Jeremy Fox

Local currencies of the kind described here are more revolutionary than may first appear, not least because they amount to a rejection of the most fundamental neoliberal principles – the primacy of the market and the monetisation of human values.

A core principle of neoliberalism is that citizens are to be defined first and foremost as consumers.

We live an age of grievance and disillusionment.

Are high executive and banking pay related to results? Or to social value added? Or does executive compensation simply ratchet upwards, irrespective of either? Jeremy Fox reviews work from the High Pay commission, the New Economics Foundation and Ha-Joon Chang suggesting the answers are “No”, “No” and “Yes”.

The prevailing neo-liberal ideology to which the UK is wedded rests on the idea of completely open borders to trade and capital flows. It is a dog-eat-dog world that places market competition as the prime motif of economic policy-making. Companies are free, even encouraged, to have their products made wherever it is cheapest to do so and to export them into the UK rather than have them manufactured locally.