The Peace Party Candidate for Guildford at the December, 2019 General Election wrote to his local paper after seeing the results of its ‘Great Big Lockdown Survey’ published on May 15, 2020.

The question reading, “Are you willing to accept a tax rise (to help the economy recover)?” perpetuates the back-to-front view of the economy promoted by most “main-stream” politicians.  “The Modern Money Theory lens”, wrote John Morris, “makes it clear for me that, for a sovereign currency-issuing nation like the UK, taxes pay for nothing.”

“Money for services like the NHS and social security and for special purposes is simply spent into existence, on the instruction of the Government of the day. Extra spending produces greater employment.”

“Taxes, of course, are necessary to remove money from the system once it has done its work – to prevent inflation and for citizens to demonstrate recognition that the Government is working for the ‘common good’.”

John suggested that “The question might have been better worded, ‘Should the Government spend more on helping the economy recover once the COVID-19 outbreak is over?'”

“There could have been a subsidiary question to help the Financial Impact analysis at the end of the Survey: ‘Should the Government be spending more to maintain household incomes during the COVID-19 outbreak?’ with the follow-on enquiry, ‘Might this be best done by the introduction of a Universal Basic Income – for all?'”