I think I’ll be skipping that article. Because that quote alone seems deeply myopic in a way that just angers me. Certainly not everyone benefits from market level increases in this shit, particularly property value increases. But noone benefits when the the economy crashes. Just as an example lets take the very real, very direct effects of the Pound falling. The pound lost around 30% of its value in something like 12 hours. The vote happened on Thursday, and when you woke up Friday your savings, and your paycheck were 30% smaller than when you went to bed. If when you went to bed on Thursday a gallon of milk cost the equivalent of $5, then when you woke up the next morning that gallon of milk cost the equivalent of $6.50. In 12 hours. I don’t care what level of society you live at (or that that’s a bit of a simplification) that’s bad for you. The strength of the Pound isn’t just an abstract used for trading, it represents the real purchasing power of the currency the people of the UK are paid with and live by. There are some narrow metrics by which a weak Pound can be beneficial (it attracts tourism for one, something that’s negated by all the jingoism), but they don’t likely offset the associated negatives. And the further down it goes the larger that disparity. Those stocks that are tumbling? Those companies are already, according to reports, laying people off or planning to. Including in the US.
Its all well and good to wax poetic about the benefits that might be seen, or progressive changes that might be made. But arguing that the economic downturn that’s already starting is beneficial simple because the poor are slightly less directly hurt by it is cruel and naive. How many of the economically not well off did better during the great recession simply because Wall Street got hit hard? I was one of those people without savings, who did not benefit from an inflated housing market, and could not take advantage of the market. I lost my job and my home because of that shit. And endless think pieces and studies have been written about how those at the lower margins of society, and the young, were increasingly forced into low paid, low benefit, zero advancement, service jobs.
And as an added problem we heard very similar things in the US after 08. Especially in NY and other cities. The recession was going to lower property values, the damage would be bad but as an upside rents would finally go down. The yearly increases would stop! The city would become more livable for the working! It never happened. Rising rents slowed for a time, but NYC and many other places have only become more expensive to live in over time.
In short you can get some frosting on this shit sandwich. That doesn’t make it a good move. That doesn’t mean that there will not be large negative effects. Negative effects that disproportionately effect the working class and the poor (including the very people who voted for this). “Large parts of the country have been haemorrhaging jobs for
years.” That doesn’t stop because of Brexit, if anything all parts of the country are now at risk of haemorrhaging jobs. And the wealthy who do benefit from all that? Who have taken vast hits in their trading portfolios? They’re still billionaires. The middle and impoverished classes have a much, much short fall to the point where they’re ruined.
Which is to say nothing of the fact that the UK has imposed this situation on another nation. A nation that did not get a say, and now has a minimum of control over how it is effected. The close economic ties Ireland has with the UK likely mean a huge economic downturn there. After the UK (yes the UK! bastions of self determination in the face of EU bureaucracy), Germany and the IMF strangled recovery there by forcing severe austerity measures after 08. The IMF has apologized. The UK has voted to tank their economy a 2nd time.
If hopes and wishes were loaves and fishes…
