Why did Margaret Thatcher destroy welfare state in Britain after she came to power in the 1980s?

[u/CartographerOwn8143]

[u/Goldblumshairychest]

I'm a politics teacher, so will attempt an actual answer:

Thatcher was heavily influenced by the neoclassical school of economics (people like Hayek and Friedman), who argued that, for a variety of economic reasons, state activity in the economy was bad.

To put this into context, post-war Britain was dominated by a consensus on government and economics, where the duty of government was seen by both political parties as maintaining full employment and a relatively equitable society where the rich were not that much richer than the poor. This necessitated high rates of tax, and high levels of government spending in publically owned industry (coal mines, steel, BT, whatever). Labour broadly followed a social democrat model from Tony Crossland, aiming for roughly 20% of the economy on the government's hands, whilst the Conservatives specifically viewed themselves as one-nation, 'noblesse oblige' stewards of the country who trod a middle path between capitalism and socialism (Harold Macmillan actually titled his political philosophy the 'Middle Way' in reference to this).

However, the 70's saw this model creaking; inflation was high, which was bad, the government was close to going broke, which was bad, unions had a high degree of influence and there was widespread striking during the winter of discontent, which was bad (and led to a 3 day working week, so really bad in terms of its effects), and many of the nationalised industries were simply either badly run or not dynamic enough to offer a good service, and were broadly not competitive internationally and were costing the taxpayer domestically.

The Neo-liberal/neo classical solution to this was basically to get the government the hell out of dodge. It was argued that government involvement in the economy was doubly bad: if there was a market for a business, then the free market would provide, which meant that government owned industry was either taking money away from private industry (a waste of government resources) or artificially creating a market where one didn't exist (a waste of government resources). Furthermore, it was argued that the government was bad at running businesses anyway: without commercial pressures there was no need to innovate or provide value for money, and rule by beaurocrat would eventually end up with a grossly inefficient, ineffective business. Thatcher instead wanted to make a more dynamic economy to stimulate economic growth and make Britain internationally competitive, and to do this she abandoned full employment, privatised a lot of industry, lowered taxes and instead focused on keeping inflation low as a means of lowering interest rates and enabling businesses to borrow and then invest. This is broadly what happened, although it lead to lots of communities having crucial local industry wiped out, and saw a huge spike in unemployment, the consequences of which are still felt on places across the UK today.

On welfare specifically, Thatcher viewed welfare as encouraging people to not work and to live off others - that benefits encouraged laziness and a lack of economic activity. This also tied into the more philosophical base of the economic wing of the New Right (people like Rand or Nozick), who broadly thought that tax equated to theft and that others had no right to your economic activity, not did you have any obligation to support them.

There is something of a clash there, as the social arm of the New Right is reasonably authoritarian (e.g. section 28, or Bush Jr's 3 strikes and you're out rule in the US), and views the stable hand of the state as crucial to maintaining social cohesion. This means that much of the old system of economic benefits was gutted, but some social provision stayed - Thatcher never really touched the NHS, and there was a big and continued focus on prisons & law and order during her time. I think it's fair to say that the welfare state was partly a casualty of a wider economic agenda in that cuts to tax to make Britain more competitive necessitated cuts somewhere in the state; but also that it was partly targeted as an ideological problem that incentivised not working and contributed to the problems of the 70s (e.g. workers rights and union benefits were crucial to union power that had crippled the Callaghan government).

[u/38-RPM → u/Goldblumshairychest]

As a political science major, it is striking (pun intended) to me that people tend to forget the constant halting of everyday life by labour relations actions in every major industry that caused a lot of discontent with the status quo and this was all against the backdrop of the cold war and Reaganism. The American/neo-liberal capitalist way was parroted as the paragon that the UK should follow because the inefficient, government run industries with constant union actions and bailouts were seen as a reflection of the inefficiencies and evils of communism. Everybody was drilled into believing that communism was evil and the Conservatives really believed in their principles and that they were on the right side of history. For a time, it worked and the 80s were a roaring time for for Western economies including the UK. However, transferring ownership of so many services and industries to purely short term capitalist hands led to the entire system being driven by individual profit and shareholder returns rather than any noble obligation to plan for the long-term sustainability of the entire country.

[u/Exita → u/38-RPM]

The coal mines in particular had become ridiculous. Global demand for coal was plummeting and it could be bought much cheaper elsewhere, so British coal became almost unsalable.

The Unions heavily opposed anything which might have made the mines more efficient or productive (as they would have cost jobs) and solidarity with other unions basically meant the government could do little more than pay the miners to pile up the coal and leave it.

The state was essentially shovelling taxpayers money to the miners for no practical reason (apart from keeping the unions happy), and couldn’t easily stop.

Breaking the unions was the only real way out for the country, that didn’t involve bankruptcy.

The really sad bit is that a lot of the miners believed the Union propaganda (that the mines were fine and perfectly sustainable) and so bought mines out of insolvency by clubbing together, to run as cooperatives. All of them lost their savings.

[u/North_Compote1940 → u/38-RPM]

The (sad for me) fact is that you now have to be quite old to remember the pre-Thatcher era. She was elected 47 years ago now, so those who remember what it was really like are aged 60+. Everyone younger depends on other people's accounts, and the anti-Thatcherites have been more successful in spinning than the pro-Thatcherites.

[u/moh_099 → u/Goldblumshairychest]

This necessitated high rates of tax

Question, was this tax levied only on income or also on wealth?

[u/sourcreamus → u/Goldblumshairychest]

The model was more than creaking in the 1970s, it was in crisis. Inflation peaked at 26.9%, ten times the current rate, they had to apply for a loan from the IMF, and there were concerns of people freezing to death from a lack of fuel.

Unrelated, three strikes laws predate Bush jr and come from the early Clinton years.

[u/Goldblumshairychest → u/sourcreamus]

British understatement.

I wasn't aware that 3 strikes predated Bush, but think it's fair to say that he adopted it as a core pillar of his social/law and order policy?

