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Lettres d’Uzès #30: Do you, Mister Jones?

24/5/2013

16 Comments

 
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One of the problems with a first in PPE from Oxford is that the recipient has no experience of real politics, philosophy or economics. Real politics are not to be found in the party posturings of Parliament. Real philosophy is not to be found in the Bodleian. And real economics takes place in the boardrooms of multi-national companies where very smart people engage in the quotidian activities of the global capitalism to which Cameron, Osborne, Blair, Milliband, Hollande and Merkel pay lip service.

The terminology gives the clue to the nature of these activities: multi-national, global capitalism.

Why would anyone expect these companies to pay their taxes in one country when it is not necessary in another? Why are the press and the various governments so surprised?

I’m not. The likes of Google and Apple, Starbuck’s and Amazon, are, after all, doing what they do. They are in business and by definition must be business-like if they are to continue their success. Paying out millions unnecessarily is not good business. Even I understand that.

But Cameron – educated at Eton, Oxford and Conservative Central Office – doesn’t get it. Nor does Hollande – educated at a private Catholic school, HEC Paris, the Paris Institute of Political Studies, the École National d’Administration and finally by Mitterand himself.

And yet, when Hollande alienated a few of his millionaire countrymen with his taxation proposals, it was Cameron who quickly proclaimed that Britain would roll out the red carpet for any who chose to re-locate across the channel. Now he is struggling to find a way between condemnation of “aggressive tax avoidance” and his natural Conservative instincts, which is to defend whatever is the current reinvention of capitalism.

But something is happening here, and you don’t know what it is, do you, Mister Jones?

You should, however. It is nearly 50 years since I first read Monopoly Capital by Sweezy and Baran, and I have been reading extensions of their theory – the internationalization of monopoly capital, the globalization of labour and the monopolization of communications – ever since. Some of it in The Economist for Christ’s sake. It is more than 30 years since Maurice Saatchi and ‘The World’s Favourite Airline’ discovered the opportunity and potential of globalization in an article in the Harvard Business Review. The analysis was there. The warnings were there.

Did Mister Jones – and it’s a collective Mister Jones: Cameron, Holland, Blair et al – not read these? Maybe not.

The problem is, Mister Jones, “You’ve been with the professors/ and they all liked your looks./With great lawyers/you discussed lepers and crooks./You’ve been through all of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s books;/you’re very well-read it’s well-known.”

But not well enough. Because the way you are stumbling through the current crisis demonstrates no understanding of its global nature.

“And you say, Oh my God, am I here all alone?”

No. But you’re trying to deal with it as if you were. It’s an international problem and it requires international solutions. Little Englander attitudes are only there to be exploited. As are petit Français.

As Eric Schmidt, the boss of Google advised us all,"I don't think companies should decide what tax policies should be. I think governments should.

"All of us are operating in a very, very longstanding tax regime which was set up for various reasons that don't necessarily make sense to me or anyone else.

But they are the way the global tax regime works."

Go on. Google it. It makes sense to me.

I doubt whether there is anyone reading this blog who has not recognised the song from which I have quoted so liberally. It is Dylan’s birthday today, and Jill and I have booked a table in a half-way decent restaurant where we can raise a glass to Bob as he embarks on his 73rd year. May you climb on every rung. P.S. Today’s listening will consist of … Dylan, but to start, the duet of Dark Eyes with Patti Smith from the Paradise Lost tour.

16 Comments
Daniel
24/5/2013 00:07:04

It's naive. And probably disingenuous. As you say, there is a big clue in the terminology. As you pointed outin your Thatcher piece, there's no morality in the markets. The capitalist system is ruthless and unforgiving. Regulation needs to be equally so.

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Max
4/6/2013 05:22:24

It's an attempt to have it both ways. This government doesn't know which way to turn. And the egregious Osborne slagging off companies is just hysterical, frankly.

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Anders
24/5/2013 01:39:33

It is certainly true that there is an exclusively political sub-class in power. This is as true of Labour as it is of the Tories. No real life experience etc. But I am not sure this is the issue. The issue as you say is that no national government can resist the inexorable hegemony of international capitalism. Withdrawal from Europe, for example, would be the capitalist equivalent of 'socialism in one country'. Doomed to failure. Every problem we have, from climate change to religious fundamentalism, is global.

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Anders
24/5/2013 01:43:48

All our problems are global. From climate change to religious fundamentalism. To attempt to deal with them on a national basis is the equivalent of Stalin's "socialism in one country". Doomed to failure.

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Max
4/6/2013 05:23:51

Interesting parallel. Is Trotsky's permanent revolution also a parallel for the ways in which capitalism re-invents itself? Just a thought.

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CJ
24/5/2013 03:22:07

That was a great tour. And Patti chose Dark Eyes, a seriously under-rated song, from the whole of Dylan's work when offered by Bob a duet of any song. Good choice. By her and you.

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Max
4/6/2013 05:37:01

It was a great tour. And I would have loved to see it. The bootlegs though pretty much capture it.

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Didier
24/5/2013 08:57:55

You have it right about Hollande. He is not a socialiste in any way. He has been part of the ruling class all his career. Never a job before politics.

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Max
4/6/2013 05:40:10

Everywhere. Cameron, Hollande, Obama, Merkel, Putin, the whole of the Chinese leadership. A new sub-class of exclusively careerist politicians. The exception? Italy and Berlusconi!

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Matt
24/5/2013 13:44:26

I get the analogy of Dylan's journalist mr Jones stumbling around in the new and alien hop environment and Cameron stumbling through the new economic world, but it's a little contrived. One point of comparison though is the fact that both, naively but enthusiastically, want to be liked and accepted by the new world. But are mocked and dissed by it.

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Allan
25/5/2013 00:25:14

Agree with Matt but understand the need to introduce Dylan into a blog published on his birthday. Agree wholeheartedly with the parallel he points out: the confusion and need to be liked and admired of Mr Jones. This is where generations of politicians have found themselves, dishing out knighthoods to people like Fred Goodwin in a bizarre attempt to be one of them.

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Max
4/6/2013 05:42:15

But even the President of the United States sometimes must have to stand naked. Or not.

Rebecca
28/5/2013 00:25:29

Heard Schmidt on the radio. "We'll pay what the tax laws say we must pay. It's up to the government to set the rules." Can't argue. An intelligent man trying to thread his way through political posturing.

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Max
4/6/2013 05:43:16

He certainly came over well on the tax issue. On privacy, data-gathering etc, less so.

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Archie
30/5/2013 13:15:27

Things are never what they seem, thank the tooth fairy that these over educated cretins are not really making all the decisions Dref ps didnt ez manage Chelsea

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Max
4/6/2013 05:46:18

Welcome back Erch! Not the important decisions anyway. They are for the 'markets' to decide. And I've lost track of who is managing Chelsea at any given moment. xx

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    Max Smith

    European writer, radical, restaurateur and Red Sox fan. 70-something husband, father, step-father, grandfather and son. Resident in Warwick, England.

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