Social failure is the fault of the political elites.

Many years ago JK Galbraith posited that the problem of the USA underclass could be resolved. Governments had the means to achieve change but not the desire to will the funding to make it happen.

The use of the word 'underclass' raises hackles in some, but it is a convenient shorthand as used by Galbraith in a non-pejorative sense.   He argued that people in well-paid, satisfying employment with plenty of discretionary income needed the underclass to maintain their standard of living.

The underclass undertook the dirty, repetitive, low-paid jobs: care staff, cleaners,  shelf-stackers, lavatory attendants and the like. They live in poor housing, have poor education and often poor health. Raising taxation to improve their lot would eat into the resources of the better off.  Indeed it would be counter-productive as who would do the dirty work if you gave these people or their children a better education?

Galbraith's analysis travels well to the United Kingdom.  The problems in the UK have been well documented.

Somewhere along the line governments gave up on the underclass. Instead of measures to counter the problems successive governments have entrenched deprivation through the welfare system, by permitting sink schools, be making unemployment  more financially advantageous than working and so forth.   I know there are examples of policies which were intended to have the opposite effect, such as the Sure Start initiative, but the position is that problems in deprived areas and of the underclass are no better than they were in 1985 when the Church of England published its devastating critique: Faith in the City.

Life for many is grim.  I have some hopes that the educational reforms of the present government may bear fruit and that the benefit changes will likewise prove positive.  But they are only a start, much more requires to be done.  Unfortunately our economy is weak and we do not have the means, never mind possibly the will, to make the radical changes that are needed, unless taxation is increased.


I commend the article to which I have provided the following link:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/david-cameron/8700270/UK-riots-Mr-Cameron-has-been-handed-a-chance-to-mend-this-broken-society.html

I have supported the Centre for Social Justice for some years, having been introduced to it by Greg Clark MP, who is now the Minister for Cities.