Wednesday, December 24, 2008

Britain Binged On Debt

By Abbi Rouse

Reform claims that Britain's economy has become bloated over the past few years due to Brits bingeing on debt and failing to work off the excess.

A new report from the independant think tank reported that it is not just consumer borrowing that has caused the countrys coffers to become corpulent with debt, as the public structural budget deficit has become the fourth highest of all countries in the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. The group states that Britains trade deficit is continuing to burgeon, while public spending programmes are based on out-of-date and over-optimistic forecasts for gross domestic product (GDP) growth. Meanwhile, this tendency to rely on cheap credit cards and cheap loans to support spending habits has produced an economy that is unfit and working inefficiently.

It's also been warned that over the coming years, around 4000 will have to be paid by the average taxpaying family, in an attempt to rebalance the national debt, that's equivalent to 100 billion pounds in tax contributions each year.

Ahead of the pre-Budget report, which will be announced by Alistair Darling on Monday November 24th, Reform has warned that simply injecting more public money into the banking industry will have little lasting effect on the state of the countrys economy. So too, it warned, cutting public expenditure on vital long-term development programmes is equally ill-advised, as it claimed that as recent history has shown, cuts in spending will inevitably lead to increased investment a few years down the line.

The group insisted that there is only one course of action that will relieve the strain of the national debt: "In order to move beyond the obese economy, Britain has to consume less and work more. Households need a sense of direction towards a higher saving, lower tax economy. The short-term objective is the same as the long-term path to economic growth - to increase productivity. This should be the theme of the Pre-Budget Report and of Budget 2009."

In addition, the group called on the chancellor to focus the following key objectives: personal productivity, private sector productivity and public sector reform.

Finally, the group insists that the government must provide support to individuals in an attempt to stop them relying on loans and other types of credit and start spending their own money, as they are vital to economy recovery.

For those who have seen their finances blown out to sea in the recent economic storm, taking out a debt consolidation loan may prove an effective way to get back on a firm footing monetarily. Meanwhile, the number of people who are in need of a debt consolidation loan may grow in the coming months as the independent financial advice site the Motley Fool warned that millions of Britons are unprepared for a recession. - 16036

About the Author: