who are you?

[Rich]

Is no-one going to admit to chanting it while seated in the Kop on Saturday?

[Redspin]

your derranged comments are getting more bizarre

I'm on anfieldanfield's side on this one. I think I'd prefer a packed stadium and a diverse national and worldwide fanbase to a world where only people from Merseyside go. I speak as a scouser too.

If people from Japan or wherever can get tickets, then clearly tickets are out there to be had. I live down south, so I have to spend ridiculous amounts of time on the phone trying to get tickets, but that's the price we pay for being a football institution and I don't begrudge people from Japan, Norway or Timbuktu getting tickets ahead of me. Good luck to them.

[univofchicago]

Friedman visited Chile in 1975 during the military dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet. Invited by a private foundation, he gave a series of lectures on economics. Several professors from the Chicago School of Economics became advisors to the Chilean government and several Ph.D. graduates from the same university – known as "the Chicago boys" – served in Chilean ministries. Friedman met with Pinochet during his visit to Chile. He had given a lecture advocating monetarist economics to the Catholic University of Chile. Friedman says that the "the emphasis of that talk was that free markets would undermine political centralization and political control."[12] Nevertheless, he was accused of supporting a regime whose policies included torture and the killing of political opponents. A number of protesters demonstrated against Friedman during the 1976 Nobel Prize ceremony.

Nice fella.

Tom, urgh!!!

I promised myself yesterday not to write another post on this thread, but that post of yours HAS be answered. Hope you read this post IN FULL and not just dismiss it from the start.

What happened was that Allende was thrown out in Chile and a new government came in that was headed by Pinochet. For AN ACCIDENTAL REASON, the only economists in Chile who were not tainted with the connection to Allende were a group that had been trained at the University of Chicago or better known as “Chicago Boys”.

When Milton Friedman visited Chile to give a talk at the Catholic University of Chile, he was there as a guest of a private organization and NOT the guest of the government. Furthermore, the University of Chicago already had an arrangement FOR YEARS with the Catholic University of Chile, whereby the Catholic University would send students to Chicago and Chicago would send people down to Chile to reorganize the Catholic University’s economics department.

The talk was titled “The Fragility of Freedom” and the essence of the talk was to explain that freedom was a very fragile thing and that what destroyed it more than anything else was central control; that in order to maintain freedom, you had to have free markets, and that free markets would work best if you had political freedom. It was TOTALLY an anti-totalitarian talk and something that should have UNDERMINED Pinochet. Friedman was absolutely opposed to dictatorship. It wasn’t as though Friedman had selected a group of students from Chile, educated them and ordered them to work for Pinochet. That is a CLASSIC myth and something that was instigated by the communists as explained below:

At that time, the communists were determined to overthrow Pinochet. This was very important to them because they believed that Allende’s regime was going to bring a communist state in through regular political channels and not by a revolution (and Pinochet OVERTHREW the political channels). They were determined to discredit Pinochet and went on a campaign to discredit ANYBODY who had ANYTHING to do with him. And it was through that connection that Friedman was subject to abuse in the sense that there were large demonstrations at the Nobel Prizes – it was a concerted effort by the communists to tar and feather Milton Friedman in their quest to overthrow Pinochet.

The double standard in all the “Friedman advocates dictatorship” or “Friedman advocated the Pinochet regime” nonsense is that Friedman had spent time in Yugoslavia, which was a communist country and in communist China. He gave EXACTLY the same lectures in China and in Yugoslavia arguing for free markets and political freedom yet NOBODY made an objection to what he said there. How come?

It’s ironic that you bring up Chile because it is a fine example of how Chicago theory worked in practice. In the end, Chilean economy did very well, but more important, the central government and the military junta were replaced by a democratic society. So the really important thing about the Chilean business is that free markets did work their way in bringing about a free society.

As a resident in liverpool in the late 70s and 80s I can testify to the devastating effects of monaterist policy. We were the "lab rats" in some ****ed-up thatcherite monetarist wet-dream. As mentioned previously monetarist policy is utopian - like most utopian "experiments" (communism etc.) it has devasting social effects. Just ask Salvador Allende and the other poor ****ers who Pinochet "disapeared" in order to further it in chile.