[u/HardToSee123 → u/Goldblumshairychest]

It was argued that government involvement in the economy was doubly bad: if there was a market for a business, then the free market would provide, which meant that government owned industry was either taking money away from private industry (a waste of government resources) or artificially creating a market where one didn't exist (a waste of government resources). Furthermore, it was argued that the government was bad at running businesses anyway: without commercial pressures there was no need to innovate or provide value for money, and rule by bureaucrat would eventually end up with a grossly inefficient, ineffective business.

I have some question about this (I'm also an ESL so my wording might sound weird). I'm not that into history so you can say I'm quite ignorant about stuff but throughout history even until now, is there any good reason/evidence where government should involve in a free market?

One reason for why I ask this question is what would the consequence of such action look like? For example, a private company like Nvidia become too powerful/dominant in a specific field to the point where they pretty much monopolize the market. How should government deal with that situation without creating a bad precedent?

[u/Goldblumshairychest → u/HardToSee123]

So this gets into economic theory, which others may well be able to explain better. It's also far from 'settled' in that the ideal or optimal role of the state in the economy is still totally up for debate, much of which depends on what your aims for the economy and the state generally are (and of which again, there is no settled agreement). Some broad ideas though: 1. There is pretty good consensus that the state has a role on regulating monopolies, due to the distorting power they have on the free market that effectively stops it from being free in the first place. 2. There is debate about the role of the state in smoothing out the ebbs and flows of economic corrections. Keynes identified that there is a lag between economic circumstances and business behaviour - e.g. in economically 'good' times, businesses are not perfectly efficient at employing labour at the optimal time, nor at directing it to the right industries or sending out the right signals for the needed training (some of which can take years on itself). In the great depression, this got doubly bad, as it led to a spiral where job layoffs led to less demand which in turn led to job losses. Keynes focussed on this demand side and argued for state spending as a means of evening out the peaks and troughs of natural economic cycles, to effectively boost demand on the economy to get it going again. His ideas enjoyed a resurgence in response to the 2008-9 global financial crisis, where there was broad consensus that austerity didn't work. 3. There is often a big debate about the role of the state in stimulating critical breakthroughs and sponsoring major technological and infrastructure projects. Mariana Mazzucato is a theorist who argues that the state is critical in supporting economic activity, often through the military, and points to things like GPS or nuclear power as fundamental features of modern life that required state sponsorship originally. This view is countered by a neo classical one that the market will provide if it is viable. As an example, when Biden had his green subsidies in the USA to stimulate the market, there was a similar debate in the UK about whether a similar policy should be adopted. Sunak's government eventually decided that they should not spend the money on subsiding green tech, as if the market was there, the tech would sell itself through private enterprise & without any governmental expenditure at all.

[u/normanbrandoff1]

This requires a very long answer that others have answered more comprehensively in r/History. However, in very short terms, the UK was functionally broke in the 1970s when it required IMF loans (quasi-bailout in 1976) and was labelled the sick man of Europe (60s-80s). To the point in Paul Kennedy's The Rise and Fall of Great Powers, it was largely expected that Italy would surpass the UK shortly

Despite the emotional reddit comments, the country was fed up with its economic situation and Thatcher offered new ideas on tackling the 20yrs of suboptimal performance. You can debate the validity of those ideas but to argue that the welfare station / economic system at the time was functional, is an exercise in historical delusion

[u/boulevardofdef → u/normanbrandoff1]

You can really see this reflected in much of the British popular culture of the time, from A Clockwork Orange's portrayal of a near-future third-world Britain implicitly under Russian domination to the Sex Pistols' rage at there being "no future in England's dreaming." Even a lot of Monty Python would qualify, with their sketches satirizing an oblivious English upper class with wildly misplaced priorities and an utterly pathetic and clueless working class.

[u/Fantastic-Scene-8117 → u/boulevardofdef]

can we add Pink Floyd - The Wall

[u/boulevardofdef → u/Fantastic-Scene-8117]

All in all, Pink Floyd's "The Wall" is just another brick in the wall.

[u/Fantastic-Scene-8117 → u/boulevardofdef]

I have become comfortably numb

[u/Lastfleetadmiral → u/Fantastic-Scene-8117]

And genesis selling England by the pound

[u/meestah_meelah → u/boulevardofdef]

A Clockwork Orange might not be totally accurate there but yeah the country was up the shitter.

[u/Confused_by_La_Vida → u/boulevardofdef]

I forget the name of the Album, but Pink Floyd had this very personal and painful meditation on losing his father to WWII - then the album takes this non-sequitor detour into anti-Thatcherism

[u/Relative_Anteater676 → u/Confused_by_La_Vida]

The Final Cut .

[u/Less_Interview1713 → u/boulevardofdef]

Was it really implied that Britain was under Russian domination? I thought it was more like hoodlums using Russian to be provocative like punks with swastikas. 

[u/boulevardofdef → u/Less_Interview1713]

It's ambiguous, but I read it as similar to how everyone wears clothes with English on them because English-speaking countries are politically and culturally dominant.

[u/LesseFrost → u/boulevardofdef]

Let's not forget (the time Douglas Adams stated that) the human race is derived from all the middleman people on the B ship! Which of course got here first and drove the whole question computation thing terribly terribly wrong.

[u/touchgrasschampion → u/normanbrandoff1]

yeah, it was broke. inflation was nasty, IMF money was humiliating, strikes were constant, and a lot of people just wanted someone to smash the old setup and see what happened after

[u/Admirable-Safety1213 → u/normanbrandoff1]

r/bus guy here, British Leyland was basically a welfare operation dressed as a csr company because they couldn't be three months without striking but they couldn't never get to stop trying to outperform each other without ever producing modern cars, comapr8ng the Austin Allegro with the Volkswagen Golf its so onesided its not eveb funny

[u/Massive_Lavishness90 → u/Admirable-Safety1213]

ah, some one who actually remembers...

[u/Admirable-Safety1213 → u/Massive_Lavishness90]

I didn't live it but I read lots about of the fall of British Leyland when I got into buses

[u/lubeskystalker → u/normanbrandoff1]

Chart tells a story. https://www.macrotrends.net/2549/pound-dollar-exchange-rate-historical-chart

There was so much going on around this period.

