Tonight I watched an old DVD - Brassed Off - about how coal pit closures made miners, and whole mining communities, feel denigrated, demotivated, and ultimately despairing. Oh, and about some very good brass band music.
Looking back on these events now, why did they happen? Mrs T blamed the philosophy of "collectivism" -- the idea that human interdependence and the importance of a collective take priority over the importance of separate individuals [my thanks to Wikipedia]. In its most benign political form, collectivism involves efforts to reduce the inequities of unrestrained capitalism by government regulation, redistribution of income, and varying degrees of planning and public ownership [Wikipedia again]. But Mrs T argued that the 'collectives' of the unions had been building dangerous amounts of power since at least 1964, when a guy who worked for BOAC (the state airline company) but resigned from the (only) union was sacked by the company on the insistence of the union. (Rookes v Barnard [1964] AC 1129, [1964] 1 All ER 367. He went to court but it took years and a House of Lords decision before he won). She thought that union power had been building for so long that a major and painful confrontation was inevitable.
It's easy to forget just how much of a mess Britain was in during the late 70s. Inflation was over 20%, interest rates reached 17%, income tax rates ranged from 35% to 83% (compare today's 22-40%), and corporation tax was 52% (now 28%). It was clear to many people that the unions had major political influence. It was also clear that, while unions looked after the workers, they did little for consumers of the products that were produced -- ask anyone who bought a 1970s British car. My dad tells of a guy he knew whose job was to inspect cars for faults before they left the factory. As he lay under the car, with his legs sticking out, there would be guys on motorbikes whizzing up and down the factory floor -- a clear warning to him of the consequences if he dared declare a car unfit or inadequate for sale.
So my point is (finally! I hear some of you say) that the unionised society of the late 1970s WAS a disaster waiting to happen, AND there were indicators that were clear to everyone that something was very wrong.
Before anyone thinks I'm taking political sides in this posting, let me talk about the credit crunch. Disaster waiting to happen? With hindsight, yes. Clear indicators in advance? YES. I did a project once for a building society looking at bad debts. It was abundantly clear that the highest mortgage that most people could be expected to repay was 3 times their salary ... and if they worked 2 jobs, it was wise to factor that in for just 1 year (i.e. to pay moving costs and expenses but not the long-term mortgage). There were also particular risks with 100% mortgages (not because the borrowers were necessarily poorer, but because they lost little or nothing if they simply walked away from the property and the mortgage) and with 'sub-prime' (i.e. low income) borrowers -- I remember one case where the mortgage was for just 60% of the property value, and it had still become a bad debt. So when I heard in 2006 that you could get a mortgage of 5 times your salary, or for 125% of the value of the property ... I wish I had paid more attention.
In this case, the philosophy at fault was capitalism, specifically the laws of supply and demand, which led to risk-taking by financial institutions in order to be competitive in the mortgage market. Similarly, the drive to recruit top staff in the financial industry led to another disaster waiting to happen; the indicator this time was paying bankers guaranteed bonuses, the disaster was the bad press suffered when banks lost millions and their staff still got paid bonuses, and those hurt were the long-serving staff whose guaranteed bonuses had expired and were therefore cheaper to fire.
In summary: following a particular political/economic philosophy too far seems to produce disasters, which are clearly indicated beforehand for those with eyes to see. And the longer the disaster is delayed, the more pain it causes to largely innocent people when it happens. Many miners lost job, savings, community, and possibly more in '84. Those who have lost jobs in '08, (here's a quick A to Z: architects, bank tellers, builders, engineers, estate agents, MFI, Roseby's, property lawyers, Waterford, Woolworths and Zavvi) may well be suffering similarly, except that few live in communities as close and supportive as many mining villages were, and they have more chance of finding a similar job than the miners ever did.
Which begs at least one question: Are there any other areas where there are clear indicators of disasters waiting to happen? I'm going to stick my neck out here and say that EDUCATION -- specifically A-level education -- is such an area. I'm thinking particularly of a comment made by a University of London maths tutor: "I had to give many members of my 1st year class remedial teaching. When I tested them at the start, 15 did not know how to calculate the area of a circle".
To me, that's a clear indicator that something is very wrong . There are others: universities planning additional entrance exams, schools switching to the international baccalaureate exam.
Which philosophy is responsible for this? Ah, there's the rub. I can see two possible candidates: either the desire for "inclusiveness" (i.e. to enable as many children as possible to 'succeed', which may include getting into university); or "outcome-based education" -- focusing on the children achieving outcomes rather than on learning certain inputs, which (very loosely speaking) is the opposite of rote learning. Note I'm not saying either of these philosophies are inherently bad or wrong, just that their uncontrolled extremes are dangerous.
I look forward to the comments of anyone who managed to read this far.
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