Worst Family Life in Western Europe

Guardian: Unhappy families: UK is third worst in Europe for home life

The unhappy family life, as defined by the Gaurdian article article is down to:

1. reduction in Wages
2. Availability of quality housing
3. too much Debt

All of these problems lie in the availability of loose credit to fuel a speculative housing boom:

1. Wages (and the return on capital) are suppressed as more money from capital and labour is used to pay rent (or debt based purchase - which is the same thing) Many jobs and businesses become uneconomic in this country due to the huge rents charged to business owners and workers to operate in an economically productive manner. Money supply diminishes due to debt contraction forming a nasty vicious circle of reduced productivity and poor return on capital, wage decreases, underemployment and unemployment are the results.

2. The availability of housing is suppressed, as housing and earmarked land is taken out of circulation for speculative purposes and there is a growing pressure from the financial incentive for people to act in a way to suppress new house building. BTL nick all the properties, second homes etc.

3. More people, whether genuine or speculators, take out higher levels of debt to access land and housing for their basic needs and personal and business debt goes up and up, innovation is suppressed as people and business compete to max out their debt for a competitive advantage to buy up property or build a business.

This classic cycle has happened time and time again over hundreds of years. The human misery it causes has been witnessed, today of course, in the west, we only see its effects as social problems and poverty (as in this article) but in past times and the third world people are watching their children die in front of them because of it.

I know that last sentence is melodramatic but it is unfortunately real, and it is the basis where I get my moral indignation of speculation in land and natural monopolies and is at the heart of the problems of the two families in the article.

The relative problems of families in Europe, which this story leads on, demonstrates the point at which economic rent consumes the wages of the typical families in the UK compared to our western Europe Counterparts. The problems of Bulgaria and Romania are more structural and are not a good comparison.

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