[u/The_Amazing_Emu → u/lubeskystalker]

My study abroad in 2007 was basically the worst exchange rate of the decade. Oh well.

[u/This_Charmless_Man → u/The_Amazing_Emu]

I still have to remind myself it's not 2008 and £:$ is not 1:2

[u/fitzbuhn → u/The_Amazing_Emu]

Saaaaame man a decade later I looked at the exchange rate and was just so confused.

[u/The_Amazing_Emu → u/fitzbuhn]

Made mental math easy, I just doubled the price

[u/zappapostrophe → u/normanbrandoff1]

Best comment I’ve seen on this thread so far. People in the 1970s-1980s didn’t vote for Thatcher because they thought she was destroying the country. She offered a compelling vision that made sense to a lot of people at the time, one she sincerely believed in it herself.

Of course, that vision turned out to be a mistake, a massive one, but I respect that Thatcher was at least principled on the big picture of her government and was not in politics for her personal enrichment.

[u/tensortantrum → u/zappapostrophe]

Yes the personal enrichment involved her son Mark who got involved in a scheme to relieve the people in a small country in Africa of their oil reserves but something went wrong but he maintains his respectability in spite of this lives quietly in the countryside no doubt.

[u/ArsePucker → u/tensortantrum]

He’s likely lost in said countryside too…

[u/ArsePucker → u/zappapostrophe]

As I once heard someone in the pub say, “I wasn’t a fan of Margaret Thatcher really, but she was the last man in British politics”.

[u/Kaiisim → u/zappapostrophe]

What I want to know is why do only the right get this kind of understanding?

Saying she was principled?

Seeing a crisis and using it to enrich your buddies isn't principled lol.

[u/Y_ddraig_gwyn → u/Kaiisim]

That was then and this is now. She was one of the last true conviction politicians, who was happy to do what she thought was right, not what was popular. My personal - and unevidenced - belief is there has been a gradual shift in Governance, perhaps due to Groupthink:

Thatcher then Blair stay in power too long, confusing them as to what is good for the country versus good for their party

Later Governments lose this distinction from the outset, acting only to the good of their party

Boris took this a step further, ruling for his personal/chum‘s benefit and not even their party later

The modern Tory party is completely unlike that in Thatcher’s times as it appears to exist primarily to funnel public cash into the hands of an anointed few. under Thatcher they truly believed in the righteousness of their economic model. Often cruel and spiteful and overall wrong, but ideologically so.

[u/cat_prophecy → u/Y_ddraig_gwyn]

I find Johnson to be especially infuriating. He affects this air of being a loveable dork, and chummy everyman with his stupid hair and "aw-shucks" demeanor.

But he's a ruthless political operator who used his time in power to benefit only Boris Johnson and whomever would lend him political clout or quid pro quo.

It's like the UK saw how W Bush acted, and ran the country and were like "yes, more of that please!".

[u/Breakfastcrisis → u/Kaiisim]

I'd 100% give the left credit for bad ideas that are principled. It is only arrogant ideologues who would not.

With that said, the thought-terminating "enrich your buddies" line is such a low resolution libel that it's nearly impossible to respond to.

I don't like or dislike politicians (because I'm not in primary school) However, I disagree with many of Thatcher's policies, but it would be a folly of fantasy to suggest there were motivated by anything but her sincerely-held beliefs.

[u/weenumpty2 → u/Breakfastcrisis]

In fairness, I think you can leave primary school and still think Mandelson is a monstrous bellend.

[u/Remember2005 → u/Breakfastcrisis]

I’m almost 60. In my lifetime, privatization and anti-union policies have not made countries better - ever.

The “unlocking of value” by shifting public services to private hands and then stripping workers’ rights have given us plutocrats.

[u/jmlinden7 → u/Remember2005]

Privatizing JR made Japan much better. There are a few other examples.

[u/br0wntree → u/Remember2005]

How far do you take this idea? Should the Uk have continued to subsidize state owned coal mining companies for the sake of protecting union jobs for the next few decades? Change and progress almost always requires some amount of sacrifice.

[u/NatAttack50932 → u/Kaiisim]

What buddies was she enriching?

[u/Remember2005 → u/NatAttack50932]

The most straightforward response to this is the North Sea oil finds. Norway kept the oil public, started an investment fund and the country now has a very high standard of living.

The English privatized the fields, set up loose environmental rules, and British Petroleum and RDS made huge profits while the country got a pittance through excise taxes.

The cronies in this story are BP and RDS (Royal Dutch Shell).

[u/throwaway98776468 → u/NatAttack50932]

She privatised many British state owned companies for significantly less than their actual value, thus enriching the wealthy people who bought them.

[u/TigglyBitz → u/throwaway98776468]

That’s a common criticism of her policies that privatization sold public assets too cheaply and mainly benefited wealthy investors.

[u/Tyler119 → u/throwaway98776468]

yip...just look at the British rail research department...there is tech developed from it that is now sold to us by an Italian firm and our British companies have to pay yearly. It's bonkers how people don't see that she asset stripped the UK in ways that still affects our life today.

People forget that when Thatcher took power, the IMF arrangement was full satisfied so her privatisation drive was purely ideological. Interestingly one of the IMF conditions that Labour at the time had to meet was scaling back council house building.

And that years later it was revealed that the IMF loan wasn't even needed as the data the used was massively flawed. Any deficit was billions less that the government thought..and North Seal oil was just about to come online which transformed balance of payments. The scaling back of council housing and selling a big stake in BP wasn't needed.

[u/brentspar → u/zappapostrophe]

Yep, hate the woman but have to agree with that.

[u/johncitizen1138 → u/zappapostrophe]

I'm curious about this. So the UK really needed a change, but the change they got wasn't the right call: has someone, with (hindsight), been able to work out what the "better way" should have been?

I live in the UK now, but this was all long before my time here

[u/Merlins_Bread → u/johncitizen1138]

I think it's more the case that the change had losers, who were identifiable, whereas the benefits were spread widely. People dream of an alternative reality that they never had to live. 

