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Comment by flakeoil | Hacker News Reader

The thing is that wether the ruling party is right or left there are limits to what they can do based on the real world we live in. For example there is a limit to how much they can lower or increase the tax. There is a limit to how much they can save on one thing and invest in another.

Often when a new party takes power, no big real changes are seen as it is not so easy to implement considering the real world. They have to go down some kind of middle path.

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Disagree. There are effective strategies for creating more sustainable economies and societies. Affordable housing, education, universal healthcare will make us all happier and healthier.

We know how to fix lots of problems, and money is orthogonal to the issue.

Sentences like "They have to go down..." are really a symptom of a static "there is no alternative" view.

> Affordable housing, education, universal healthcare will make us all happier and healthier.

Everyone would like that, but it is easier said than done.

> We know how to fix lots of problems, and money is orthogonal to the issue.

Great that you have the answer, so how do we fix it?

>Affordable housing, education, universal healthcare will make us all happier and healthier.

The past ~100yr of state policy has made a lot of economic winners out of people in these industries by putting it's thumb on the scale in their favor.

Any reversion to a "natural market state" or perhaps beyond, where the government weighs in to the advantage of those who do not make money on housing or healthcare would necessarily make loser out of all the people who right now benefit from the government having its thumb on the scale where it is currently positioned and they will fight tooth or nail to prevent this.

Let's start by taxing the ultra-rich.

Its harder to implement change than to promise it, of course.

However, historically it made a lot more difference which party was elected.

In the UK in the 80s you knew that if you voted Labour things would bet nationalised, and if you voted Conservative things would get privatised. Since the centrist consensus (e.g. Blair and Cameron) emerged it makes a lot less difference.

That, IMO, is evidence that what has changed is not that the two parties are constrained from pursuing very different policies, but that they no longer wish to.

any ideas why they might not wish to?

I think they have adopted a common ideology. The people in the parties have become more similar over the years, as have the voters they appeal too.

A few decades ago a very high proportion of Labour politicians were former trade union leaders, for example. Conservative voters tended to be more rural and more affluent.

Now a very high proportion are professional politicians who have never really done anything else. They are all people who have done well through the status quo and do not want to change anything.

> Now a very high proportion are professional politicians who have never really done anything else. They are all people who have done well through the status quo and do not want to change anything.

I really dislike that this is a thing. Politics should not be a profession. That being said, the obvious way of fixing this (term limits) would just end up giving more power to the civil service bureaucracies, which has problems.

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