Isn’t there any solidarity required with the unemployed (whom I called “the victim”), specifically when labour costs are rising because of economic growth?

I know there’s no single left dogma about this. But over here it is not uncommon to refer to solidarity when adressing this issue.

And ofcourse it doesn’t define, but as I said the policy determines left or right, if only in the practical sense that left and right political parties have different policies for this.

So “solidarity with the victim” defines whether someone is left or right? I always thought it might have something to do with principles, ideas or policy positions. Good to know that it’s really just a matter of defining who the victim is and looking to see who is on which side.

Actually, that would be horrible to know. My bad. Good thing it isn’t true.

A nation or community that wants to promote industrial expansion has many ways of using policy and public funds to support economic development. For instance, any investment in physical and educational infrastructure could support industrial development. Governments can also make direct and indirect investments in R&D to increase their competitiveness in key markets.

The quality and availability of basic public services is important as well. Crime and corruption can affect the environment for economic development and I have heard that Toyota located a new manufacturing facility in Canada rather than in the US in part because they didn’t have to worry about health care issues there.

Governments can and do offer tax incentives to companies to locate within their community. If you check the 10K filings for any large US corporation and calculate their corporate tax rate you will probably discover that it is significantly less than the sum of the federal and state rates because states will offer corporations lower rates to locate there.

Of course there are things governments do to encourage economic growth that can have a negative impact on quality of life like lax environmental regualtions, but a government that has the community’s best interests in mind will has to balance those priorities.

children or weblogs?

Wot, you mean the recent decade of relative prosperity in Oz wasn’t all John Howard’s doing after all??

All the things you agree the government ought to have done is presumably what is meant by “the govt ought to have created jobs in Meath”. Those things would presumably (and sensibly) have effected more regionally balanced growth and therefore more jobs (proportionately anyway) in Meath and less in Dublin.

By the way, the election is supposed to be 2007 not 2006. Though who knows what Bertie thinks about anything…

I would relax, too, about the “competitiveness challenge.” See Paul Krugman’s debunking of “national competitiveness” (the key articles are collected in Pop Internationalism).

I have no idea what this means.

I also, by the way, don’t see why leftism necessarily corresponds to valuing Meathian jobs especially highly. The real acid test for an MBA changing your politics is what happens when you go get a high-paying post-MBA job and start paying taxes at the top marginal rate.

And “not an economist” is a qualification, Belle, not a disclaimer.

Looks like it.

Straight thinking and talking makes a good living for an MBA, but does the straight thinking deliver jobs to the people in Meath? If so, you’re creating an artificial divide between you and them, if not, you’re becoming a cynic.

We’re simply victims of our own success.

Who’s we? The solidarity with the victim here is what determines left or right.

If the county looses jobs because of the success of the rest of the country, they’d be justified counting on the county getting support from the country.