Monetary Policy: What you are describing there is supply side economics (part of Monetary Policy). As I explained to Disco and others MANY TIMES ALREADY, Milton Friedman’s proposal included the implementation of the NEGATIVE INCOME TAX system, something that Margaret Thatcher failed to do. This system is a crucial part of the proposal to fix the social effects of the policies. So from the “moral and social” viewpoint, Friedman is VERY DIFFERENT from Thatcher. Just bear this in mind.

When you talk about Friedman and Monetary Policy, it is more to do with his idea that stability in the growth of the money supply is crucial to controlling inflation and recessions. And although the relation between the money supply and the economy is still a hugely debated issue, Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan and Bernard Bernanke has gone on record to say that Friedman’s idea was instrumental in guiding the central banks in Europe and United States towards low inflation in the past two decades.

[Redspin]

hey chicago where are you, peopole over here are riping youre hero appart, i want some reaction, i want a war

I'm quite enjoying how this thread is evolving and going this way and that, so I'd like to record my support for Univofchicago (if that's right) and say that I too am a big fan of Milton Friedman. I got A-level economics so I know what I'm talking about - fact!

[Redspin]

They appear less appealing when you've lived through them and the consequences of them though.

Thankfully that nice Mr Blair has picked up the baton from the Tories and appears to be an advocate of free-market economics

[Redspin]

Very good lesson my friend. I understand now your "Chicago" name...School of Chicago, London scool of economics....Fukuyama, Hayek, Friedman and their "End of History", "Third way" etc..

Watch Ken Loach movies and see what Thatcher's policies have done to thousands of genuine and hard workers. A disaster that ruined thousands of families.

For example, The train system in England is the worst in Europe. And its the most expensive I've ever seen. At least 30 years behind France and Switzerland. In 2002 i took the train, the guy who was cheking the tickets told me i was in 1st class and to move to the 2nd class. I was on a ****ing wooden chair! 53£ from Gatwick to B'mouth, the train was 1 hour late, stopped another hour in the middle of nowhere near Portsmouth, then it was cancelled and we had to wait another hour in S'ton for the next train. Benefits for consumer my arse!
Try again mate, Im far from being convinced.

I'm sorry you completely lose the argument mentioning Ken Loach. The man has an axe to grind, makes unwatchable movies and is so stinking rich that he hasn't a clue about the working man.

He came to my school in Liverpool many years ago to look for unknowns to play in another one of his class war diatribes - I think it was about the time he bought his first Bentley. He was a thoroughly dislikeable individual and a compelling advertisement for voting for exactly the opposite of whatever he believed in, whatever it was

[Redspin]

and she started creating a two-tier society where the poor get ****e education/health service and are trapped in ghettoes, while the rich live in luxury and end up needing security teams to keep the poor underclass away from them. Bit like the US.

So what's Blair been doing for the last 9 years to change things?

[Redspin]

I don't think UniofChicago should be attacked for his beliefs in Economoc principle - the things with these kind of policies is that you have to detach any kind of specific social conscience to the exercise.

Obviously, you try telling that to somebody negatively effected by said policy - it wont wash, and nor should it.

In my honest opinion, Capitalism is the root of most of the evil on our green planet - and probably the driver to kill the human race. However, the only other current theory/model that we can work to is Communism (which SHOULD be the solution, if humans weren't human (i.e. the classic basis of Economics - Finite resources yet infinite wants.) but seeing as we are human, and we are incapable as a race not to take more than our fair share, Communism falls over, fails and generally causes a right old pickle for the state.

So, to sum up, we are all ****ed!

I think the fun-loving people of North Korea and Cuba would agree with you

[Redspin]

If you think about it it's obvious : as soon as you introduce shareholders the priority becomes maximising profits, not efficiency.

Counter-argument is having tough regulations : don't make me laugh

In fact companies' prority is maximising share price, not profits.

[univofchicago]

I'm quite enjoying how this thread is evolving and going this way and that, so I'd like to record my support for Univofchicago (if that's right) and say that I too am a big fan of Milton Friedman. I got A-level economics so I know what I'm talking about - fact!

