British gift to America...
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On my desk after Christmas, a clutch of cuttings and letters — including one in verse. Keep writing: we like to hear from you; the editor says that our letters feature on page 35 is full but held-over ones will appear later.
It's the New Year and a tough year: a time for new resolution rather than trite New Year resolutions. So first to a serious item — a cutting sent me from the San Jose Mercury by an Amerian reader. The article is headed: -New British gift to US: a lesson we must learn." It appears that a recent speech by Jim Callaghan has hit home in the States, too. It was the time the Premier declared: "What is the cause of unemployment? Quite simply and unequivocably, it is by paying ourselves more than the value of what we produce
He went on to admit that we used to think we could spend our way out of recession and increase employment by cutting taxes and raising government spending
The American writer calls this a magnificent present to the States: the lesson of horrible experience. "Now, says the article, "with their economy still sliding and their currency an ever-sicker joke, the British have given us a courageous and statesmanlike example of recognising the malady and cause of their failure.
The article contrasts what it calls the low quality of the Presidential debate on the relationship between inflation and unemployment with the blunt words spoken by Mr Callaghan.
It argues that the Americans gave us the worst of their culture; and we gave them the worst of our economics. Will the Americans, it asks, have to see the dollar go the way of the pound before the USA awakens?