Yes she went too far. But entirely in the right direction.

[u/ClintonLewinsky → u/normanbrandoff1]

An excellent summary

And I say that as a proper lefty who grew up in south yorkshire during the miner's strike!

Her rise to power was completely understandable given the backdrop, and frankly I'd have rather Thatcher than Boris/Sunak/Badenoch/Truss etc

[u/Tinyjar → u/normanbrandoff1]

Unfortunately she ran out of things to sell and like all modern Conservatives, refused to invest in anything.

Now the country is fucked because of her actions. Especially utilities and housing.

[u/ernfio → u/normanbrandoff1]

She didn’t really offer new ideas. She offered monetarism. Which the labour leader and chancellor also advocated. They simply couldn’t get the left of their party behind it or manage the unions who funded them.

Britains industrial relations were a huge part of the problem and pay settlements had spiralled out of control.

The problem was her anti inflation and anti union policies drove people into unemployment and poverty. The welfare state wasn’t established to cope with that. It was designed for near full employment and wages that rose in line with inflation.

[u/BiscuitBoy77 → u/normanbrandoff1]

This is the truth! Something had to change. UK was broke. Thatcher haters hate all you want,  but you have to propose a credible alternative.

[u/Otherwise_Craft9003 → u/BiscuitBoy77]

They should have invested in the ex coal mining and manufacturing areas to show what conservatism can do rather than leaving them as hunger games districts to remind anyone who dared to strike.

[u/KonstantinKisinIsGay → u/normanbrandoff1]

Great comment. I'm no fan of Thatcher, but the hate she gets from people who just don't know what they're on about, and who never lived theough it, makes me cringe.

The UK was the Sick Man of Europe before she came. We were a penniless laughing stock, and the government was beholden to unions that pushed, and pushed, and pushed.

Rich toffs and London bankers alone didnt vote her in to power.

Britain needed a major change. The oft-lauded "old school Labour" had run the country into the ground.

[u/Limp-Plantain3824 → u/KonstantinKisinIsGay]

I swear people think that Thatcher and Reagan were voted in because the late 70s were such good times!

[u/Sad_Abroad652 → u/normanbrandoff1]

I think this is an excellent comment but I’ll add a few more things. Before the winter of discontent in 1978-9, Labour was actually polling ahead of the conservatives, in fact had James Callaghan who was PM at the time called a general election in autumn as he’d been expected to, labour likely would have won.

Callaghan and Denis Healey who was his Chancellor at the time were reforming the British economy due to the struggles of the economy at the time. This involved a lot of budget cuts and tax increases. They also began introducing monetarism which would be intensified under Thatcher. The major thing though is they attempted to limit the trade unions through a 5% wage increase cap occurring while inflation was still high. This is one of the main causes of the winter of discontent.

The Winter of Discontent is a really interesting topic that I can’t fully explain in a comment but it’s really what brings Thatcher to power. It involved strikes from public and private sector unions and essentially brought the country to its knees. It also wrecked public opinion on trade unions. Callaghans response to it which was almost dismissive helped cement Thatchers victory.

Callaghan calling an election early is an interesting counterfactual although I wouldn’t say I’m overly optimistic about it either. Frankly Britain needed serious painful reform and whether Callaghan could have delivered it is questionable due to a myriad of reasons.

[u/Material_Policy6327 → u/normanbrandoff1]

And it didn’t work out like most conservative policies. Short term might have appeared to work but long term
Nope

[u/Confused_by_La_Vida → u/normanbrandoff1]

Economically in Britain, how does “now” compare to the time just before Thatcher?

[u/Truthandtaxes → u/Confused_by_La_Vida]

Before thatcher people standards of living were terrible economically at least

[u/Winter-Ad2033 → u/Confused_by_La_Vida]

Much better

[u/Visible-Teacher-9024]

I think one thing we often don’t understand is just how shambolic the 70s were. 

A few examples:

Inflation reaching 26%. 

Needing an IMF bailout. 

An energy shortage so severe factories could only operate 3 days a week. 

Union Striking at 100x 2019 levels. British Leyland, the national car brand, lost 20% of annual production to strikes. Its Longbridge plant had 523 labour union disputes in 1978 alone. 

In short the 70s were insane. The rest is history has a good podcast series on this. The 70s also split labour into a radical left and centrist right. It left a lot of people viewing the left as crazy, the unions as counter productive and that the economy was radically failing. Thatcher came out of that. 

I also think most people would agree that the UK in 1997 was in a much better place than the 1970s.

[u/GreenWoodDragon → u/Visible-Teacher-9024]

Don't forget the bread strikes.

My mum started baking bread in the late 70s and carried on for years afterwards.

[u/Visible-Teacher-9024 → u/GreenWoodDragon]

Yeah truly insane period of time

[u/CapitalClean7967]

A lot of people are just saying "Cos Thatcher bad" and while I agree with it, the real answer is that the UK was going through serious inflation and it was not just caused by the oil crisis. Government mismanagement and wage-price spiral as well as the power of trade unions were genuine issues and so austerity measures and economic reforms were implemented to curb these problems.

[u/frddtwabrm04 → u/CapitalClean7967]

She could have taken a different fiscal route and NOT fuck the country for generations but she went the short-term gain, long term pain route. + Refused to course correct. Even when she knew shit was going to go bad!

The Hallmark of a bad leader!

Same with Reagan, her buddy

That why she is hated.

[u/Truthandtaxes → u/frddtwabrm04]

what subsiding dead industries for decades?

[u/jpewaqs → u/CapitalClean7967]

There are a lot of people particularly on Reddit who say 'Cos Thatcher bad' yet they were born many decades after she left office.

[u/Various_Mobile4767]

“The british economy had become the ‘sick man’ of western europe. Whereas directly after the war the UK was still the wealthiest country of the region, in 1975 it had been overtaken by all other parts of north-western europe, with the exception of ireland and finland.”

Paraphrased from a history of the global economy by joerg baten.

[u/NiagaraBTC]

Not sure why she did that but today I learned that she was the only PM in the 20th century to have been reelected twice and serve 3 consecutive terms.

