Heads, who wins?
Austerity has been perhaps, of the most vociferously contested themes in recent times. To opt between humanitarian beneficiaries and hardline fiscal policies is always a perplexing choice. The merits of both these treks are attested by history books, but the human value involved is too humungous to brush off. Demanding stringent spadework and spine, implementing a deduction in public expenditure, requires thorough brainstorming. Different countries in their predicaments call for varying settlements. More often than not, such measures are taken only after a budget deficit, unpaid loans, and hovering creditors. Economists like John Maynard Keynes have been brutal and unequivocal protestors against austerity. In a vicious cycle of debt-ridden governments and an under-valued human force, reduced funding poses stark obstacles.
In short-sighted governance, the maxim of negligible pending loans and deficits seems lucrative enough for the authorities to further plan a well-constructed scheme. It aids investors in restoring their conviction and projects the nation in question, as a disciplined economy. This is not only golden for the existing stakeholders but also, a future class of lenders and investors. Social welfare, disbursement, and unemployment projects are presented as viable threats to future developments. The idea of relinquished funding is more of a logical one, backed by the likes of a certain ‘Household Fallacy’. An undervalued motif on economics and a string of loosely held precedents are the foundations for its supporters. An indispensable matter, making ripples in deliberations over capitalism, many would argue , is it anything but, a necessity in most cases.
Just like history, economics cannot be judged or pin-pointed at, in any stray point in time. Intertwined with demographics, any fiscal/monetary policy affects different classes of citizens in overwhelmingly varying amounts. In societies, divides across spectrums stand at the threshold of all delicate reforms being discoursed upon. Therefore, when any government claims to ponder upon the greater good of the nation, there are massive socio-economic backlogs that citizens are asked to face headlong.
A barbed thought process with a blurred prognostication of how certain factions like the elderly, differently abled, and the homeless will be reft off their benefits, does more harm than good. Nevertheless, it is an obvious conclusion that a loan-backed economy is not even remotely bankable. If one were to minutely observe the details, it is a no brainer, the very hitches a government is hesitant to subsidize, return to haunt the eco-system at a later stage. When initially, a community was languished in the throes of unemployment, decreased funding by the public sector reinforces fewer job opportunities and a perennial cycle of liabilities.
Since every dollar spent is indirectly a dollar earned by someone, surging tax rates undermine an entire society’s upliftment. Individuals and households begin trotting along the lines of diminished spending, and rightly so. However, these fiscal measures seldom touch upon those, who are better off and their tier in the hierarchy remains blissfuly oblivious to the undertakings.
Times like these, appeal for a massive amount of dialogue and the repercussions to be faced by the bourgeois are immense. If, however, all estates in a management are equivalently handled, there is scope for a collective input to get rid of the crises in hand. Closing in on the end of an economic oddity, if numerous lives are lost or disastrously affected, it implies a carefree policy making and execution. People, in any organisation are always assets. They constitute healthy, robust, and steady market and productive results. If we were to ostracise these prodigious selling points in our working spaces, which ‘economy’ are we attempting to revive?
