Powering this downward spiral is falling wages: since 2008, real pay in Britain, which takes inflation into account, has dropped by more than 10 per cent. It should come as little surprise, then, that nearly 17 million Brits of working age have less than £100 in personal savings. In the United States it’s a similar story, with 63 per cent of Americans saying they have \$500 or less put aside.
The other pillar of consent for twentieth-century capitalism, of property-ownership as the complement to democracy, is in similar retreat. In Britain, where the Conservative Noel Skelton coined the term ‘property-owning democracy’ in 1923, home-ownership is at its lowest level since 1985 and continues to fall. It’s even worse in the US, though, where a combination of high prices, low wages and little credit means the average American is less likely to own their own home than at any time since 1965 – four years before the Moon landing.
Measuring Inertia
While ordinary people are struggling, measured through use of food banks and food stamps, wages which buy less or unmet expectations regarding home ownership, the abstract vision of the economy pedalled by elites, defined by growth and productivity, is in similar disarray. After all, on output per hour worked, perhaps the most useful measure of economic progress, Britain produced less in 2017 than it did a decade earlier. Such a development is without precedent in modern history.
The Great Disorder
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