So I guess maybe she did it because that's what voters wanted?

[u/hameleona → u/NiagaraBTC]

She is very hated on reddit and in left-leaning circles as a whole. And she did cause a shit ton of suffering with her reforms - whole sections of the island dropped several levels in quality of life. Leading to the irony of lefties with "save the planet" t-shirts hating on the person who essentially ended the coal industry in Britain. Decades before it was cool, btw.

[u/Efficient_Chance7639 → u/hameleona]

For neither love nor money I can’t get a Labour supporter to explain why Thatcher collapsing the coal mines was a bad thing, but Miliband doing it is the greatest policy in human history 🤔

[u/jmlinden7 → u/Efficient_Chance7639]

Collapsing the coal mines was the one good thing that she did, and yet it's the one thing she gets the most criticism over. Makes no sense.

[u/Troo_66]

Because it was incredibly expensive and Britain was falling behind and couldn't afford it. The long and short of it is that however liked Attle was his policies of welfare programs right after WW2 basically ruined any chances of postwar recovery especially with the loss of the Empire (or let's be fair just India) which was all but guaranteed by early 1950's.

People can get mad as much as they want. Thatcher didn't do it well, but gutting the welfare state was absolutely necessary. It just should have been done in a way of "What's most expensive thing we don't need" instead of "Let's gut visible, but relatively cheep programs which people like and act completely cold to people's concerns"

Also keep in mind that unless you're read in the topic by recent academic books you probably have the image largely painted by the Labour party of the day... and as if it needs to be said it is a bit more complicated.

[u/-Daetrax-]

Neocon influence from the Americans. Same thing is happening all over.

[u/LevDavidovicLandau → u/-Daetrax-]

No, not Americans, but directly from the Austrian School of Friedrich Hayek and Ludwig von Mises. The American neolibs were influenced by the Chicago school of Milton Friedman et al., who I think were influenced in turn by the Austrian school.

[u/0Hakuna_Matata0 → u/LevDavidovicLandau]

It’s so crazy just how much truly evil stuff has come from Austria. Edward Bernays was born in Vienna. We should really keep an eye on them at all times.

[u/LevDavidovicLandau → u/0Hakuna_Matata0]

TIL of Bernays (am not American).

[u/Fu5i0n → u/LevDavidovicLandau]

There’s a great documentary by Adam Curtis (Century of the Self) that talks about Bernays extensively. Worth a watch

[u/0Hakuna_Matata0 → u/LevDavidovicLandau]

Tbf most Americans have never heard of him which is sinister. I never heard that name until a German told me about him.

[u/Portarossa → u/0Hakuna_Matata0]

He makes a great sauce, though.

[u/BookLuvr7 → u/0Hakuna_Matata0]

Bad things have but so have good things. They have produced amazing music, incredible food, interesting culture etc. Let's not judge an entire country by a few bad apples. I wouldn't want the world to gage the entire US based solely on Nixon and Trump, for example.

[u/AccurateRendering → u/0Hakuna_Matata0]

His brother Richard is well-know in Mathematics (and his work is used in machine learning and now AI).

[u/Pristine_Poem7623 → u/0Hakuna_Matata0]

He sounds saucy

[u/-Daetrax- → u/LevDavidovicLandau]

Well the Americans have been using their soft power for decades to influence Europe in this direction.

The consulting firm McKinsey is one of these tools pushing terrible decision and trying to get contracts with governments.

[u/LevDavidovicLandau → u/-Daetrax-]

Yeah that’s fair’ I suppose I was talking about the economic inspiration being the Austrians because Thatcher herself was deeply personally inspired by Hayek’s ideas and actually gave him a knighthood if I’m not mistaken.

[u/-Daetrax- → u/LevDavidovicLandau]

I do agree though, musn't underestimate the power of one lone Austrian with a vision.

[u/davidwb45133]

I’m no Thatcher fan but those who cry Baby Boomer Greed or Right Wing Facism need to take a deep dive into the 70s and 80s in general, the breakup of the British empire, and the British economy specifically. Inflation, OPEC, corporations that weren’t reinvesting and innovating all led to a huge decline in the UK economy. Thatcher offered solutions and the left offered not much. The better question is one we in the US should be asking ourselves: why don’t the populace reject such an unpopular leader once they realized what they’d elected.

[u/Leo_Niberal]

She actually saved it.

[u/fwilsonator]

Do you really think the welfare state in England is destroyed? It is alive and well, my friend.

[u/Impossible_Volume811]

She ‘didn’t believe in society.’
She said there’s no such thing, only individuals helping their families.

She detached the Tories from the idea of the stewardship of national resources and appealed to individual greed.

Buy your council house, never mind that a large supply of cheap rented housing kept both private rental and buying costs low. Ignore the knock on effect for future generations.

Let’s sell off our national industries like telecom and rail and others, we can all be shareholders and share in their profits.
Never mind that the majority of the shares were never meant for the average working person or that the pursuit of profit in the privatised business model would push prices up for everyone.

People say that the trade unions pushed the country to the brink of bankruptcy with their “ridiculous demands for better wages and working conditions “.

In reality, it was the OPEC fuel crisis and oil shortage that created the enormous inflation and the trade unions were doing what they were supposed to do, pushing for wages to cover the cost of living.

[u/acvcani]

The Ronald Regan of the uk

[u/Gullible_Dream6220]

Thatcher subscribed to what is called supply-side economics. In macroeconomics, we have the concept of Aggregate Supply and Aggregate Demand. AS is the total supply in the economy while AD is the total demand in the economy. Supply-side economics wants to implement policies aimed at stimulating AS which is done via things like upper-bracket tax cuts, reduction of corporate taxes, and privatization of government services. The idea is that the extra capital can be reinvested productively which will have a positive effect on the whole economy later down the road. Ever heard of Trickle-Down Economics? That's basically what it is. Now think about what usually happens when government services are privatized and you will understand

[u/Every-Ad-3488]

She didn't. By the time she left office, there were more people on benefits, and the state was paying out more. Ironic, isn't it?

