EoW January 2009

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The International Magazine
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Whenyouhave finishedwith
thismagazineplease recycle it
Happy New Economy?
As we embark on a new year, I wonder how
we’ll be viewing the events of the latter
half of 2008 – the global financial crisis?
One thing is certain. In Autumn 2008 many
governments found they had surprisingly
long arms; long enough to reach deep
into pockets to find billions of pounds,
euros and dollars that the taxpayer had
never suspected was up for grabs. Let’s
hope that this money hasn’t ultimately
been thrown into a lost cause, when it
could have done so much to, say, provide
aid for developing countries, support
research into sustainable energy sources,
or provide investment in infrastructure
and education.
For at the same time as the UK government
was pumping money into the banking
system the vacuum innovator, James
Dyson, lost the comparatively paltry
government funding he’d been promised
to establish the Dyson School of Design
Innovation. This project, jointly-funded
by the government and the James Dyson
Foundation, was to be a school of design
and engineering, providing students with
the opportunity to work on engineering
projects with industry experts.
Most engineers and manufacturers won’t
have been surprised by the discovery that
lending money to make money isn’t a
sound basis for national growth. I know
that, because over the years I’ve heard
so many of them say it. So now is the
opportunity to try something new;
time to support manufacturing which,
incidentally, has been quietly working
through its own crisis in recent years
without attracting much in the way of
national headlines. Innovation, design
and trade should be the way forward, with
banks and the financial sector relegated
to doing what they were always intended
to do – providing the finance and backing
to fund the growth of the manufacturing
sectors.
We’ve been bombarded with economic
concepts over recent months – sub-prime
investment, tier-one capital, subordinated
debt, collateralised debt obligation.
Here’s another we should be considering
– opportunity cost: what could have been
achieved if not for
the chosen course
of action.
Gill Watson