Could you create jobs with £375 billion to spend?
Since the crisis the Bank of England has created £375 billion of new money in an attempt to get the economy going again. But instead of putting it into the real economy, where it could support businesses, shops and real jobs, they’ve just pumped it into the financial markets.That’s why the stock market is near its highest ever level, even though there are around 2.5 million people who can’t find jobs at all, and a further 3 million people who can’t get enough hours of employment. [1] Meanwhile over 500,000 people have become dependent on food banks to live. [2]
This is crazy…
This is a crazy approach to fixing a broken economy. If just a fraction of that £375 billion had been spent into the real economy by the government, as new debt-free money, it would have created jobs, allowed us to reduce our debts, and get the economy going again. We have tried to explain this to the government [3], and even the former chairman of the Financial Services Authority, Lord Adair Turner has said that “If [President] Herbert Hoover had known in 1931 that [the policy of creating money and spending it into the economy through government budgets] was possible, the US Great Depression would have been less severe.” [4]
We want to campaign for a better approach
Instead of seeing more money flooding the financial markets, we want to see the power to create money be used for something useful. There’s so much that needs to be done, including:- Rebuilding the hundreds of school buildings that are not fit for purpose (the government has just borrowed £700million from private banks – who will create the money used to pay for the rebuilding – instead of using their own power to create money).
- Switching the country over to clean and renewable energy so that we don’t become dependent on countries like Qatar for energy imports in the future
- Getting money directly to ordinary people by creating jobs so that they can start to pay down some of their debts
Our campaign (codename “QE for jobs”) would ask for £50 billion to be created by the Bank of England and spent by government with the aim of increasing employment and doing some of the long-term things that are essential for this country.
Here’s the plan:
Over the next 2 years we’re aiming to:· get the idea of ‘QE for jobs’ into the mainstream public debate
· get the main political parties to adopt it into their 2015 manifesto
· build a large movement of individuals and groups in support of the campaign
· get business leaders to write an open letter to George Osborne asking him to carry it out
This doesn’t mean we are changing direction. Our main objective will always be to fully change the way that money is created so that banks can no longer create money and cause the kind of crisis that we’re facing today.[6]
This is a campaign that we think will lead the way to getting the money creation more mainstream. It is a step in the right direction and would mean our reforms are more likely to be implemented. It could also raise our profile and broaden our network along the way.
Can you help us kickstart the campaign?
We’ve speaking to potential partners and there’s a lot of interest in this idea, but we need to have the funds to get the ball rolling.Currently we have 378 people who donate every month, and this keeps the campaign going. If we can increase that to 430, we’ll be able to focus on this huge opportunity to get a change in the monetary system and have money created in the public interest for the first time in decades.
If you can, please help by donating monthly, either by direct debit or paypal:
Donate now
Why donate to Positive Money?
Compared to most not-for-profits and charities, we’re tiny and don’t have any huge funders to support our work. However, we are tackling one of the root causes of many problems. We depend on the monthly donations of around 350 of the 11,500 people receiving this email, to provide half of all our funding, plus a number of grants from smaller charitable trusts.
Any donations made in June will be DOUBLED…
The James Gibb Stuart Trust, who helped Positive Money to get off the ground, are currently matching any donations set up this month, for the next 12 months. That means if you start donating £10 a month, it’ll be matched with an additional £120 over the next year.
Plus if you donate £10 or more per month – we will send you a free copy of the book Modernising Money. If we can raise an extra £1200 a month in donations, this will be doubled by the James Gibb Stuart Trust and we’ll be able to cover a significant amount of our costs for a QE campaign and at least keep Positive Money going until the 2015 election.
Donate now
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[1] http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-20509189
[2] http://www.church-poverty.org.uk/foodfuelfinance/walkingthebreadline/report
[3] http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201213/cmselect/cmtreasy/writev/qe/m08.htm
[4] http://www.fsa.gov.uk/static/pubs/speeches/0206-at.pdf - p34.
[5] http://cdn.hm-treasury.gov.uk/ukecon_mon_policy_framework.pdf
[6] http://www.positivemoney.org/about/statement-of-purpose/
Blogger Reference Link http://www.p2pfoundation.net/Transfinancial_Economics
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