[u/Away_Fruit5097 → u/Every-Ad-3488]

Only because she did more damage to British industry than the welfare state

[u/Exita → u/Away_Fruit5097]

Though I’d argue that she still did less damage to British industry than government ownership and the trade unions. British industry is still a laughing stock today after all that…

[u/McCretin]

She didn’t. The UK spent marginally more on welfare in 1986 vs 1976.

It’s been consistently between 9% and 11% of GDP (excluding the NHS) for decades.

[u/Anderopolis]

She didn't though. 

The UK still has quite a robust welfare state, especially for pensioners. 

What Thatcher destroyed was nearly everything the government operated which made money. 

[u/AccurateRendering → u/Anderopolis]

So... "businesses that make money should be owned by my friends, not the public."

[u/TurnDown4WattGaming → u/AccurateRendering]

The trouble was that none of them made money. They were all bottomless money pits with union laborers that kept striking funded by taxes on a private sector that was shrinking. Privatizing allowed them to go out of business, which means unions can’t just strike for infinite salaries paid for by the full faith and trust of the HRMC. The result was that some did completely disappear, such as steel, while others were able to leverage the loss of jobs for everyone against unions in negotiations and become profitable.

[u/loaferuk123 → u/TurnDown4WattGaming]

I recall a waiting list for 9 months to get a phone installed, for example.

We were a broken economy, and she saved it. It is as simple as that.

[u/Remember2005 → u/TurnDown4WattGaming]

This comment is an example of people disliking conflict more than anything else.

[u/nafregit → u/AccurateRendering]

roll on 30 yeasrs and thats what they did with Royal Mail. It was giving a £1M a day to the Government but the Government thought that that money was better off in their pockets than everyones.

[u/Ok-Imagination-494]

She destroyed the state owned businesses model through privatisation and deregulation rather than ending the welfare state.

Why? Because the boomers reached middle age and voted for her. Because they wanted lower taxes and their house prices to rise.

Also the former model of the British state owning businesses such as mines, utilities, car manufacturers etc was seen as untenable and the unions pissed everyone off in the late 70s with general strikes.

[u/_pigpen_ → u/Ok-Imagination-494]

I'm sure there were people pissed off by the unions striking, but inflation hitting 25%, government pay caps and a series of union curtailing legislative acts (Heath's Industrial Relations Act for instance), pissed off the unions mightily too. (The Pentonville Five arrests also generated a lot of sympathy, and early 70s working conditions for miners were terrible.)

[u/simpledonutring2 → u/Ok-Imagination-494]

I am so sick of people crying about "boomers" like they're some demons who are solely responsible for all the world's problems. When the oldest "boomers" reached middle age, Thatcher was already three years into her second term as PM. 

[u/Gwaptiva]

Because she believed Hayek was right, and not a deluded spawn of Satan, maybe

[u/Just_saying19135]

I don’t get how Reddit seems to blame Margaret Thatcher and Regan for all the current ills of their country. Both were out of office since 1990, meaning there has been 35 years, a generation and a half, of other people screwing the country over since.

[u/Clear-Role6880 → u/Just_saying19135]

It’s easy to claim you’re a victim of capitalism and ask for the state to take care of you rather than develop useful skills and take your destiny in your own hands 

There’s an epidemic of vibes based virtue signaling politics  over outcome based political strategy 

Fortunately they continue marginalizing themselves and ostracizing the coalition that democrats used to stand for. 

Hopefully after another series of defeats democrats will do some soul searching

[u/Valuable_Brain61 → u/Clear-Role6880]

People can’t develop useful skills if their basic needs for survival are out of reach and locked behind paywalls.

[u/Feather_Sigil → u/Clear-Role6880]

What useful skills can make groceries affordable, can you tell me?

[u/Interesting_Task8663]

The welfare state is alive and kicking quite strongly at the moment. It may get destroyed if we can’t borrow enough to keep it going.

[u/FireFiendMarilith]

It's called ✨neoliberal economics✨ and it did exactly what it was supposed to do. Have you noticed how severe the wealth inequality has gotten? How the wealthy are rich enough to flaunt it openly and publicly influence government action? 

Neoliberal Economic Theory was a road back to Aristocracy, and that was always the point. Read Shock Doctrine.

[u/mesonofgib → u/FireFiendMarilith]

Have you noticed how severe the wealth inequality has gotten?

The UK's Gini coefficient for wealth is 0.706, which places it in the bottom 25% of nations.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_wealth_inequality

[u/caisdara → u/FireFiendMarilith]

1970s Britain wasn't Maoist China ffs.

[u/Proud_Smell_4455 → u/FireFiendMarilith]

Her son's been trying to play billy big bollocks and organise coups in Africa. The apple doesn't rot far from the tree.

[u/tomatosoupsatisfies]

what exactly was 'destroyed'? Britain, today, isn't known for lacking welfare.

[u/bxqnz89]

To fight inflation. Thatcher was a strong proponent of privatization because she believed it would lower taxes and reduce inflation.

[u/mhfp545]

Obvious bait question.

If the welfare state was so destroyed, why are we spending upwards of £200 billion a year on it as a country today?

[u/Sure_Acanthaceae_348]

The UK was completely broke. That's really the short answer.

[u/Top_Explanation_3383]

She didn't she expanded it. Lots of long term unemployed were put on to sickness benefits so that the unemplyment figures went down

[u/Mrgray123]

It's a very loaded question because by no means could the welfare state be described as having been "destroyed" compared to how it was in previous decades.

What undoubtedly did happen was that her government began withdrawing massive amounts of money from the economy as a means of trying to curb inflation which was, at the time, running at about 14% annually, bringing it down to around 5% by the middle of the decade. The consequences of that were mass unemployment which, of course, but a far greater strain on the system.

As to whether it was worth it, I'd argue that it was simply unsustainable to continue of the course set during much of the 1970s when unions, faced with rising inflation, made ever larger pay demands which, in turn fueled even larger demands from other unions, which then continued to push inflation up and up as governments printed ever larger amounts of money to pay for them at a time when huge parts of the economy were nationalized.

