 16

• Built on debt downloaded to local areas
• Policies justified by debt
• “Solved” by increasing debt through loans

If you were poor going into austerity, you emerged poorer

Question 17

Are the impacts of austerity cumulative?

Answer 17

No, the impacts intersect to amplify and aggravate impacts

Question 18

What is the other dark side of austerity?

Answer 18

The wealth defence industry

Question 19

Did taxes increase during austerity as one would anticipate?

Answer 19

No, actually decreased prior to and during austerity (2007-2013)

HM Treasury 2013

Question 20

Is tax avoidance illegal?

Answer 20

No, it is technically legal, just immoral

Tax evasion (deliberately and knowingly failing to declare income) is illegal

Question 21

How much of multinational profit is shifted to tax havens each year?

Answer 21

40% - amounts to 28% of UK corporation tax revenue

Torslov et al 2020

Question 22

What are the implications of tax avoidance?

Answer 22

There is a lot of money just floating around (up to 1/3 of total capital in the world)

(Varoufakis 2021)

Question 23

Who has highlighted the importance of higher levels of poverty in urban areas when concerning austerity?

Answer 23

Hastings et al 2017

Question 24

How does Lefebvre view public space?

Answer 24

• As a space for leisure, for use value instead of exchange value
• Also about how public space is always political space
• Austerity as a means of extracting exchange value from spaces which used to be private

Zieleniec 2018

Question 25

How has austerity interacted with urban planning?

Answer 25

More decentralised (Tonkiss 2013)

Question 26

How is the privatisation of public spaces during austerity countered?

Answer 26

Insurgent gardening (Tonkiss 2013)

Question 27

Why has the privatisation of public spaces occurred during austerity?

Answer 27

• Maintenance too expensive for councils
• Easier to sell off to make exchange value out of the utility
• Implications for surveillance and citizenship

Shenker 2017

Question 28

What is a paradox about austerity?

Answer 28

Why do we give to poor people in some parts of the world, but stigmatise those on benefits in the UK?

Question 29

What factors are not included in unemployment stats?

Answer 29

Sickness benefits and out migration from places which experienced deindustrialisation

Beatty and Fothergill 2017

Question 30

Is austerity really a solution to crises?

Answer 30

• Not really
• Actually framed as a “solution” as part of a wider economic agenda to enable more privatisation

Skidelsky 2015

Question 31

What, supposedly, was the purpose of austerity in the UK?

Answer 31

1. Reduce the defecit
2. Stimulate market confidence
3. Create economic growth

Deleidi and Mazzucato 2018 - comepare to Skidelsky 2015

Question 32

What is the trouble with austerity?

Answer 32

It is irrational

Reduces capacity for social reproduction of labour

Question 33

In what ways does the workhouse panopticon exist today?

Answer 33

• 19th century origins to make sure that workhouse inmates watched each other, a means of disciplining themselves (cheap) - Williams 2020
• Today the panopticon exists with changes to social security and during austerity
• Cheryl’s story (Strong 2020) about needing to maintain consumption patterns
• Conspicuous consumption creating an INFORMAL, intangible form of panopticon
• Also Jeff’s story of work placements being tracked

Question 34

Why is “flexible work” a myth during neoliberalism?

Answer 34

Not flexible work, but rather “flexible employment” - links with the Structural exacerbators of austerity

Brenner 2002