Redistribution is better than ‘trickle down’ wealth

I NEARLY fell off my chair. An economist was on radio arguing that none of us suffer from government “mistakes” like the Blue Streak rockets, delorean cars, Concorde aircraft, London’s Garden Bridge - more recently £52m worth of unusable NHS face-masks - because ordinary families get a bite-sized piece of the misspending.

In other words, trickle down.

From pre-biblical times it has been acknowledged that the leftovers from a rich-man’s table will be eagerly consumed by the servants below stairs. Moreover, if serfs work 100 hours a week for the lord of the manor they will benefit from a tied cottage and chicken roast on Christmas Day.

Moving to the larger theatre of national wealth, former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was an unashamed advocate of trickle down. Whatever the tribulations suffered by out-of-work miners, single-parent mums, zero-hours barmaids, or homeless asylumseekers, she argued that everyone gains from rich people getting richer. So, overnight, income tax at the higher rate came down from 60p in the pound to a paltry 40p.

There was even a gigantic advertising campaign, “Call Sid”. The idea: buy ten or 20 shares in newly privatised British Gas and become a leading stakeholder in a golden future where no utility whatsoever is left in public hands.

Trickle down with scant regard to ballooning gas bills alongside fat-cat water boards totally unaccountable for either water quality or water leakage.

Yet the doctrine of trickle down obstinately survives and prospers, alongside that forbidden notion, redistribution.

Only through making rich people a little bit poorer and poor people a lot richer can anybody left behind ever get out in front.

In other words, why not raise the higher band of income tax to 85p in the pound? Why not limit Lottery payouts to £500,000? And why not ask a duff goalkeeper to pay hardworking fans back the dozens of millions it cost to transfer him?

Redistribution is not tokenism. It succeeds by replacing the pathetic, patronising and paternalistic practice of beggars waiting for scraps or crumbs with proper wages, superior conditions of employment and affordable housing, fit for human habitation.