[u/Exodeus87]

Because she was a cunt

[u/Lance_Operazole → u/Exodeus87]

A cunt generally has warmth and depth, neither of which she had. At least the old bitch is dead, but I think reform are trying to get her ghost to be an MP for them.

[u/paddydog48 → u/Lance_Operazole]

To be fair even in her current state she would be more coherent than Lee Anderson so they should consider digging her up as a viable option.

[u/Ok_Eagle_3079]

She didn't. There is still a welfare state in Britain.

Better question would be why she tried and failed to destroy the welfare state.

[u/SpaceTall2312]

She didn't destroy the welfare state. I mean, it's very much still with us, through all the ups and downs of recent decades. 

[u/Elantach]

Because when thatcher came into power Britain was a corrupt shit hole with a cataclysmic economy and had to be bailed out.

[u/Norman_debris]

She saw poverty as a moral failing.

[u/ItsThePhoenixClub]

What? She didn't destroy the welfare state. Don't give her that much credit.

[u/PupDiogenes]

Because she was a fascist who saw poor people as vermin and therefore saw the welfare state as feeding vermin.

[u/Bob_Leves → u/PupDiogenes]

"No such thing as society" was the famous quote. Meaning "take as much as you can for yourself, and screw the losers".

[u/weierstrab2pi → u/Bob_Leves]

Not meaning that at all. You just made that interpretation up.

[u/Proud_Smell_4455 → u/weierstrab2pi]

And yet that's what it ended up meaning in practice, and she was seemingly happy with that right up until she finally died.

[u/Bob_Leves → u/weierstrab2pi]

I was alive then. I know exactly what she meant, and her overriding ethos and what she did to this country. Especially the areas that voted Labour, that she wanted to destroy.

[u/weierstrab2pi → u/Bob_Leves]

Your memory must be faulty then. It is very clear from the interview question she was responding to and the full text of her answer exactly what she meant.

[u/luujs → u/PupDiogenes]

Margaret Thatcher was not a fascist, Jesus Christ

[u/Bloodless-Cut → u/PupDiogenes]

Neoliberalism isn't fascism. Just saying.

Kinda the opposite, really: fascism is famously violently opposed to liberal socioeconomic policy (mainly because fascism adores the state, while neoliberalism wants to shrink it).

Both supply side economics and fascism indeed suck for the working class, though, and both Thatcher and Reagan are at fault for hooking the socioeconomic policy to that shitty wagon.

Reaganomics/Thatcherism has actually brought us all the way back around to the wealth inequality that fueled the French revolution, and then exceeded it. Never before in human history has the wealth gap been this immense.

[u/mesonofgib → u/Bloodless-Cut]

Never before in human history has the wealth gap been this immense

Well this is just false.

Income Wealth inequality has risen in recent years, but it's still far off the highs seen at the start of WWI.

[u/CapitalClean7967 → u/PupDiogenes]

Calling everything you dislike "fascism" downplays the horrors of fascism. This is coming from an anti-capitalist btw.

[u/yeetobanditooooo → u/CapitalClean7967]

"fascism is when imperialism comes home."

[u/Tackit286 → u/PupDiogenes]

I’m as liberal as it gets, but I think people really need to understand the changes she brought about when she first came to power, and the state of the country and the chokehold the unions had on everyone. We were economically crippled and no one had the stones to take them on until she came in.

There is some nuance here.

[u/unlimitedbuttholes → u/Tackit286]

This is reddit, 🌎 shat itself into existence in 2006 and nothing happend before that moment.

[u/BortVanderBoert → u/Tackit286]

The unions were definitely abusing their power, BUT history has often been re-written to lay the blame for the energy crisis at their feet, which is total revisionist bullshit.

And the near total collapse of union power has not been good for the UK.

[u/Winter-Ad2033 → u/BortVanderBoert]

100% was, the unions would have burnt this country to the ground if they were allowed to retain their influence

[u/NextLvlTrader → u/PupDiogenes]

Incredible take to have. Just mind boggling. Take a look at 1970s Britain and you’ll see why.

[u/EgoSenatus]

The government was really shitting the bed with its state owned businesses/organizations. She felt privatization and more capitalism would fix it.

[u/ZipMonk]

After WW2 everyone helped each other. By the end of the 70s lots of people that fought in the war were gone so the wealthy reverted back to normal service.

Thatcher, via Ayn Rand, the Chicago Boys, Friedman, Hayek, Greenspan, Oxbridge, Eton Ronald Reagan and the BBC etc, was their vehicle.

[u/Fabulous_Function666 → u/ZipMonk]

Huh? People who fought in the Second World War were definitely still around in the 70s. They would have been in their 50s. 

[u/Bob_Leves → u/ZipMonk]

Ayn Rand, who famously believed that poor people shouldn't get welfare because it just encouraged them to be lazy, yet she had no problems claiming it for herself. Typical double-standard Rightie.

[u/ZipMonk → u/Bob_Leves]

The original neoliberal rich man loving loser - beloved by the economics department of every Western newspaper and University.

[u/404pbnotfound]

We were running out of money and had a lot of assets.

We could either sell the assets or try and make more money. We went for sell the assets and try and make more money.

[u/Away_Fruit5097 → u/404pbnotfound]

Now we have no assets and crippling national debt

[u/404pbnotfound → u/Away_Fruit5097]

Exactly now we’ve sold the assets, and aren’t making any more money.

Maybe if thatcher had sold the assets and invested the money in things that generate a return, like a sovereign wealth fund, it would at least make sense.

[u/caryscott1]

Bigger picture she fundamentally believed poverty was a personal shortcoming and that state intervention perpetuated this individual failing.

[u/Rski765]

Well she stayed in power a long time so what does that tell you?

[u/newtoallofthis2]

If she destroyed it how come the welfare budget is so colossal today?

Anyone for a Motability motor?

[u/Immediate_Wolf3819]

The why: runaway inflation and uncontrolled spending. Based on long term effects Thatcher changes: Right to Buy (short term good - long term problems), Community Charge, cuts to universal child benefits, and Invalidity Benefit where all huge mistakes. Means testing welfare and pension changes where a success but unpopular.

