So, what was austerity all about then?

[Doucas]

The point of austerity was to address that rather dramatic and unsustainable rise and had we not done so our debt and debt to GDP ratio would undoubtedly be higher. I guess the debate is whether that matters or whether it does but austerity still went too far.

Complete rubbish, we had the slowest recovery because of austerity. The economy is not a household budget, in order to grow it you need to invest in it, if you make cuts like our current government did well you see why we've performed so badly over the past decade.

[JamesWales]

Complete rubbish, we had the slowest recovery because of austerity. The economy is not a household budget, in order to grow it you need to invest in it, if you make cuts like our current government did well you see why we've performed so badly over the past decade.

Well it's not rubbish is it - that is the reason why we (and everywhere else) had austerity
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10162176

You may find I agree with you in terms of the success or otherwise of it, but then we don't know what would have happened if we had done nothing do we.

[Wales-Bales]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10162176
You may find I agree with you in terms of the success or otherwise of it, but then we don't know what would have happened if we had done nothing do we.

Technically speaking the western nations have been bankrupt since 2008, and have been printing money like crazy in an attempt to keep things ticking over. We are now at the problem/solution stage which you aren't really supposed to be aware of.