Loadsamoney - never mind the bonuses it's the banking system stupid‏

The people who manage our pension fund money are campaigning for our living standards to be cut in order for the government to pay us back the money we lend it! Sounds crazy? On BBC2 Newsnight on Wednesday night a pension fund manager said "Right now, to protect my pensioners, I will probably force the government down the path of greater austerity. But further down the line I know those same pensioners will suffer because of health and social care cuts. But I can't help it." http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/paulmason/2010/01/meet_the_men_who_could_trigger.html

This is madness - 40% of government debt is owed to ourselves (pension funds) - when the government borrows money it borrows it from us - our pension funds buy government bonds (they are called gilts - because they used to be bits of paper with gold around them - hence gilt edged). Do we think the government won't pay us back - NO WE DON'T! We need to tell our trustees and LGPS reps to write on our behalf to Alistair Darling and say we have every confidence in him to pay us, now and in the future.

Much of the poverty in the world, and the squeeze that you are no-doubt feeling on your own income, is due to the design on the banking system used in most countries, which allows 97% of money to be created by profit-making banks, and only 3% of money to be created by the government. Money created by the banks benefits the banks; money created by the government benefits everyone. This might sound difficult to believe at first, but it is 100% accurate.

If we change this system so that money can only be created by the government (acting on behalf of the people), we could:

* clear the national debt

* increase government services with no increase in taxation

* find the money needed to solve the energy crisis

* enjoy higher disposable income, or take more time off from work

* avert the oncoming pensions crisis

* wipe out Third World debt

* completely turn around the economies of poorer or developing countries

We are currently standing at a fork in the road. One road leads to poverty for almost everyone, while the other leads to greater wealth for everyone. Politicians and economists want to take us down the road to poverty, because they don’t know that any other option exists. If we want them to change track, and do everything that is listed above, then we – organised labour – need to show them that the other road does exist.