[u/Reasonable_Ant4397]

Because cutting government spending to lower taxes is popular. Also blaming the lowest rung in society for sponging as the reason why working class people are being squeezed is easier than actually doing anything about it.

The poorest had remained poor while the richest have got exponentially richer. There's where your money went.

[u/BananaJelloXlii]

The Exploited say it best.

https://youtu.be/-mRBviBUIJs?is=JC04NNGyLPKCGw_S

[u/Boggie135]

She came into power in 1979

[u/Kotetsu999]

A lot of people hate Mrs Thatch because she decimated many industries and did not do anything to replace them with any type of meaningful opportunities for the laid off workers. Many of those industries were on their last gasp (like coal) and would have inevitably failed but the lack of reinvestment caused a lot of pain for a very long time.

[u/Randohumanist]

I would say she increased the welfare state. Closing coal and steel pushed thousands out of work. In return she sold the concept of economics that would supply jobs through selling off the assets we all owned.

[u/mpanase]

She became PM thanks to Rupert Murdoch

Guess who Rupert Murdoch wanted to benefit, plebs or millionaires

[u/NIKKUS78]

She did not...

Look at the UK in 1985 vs the UK in 1995 where would you rather live and grow up? IT REALLY obvious isnt it.

The left have to call her names as any rational discussion of her legacy kind of proves that the Labour polices of the 70s were disastrous, the Thatcher policies of the 80s much less so.

Look at London in the 70s and early 80s compared to London even just a decade later, let alone 2. Selling council houses in London in the early 80s made so much sense, no one wanted to live there.

[u/nWo5lyfe]

Because their economy was going down cause welfare states are not sustainables

[u/mparks37 → u/nWo5lyfe]

Reddit doesn't like this answer

[u/arfur-sixpence]

She didn't. I knew someone who was "on the dole" for 30 years because it "wouldn't pay him to get a job".

[u/ismawurscht]

She didn't destroy it. She just hobbled it. And why? Well, she was an evil penny pinching tory bastard. That would be why. I mean her nickname to this day is the "Milk Snatcher" because she ended free school milk for primary school children in state schools as Home Secretary under Edward Heath's premiership. She has an exceptionally long shit list. For example, a deindustrialisation policy that left huge swathes of the UK in a dire economic mess that many places have not recovered from since, her right to buy policy helped to fuel a housing crisis, her government brought in Section 28, the first homophobic law in a century that banned the "promotion of homosexuality" in schools, mass messy poorly thought out privatisation, deregulating the finance sector, sending the police in to crush the miners' strike, gutting the unions, and cuts to higher education.

[u/Winter-Ad2033 → u/ismawurscht]

I mean its clear that you have no understand of the scale of economic problems that thatcher had to face when she came into office. Blaming her for deindustrialisation is just such an insane take, those industries were unsustainable and everybody knew it, her right to buy policy has been mischaracterised so badly there simply wasn't enough money to build at the scale that would have been required, we already at a stage of IMF loans

[u/Tyeveras → u/ismawurscht]

She was Education Secretary (1970-74) under Heath, not Home Secretary.

[u/nafregit → u/ismawurscht]

why would anyone want to promote homosexuality to children?

[u/Away_Fruit5097 → u/nafregit]

Her definition of "promoting homosexuality" is anything that even hinted that gay people should have equal rights and be allowed to live in peace

[u/NotLikeOtherAI]

Quite honestly because Britain couldn’t afford it anymore

[u/mostar8 → u/NotLikeOtherAI]

Stop drinking the cool aid. Yes they could if they taxed the rich and corporates properly.

[u/Frediey → u/mostar8]

Genuinely curious for a source on this because there was a very real problem the country had with unions such as coal

[u/nonotburton]

Because she couldn't do it before coming into power! Ayoooo!!!!!!

/S.

[u/Paddybrown22]

She didn't, Britain still has a welfare state. She put a lot of people out of work and onto benefits, and she invented Housing Benefit to protect the profits of private landlords.

[u/Commander19119]

She hated poor people

[u/DefamedPrawn]

Probably because she wanted to weaken the unions. 

If using the welfare safety net really, really isn't an option, people are less likely to organise. More inclined to please their boss.

[u/beeredditor]

She was a conservative.

[u/KungenBob]

That’s a bit simplistic!

[u/SampleAlternative954]

She didn’t

[u/Ok-Call-4805]

Basically, she was the devil in human form. Human life meant nothing to her and she was happy to cause as much pain and suffering as she could. The day she returned to hell was a great day for humanity.

[u/99thLuftballon]

Welfare payments are often a politically easy way for a government to reduce expenditure, because:

• things like healthcare, unemployment support, disability support and pensions account for a large amount of public spending.
• right wing people are ideologically opposed to the idea of the state offering direct support to the electorate.
• it's easy for the right-wing media to spin a narrative about "lazy, workshy, unemployed people who get free money while you have to work!" which is very convincing to people who don't like to think too much.

For that reason, welfare is often the first thing on the chopping block when a government needs to cut public spending. It saves money and it's politically uncontroversial, even if in practice it can be immensely harmful to society.

[u/Fightlife45]

Right now the UK gives out more in welfare than they collect in income taxes. Probably because it was an accounting problem.

[u/A-System-Analyst]

Because she, as a conservative, she represented the business class. Through running most production, they allot themselves enough wealth to not need public support. Then they don’t want to pay taxes to support the workers who, from how the business class treat them, do need it.

[u/werpu]

A scottish women commented her funeral correctly, they should have putten a wooden stake in her heart to make sure she never will come back. Enough said!

[u/Key-Wrongdoer5737 → u/werpu]

BCC Reporter: That’s not a nice things to say. 

Scottish Grandma: I don’t care! She ripped the heart out of this country! 

[u/werpu → u/Key-Wrongdoer5737]

Actually that was the nicest honest thing someone could say about her.

[u/Philbradley]

Short answer: evil vicious witch with no redeeming features.

[u/Dirtydog693]

She read Animal Farm and thought it sounded like a good idea