The author makes one fundamental mistake, through no fault of his own, which is the same mistake that almost all modern economic commentators make when discussing economics: they assume that economic value and monetary value are the same thing.
The authors of the Register article start with a graph (below).
Production Index
The author of the Register article wrote:
This is called the Production Index, and it's a graph of UK manufacturing output since just after the Second World War. It's an index, with 100 defined as the level of production in 2005. As you can see, our production is 2.5 times what it was in the 40s. They always say that back then everyone earned their living making Whippet flanges. So at first glance it seems a lie to say that we're producing less than we used to…
First, and most obviously, it is important to point out that the index does not measure how much we earn, but rather the value of what we earn…
Of course, this is the only thing we should be concerned with: increasing the value of what is produced means that more value is shared among all of us who produce.
No, not actually. It just means more cash in the pockets of shareholders and directors.
He continues:
Additionally, it is also strikingly clear that fewer people are working in manufacturing than in the past, yet production is increasing and there are fewer workers, which is technically known in economics as a “good thing.”
Again, no. First of all, how many fewer people are employed today than in the past? What skills have we lost as a result of the decline in the productive workforce? The author does not discuss these questions.
The sad truth is that UK manufacturing has been devastated, particularly over the last 30 years or so. We used to have a steel industry. We produced our own energy. We used this capacity to produce ships, cars, military equipment, planes, bridges and other products we were proud of. All of that is gone, and to bring out graphs and articles claiming that our collapsed manufacturing is OK because it's actually making more profit is disingenuous at best.
You may ask why this happened. The usual answer is globalization. But globalization is no accident. One of its foundations is the Lima Declaration.
The Lima Declaration
The official name of this treaty is the Lima Declaration and Programme of Action on Industrial Development and Cooperation. It was signed at a conference of the United Nations Industrial Development Organization in Lima, Peru in 1975. It is an international agreement to reduce domestic manufacturing in developed countries and transfer that manufacturing capacity to developing countries.
This treaty sets in place policies that for over 30 years have encouraged corporations to grow into global multinationals, which benefit only these corporations and their international bankers.
The key clause states…
We recognize the urgent need to establish a new international economic order based on fairness, sovereign equality, interdependence and cooperation, in order to transform the current structure of economic relations, as expressed in the Declaration and Programme of Action on the Establishment of a New International Economic Order.
Interdependence is the end of independence
The term interdependence is a neologism coined by the Club of Rome. According to the Club of Rome, we face a series of intertwined global problems, including overpopulation, food shortages, depletion of non-renewable resources, and environmental degradation. The use of irrational exponential-based computer models predicted the complete collapse of society, and possibly the biosphere. According to the Club of Rome, the only solution that can avert a global catastrophe is the development of an organic society.
Though often denied, the concepts of interdependence and independence are clearly mutually exclusive. A nation that must rely on other nations for what it needs must at least acknowledge that its own independence has limits.
Interdependence is totalitarian
One of my favorite people of the 20th century is Bertrand Russell, and those who know me will know how much irony oozes from this sentence.
My favorite book by Russell is The Influence of Science on Society from 1952. This book is essential reading for anyone wanting to understand the agenda we are all witnessing today.
Russell talks a lot about organic society in his book.
The most obvious and inevitable effect of science and technology is to make society more organic, in the sense of increasing the interdependence of its various parts…
Totalitarianism has a theory and a practice. In practice it means that one group takes control of the power structures in some way, especially the military and the police, and uses their advantage to the fullest by regulating everything in such a way that it gives them the greatest control over others. But in theory it is something else. It is the doctrine that the state, the nation, or the community has the capacity to do good that is different from the good of the individual, and does not consist in what the individual thinks or feels. This doctrine was especially put forward by Hegar. He glorified the state and thought that the community should be as organic as possible. He thought that in an organic community, excellence is in the whole. The individual is an organism, and we do not think that there is an individual good in his individual parts. If he has pain in his big toe, it is he who suffers, and not the big toe in particular. Thus, in an organic society, good and evil belong to the whole, not to the parts. This is the theoretical form of totalitarianism…
In fact, when we claim that the state has a good distinct from that of its people, what we really mean is that the good of the government or ruling class is more important than the good of other people. Such a view has no basis in anything other than arbitrary power…
More important than these metaphysical speculations is the question whether a scientific dictatorship of the kind we have been considering can be stable, or whether it is more likely to be stable than a democracy…
I do not believe that dictatorship is a permanent form of scientific society, unless it is developed on a global scale (although this condition is important).
It is interesting to see the pleasing-sounding words like “organic,” “holistic,” “differentiated,” “harmonious,” “interdependent,” “balanced,” and “sustainable” used to sell us holism.
What about manufacturing?
So if the Lima Declaration is about establishing global totalitarianism, what does it say about manufacturing?
Resolution 27 – Developed countries such as the UK should increase imports from developing countries
Resolution 28 – Developing countries are urged to increase their industrial growth rates above the 8 percent recommended at previous UN conferences and to increase exports by 350 percent by the year 2000.
Resolution 35 – Developed countries such as the UK should transfer technology, finance and capital goods to developing countries in order to achieve Resolution 28 above.
What effect does this have?
Earlier I asked how many fewer people are employed in manufacturing now than in the past. In 1995, 16% of UK employment was in manufacturing. By 2007, that number had fallen to 10% – and this was before the current recession. Mind you, most of those once-skilled people are retired, unemployed, or working in meaningless, unproductive service jobs that contribute nothing to the real economy.
So contrary to the Register article, manufacturing is in continuous decline and has been in decline since at least 1975. The same is true for agriculture, fishing, energy production and many other areas of basic economic infrastructure. The country is no longer independent; it is totally interdependent and an insignificant cog in a giant totalitarian wheel.
To suggest that all is well and rosy because there is an illusion of growth in monetary terms is not only delusional but misses the point: if we do not repeal acts of treason like the Lima Declaration, we are finished as a nation.
