What does it have to do with the state?

Ofsted has ruled that looking after your friend's children for a "reward" is illegal.

I realise that there is a big media scare, all of the time, about paedophiles and the like, but is it really any business of the government to tell parents whether they can pay for their friends to babysit their children?

It's all built on trust - as is the market - that one person's friend will not harm their child, and that both sides will fulfill their sides of the deal (A babysits B's child, so B babysits A's child later in the week) otherwise they'd lose the benefit of a friend babysitting their child (or even lose a friend). It's about what's best for both sides - and indeed what's best for the child.

Mothers could work part-time without this Ofsted judgement to cater for their child better, their child could socialise (in a way) with the friend's child, and not to mention the increased income tax (and VAT) returns for the government.

Not to mention, what problem is this solution a response to? Has someone's friend abused another child? Not that I've heard of. And also a decision made by an unelected quango, not Parliament or even the courts.

Why markets cannot be perfect, but government is worse still

It's ever so simple - humans aren't perfect. Since markets involve human transactions, they cannot be perfect.

However, that's no reason for government to intervene, for us to cry "market failure" etc etc. It is not a failure of the market, it is a failure of humans to transmit information properly. Government is even worse at transmitting information, since it doesn't rely on its own money (though yes there is the issue of democratic accountability) and tends to go with what looks nice rather than what's right.

Financial crashes, housing bubbles, etc are caused by either government and central banks having too loose monetary policy (then tightening them too quickly, circa 2007) or simply by human expectations being wrong (dotcom). And generally humans realise and adjust quicker, resulting in the market adjusting quickly.

Markets adjust. They supply more of a product when it's needed (although yes, they may misinterpret information beforehand, but that's just humans). Governments don't do it as well. They might, but they don't always notice.

Markets aren't perfect. We should accept that, but realise that government cannot do a better job, since it's a human creation rather than human consequence.

Lord Sugar

Alan Sugar is the sort of person we need in the Lords - real world, business experience. However I can't understand why any right-minded person would take up a position in Gordon Brown's government.

The "market failure" mantra

The WJEC seems to like this "market failure" stuff. In fact, I had to do a whole question on their specimen paper about carbon emissions and relate it back to economics. And I resisted the urge to spell it out, simple as simple does, that market failure was utter garbage.

Why are airline passengers not paying the "full cost of their flight" at present, one of the questions asks. They obviously want a generic "it's market failure because it doesn't take into account the external cost of pollution" answer. But that's just the start. To what extent might increasing taxes on air travel reduce carbon emissions from air travel asks the next - that's hardly economics for starters, and my answer if given free rein would be that individuals should not be forced to cough up to pay some fake scientists for dodgy theory.

In fact, on the final question asking if pollution permits were the best way to reduce CO2, I wrote, within the answer, "Since it the theory is questionable the government should not get involved", obviously in a more Orwellian-taught-to-the-test way.

I had an hour's worth of questions on that.

But the point is that we get all this "market failure" stuff, generally from lefties, who say that the market has failed to allocate resources efficiently. Says who? Those who use the market, who are willing to choose the intersection of supply and demand, certainly find it efficient - that's equilibrium for you. But who says that pollution is a failure of the market? Who says that we should distort markets to implement some crazy theory? Generally those on the authoritarian left who want the government to gain more power, to implement more legislation, etc.

Why should I be forced, by a government, to pay more because they think that we're making the world warm up? The answer's simple - I shouldn't.

What is market failure? There's no such thing. It assumes markets are perfect, and they aren't. The only way a market can "fail" is when government makes it.

John Major says it how it is

In an article for the Telegraph, John Major sets out the differences between his government and Brown's government.

It's striking because of the utter truth - in the 80s and 90s the Tories built up a strong economy, especially on the supply-side, and got inflation under control; they did put unpopular policies in place and lost the election in 1997 because of it.

Both are/were weak leaders not totally in control of their party, and that's probably the only similarity (and both were Europhiles, which brought down Major's government).

No soundbites, just real politics.

Counting out public support

I signed the petition for Gordon to resign the other day, which is nearly on 25,000 signatures as I speak. Contrast that to the one asking him to stay, of which I counted 4 or 5 real signatures and 40 joke ones.

As far as polls go, this is pretty damning. Forget 19% leads, this is in 99.9% territory.

The Budget and fuel prices

Since fuel prices have started going up (and have gone up at least 10p from where they were lowest), are the government going to abandon the 2p fuel tax rise?

Obviously not since the government just wants more of our money, but it would be the sensible thing to do, unless they want more hauliers going out of business, and higher supermarket prices, etc etc.

I suppose their excuse will be it will pull us out of deflation. But weren't they printing money for that?

New Labour are probably as confused as I am.