The Guardian View on the Brexit Economy: The UK Risks Recession

THE GUARDIAN: There is no good time to be leaving the EU but this might be the worst – as a failure to learn the lessons of the 2008 crash leaves the country exposed to another downturn

There is more than a little truth in the idea that those who do not learn from history are condemned to repeat it. The global financial crisis was meant to lead to an economic and political reckoning for neoliberals carried away with their own ideology. They made all sorts of unrealistic promises that even a brief reflection would have shattered. Yet more than a decade on, the reckoning is far from over. This is especially true in the United Kingdom, whose prime minister peddles a sunny optimism in the merits of splendid isolation to fuel his Brexit fantasies. History ought to be a protection against this stripe of reckless utopianism. Yet in a world of instant headlines and short-term hits, who has time to dwell on the inconvenient truths? Still, dwell we must. David Blanchflower, the US-based economist, points out that thanks to a short-sighted austerity policy this has been the slowest economic recovery for 300 years. While politicians trumpet near-record levels of unemployment and wage growth, they fail to mention that the latest figures show that average earnings, when adjusted for inflation, stands today at £525 a week in total pay, £22 lower than in February 2008 » | Editorial | Tuesday, September 10, 2019