Thanks Redspin,

I just want to remind everyone again that I am defending Milton Friedman NOT Margaret Thatcher. There seems to be a misunderstanding of Friedman's polices, principles and intentions (which is perfectly understandable) - a lot of it because of the negative impact that Thatcher's polices had on Liverpool and other industrial cities. From a moral viewpoint, Friedman's proposal is quite different from Thatcher's and so to accuse Friedman of not considering the social consequences is wrong. Thatcher's polices have been loosely termed as "monetary policy" by the people and the press - and thus the perception that Milton Friedman doesn't give a damn about the poor and working class. As I explained earlier, it's not true.

Some posters attacked Milton Friedman and then someone else asked me for a reaction. That was what initiated my argument. Again, sorry if I pissed people off but that was never my intention. May sound like a load of b*ll, but I always thought of Liverpool as one of the biggest and prosperous cities in the UK. I'm being dead honest. And having studied economics and worked in finance abroad, what I hear is national news and data from the UK not REGIONAL ones. It was about 1998 when I started to follow, albeit very loosely, economics in the UK and it was always on a national level (via Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, CNN). If I had knew about the history of Liverpool city in the first place, I would have kept quiet because I know that had I been affected by Thatcher's polices myself, I would have felt the same way as you guys.

[Bob]

I'm sorry you completely lose the argument mentioning Ken Loach. The man has an axe to grind, makes unwatchable movies and is so stinking rich that he hasn't a clue about the working man.

He came to my school in Liverpool many years ago to look for unknowns to play in another one of his class war diatribes - I think it was about the time he bought his first Bentley. He was a thoroughly dislikeable individual and a compelling advertisement for voting for exactly the opposite of whatever he believed in, whatever it was

Dear God

[enema of the state]

My goodness....

Where should I start? Since you brought up the "Tories" (I'm guessing you mean Thatcher's administration?), I will talk briefly about Thatcher's economic policies and then go back to your friend's fundamental question about whether the policies allowed the elite to exploit the under-privileged.

Without going into too much detail, I will outline the major economic policies that were behind the so called "Thatcherism":

- Commitment to freeing up the market
- More focus on monetary policy to control inflation
- Allow for more public ownership (in shares and assets)
- De-regulation of certain industries to bring more competition and increase efficiency
- Reduce the size of government
- Reduce the power of trade unions

All the above were ideas strongly advocated by Milton Friedman well before the early 80's when there was a wide polarization of opinion. Now, the above ideas are accepted in almost every economics department in the world. If you disagree with the any of the policies above, then you are disagreeing with virtually the entire economics profession. The ideas should be clear to anyone (Econ major or not) who has taken Econ 101.

Let me know if you disagree with any of the above polices, I'll be more than happy to explain it for you.

spoken like a true economist

the economy is just one facet of any society

"thatcherism" incorporated acceptance of some disgraceful social consequences for people in 1970's and 1980's uk that you AS A HUMAN BEING ought to make yourself aware of.

yes, britain had a booming economy during the early 1980's
this was at a price that remains unacceptable to many

british people may not understand what you mean by economics 101. If you want to make your opinion a little more informed - and have a better understanding of liverpool and its people. then you need to educate yourself on modern uk social history.

economics is like the engine of a car - waste of time if your wheels have fallen off

[univofchicago]

"thatcherism" incorporated acceptance of some disgraceful social consequences for people in 1970's and 1980's uk that you AS A HUMAN BEING ought to make yourself aware of.

yes, britain had a booming economy during the early 1980's
this was at a price that remains unacceptable to many

Goodness me, please please please...at least try to read all my posts if you can...

Understand that I am defending Milton Friedman NOT Margaret Thatcher...

Please read my argument for NEGATIVE INCOME TAX systems...

[Mumsafan]

My own thread is boring the living ****e out of me

Well I've got a BSc Hons in Economics and Politics and whilst reading this thread I have lost the will to live.

[disco]

Well I've got a BSc Hons in Economics and Politics and whilst reading this thread I have lost the will to live.

Wow, a woman of many talents