The clumsy hand of history strikes

If we watched the news when we were little we heard the words “interest rates� and “inflation� and knew that something bad was afoot from the tone of voice and the jagged line in the graph next to Moira Stewart’s head.

But then you went and played football again. Or got drunk on SuperStrongbow. And then better times returned. And since then, we’ve had it easy. You might not have been able to afford a house, but your friends who did made extraordinary amounts of money.

Work, as this column has so often explained, is something you opt into out of a lack of imagination. Not something you cling to, desperately.

Banks would lend you anything, anytime, then write to you every week offering you more.

Politics was an argument over who could take credit for these good times. Take credit for – what was that phrase that sounded a bit hasty? – “an end to boom and bust�.

Only very occasionally did the big clumsy hand of history reach out from the TV and mess your stuff up.
And even then it was a one-off, a swift punch. Well, it seems the big hand is back. I wake to a radio alarm. First thing it says: “Lehman Brothers has gone bankrupt."

Lehman Brothers – as in: I was there when they opened their tower. As in fourth biggest investment bank in America. As in 4,000 Wharfers.

Dang. Cameras by their tower. Cardboard boxes. Endless footage of the Reuters news ticker showing shares down, down, down. I maybe know slightly more than average about the City, which is to say I know next to bugger all. My knowledge is insufficient to allow me to understand this, or to know how bad things are.

The opinion people are giving non-explanation explanations, and basically saying – as far as I can tell – that our only hope is hope.

And suddenly the good times don’t seem to have been so good. You remember that wealth distribution and social mobility are the worst they have been for generations.

Certain towns, and certain people, have been written off utterly with the demise of manufacturing. Until now, some argued that was the price for the shining new economy we had built.

Now commentators are revelling in the sight of sacked bankers. As if all 4,000 of them are monsters, just because some of them are paid a lot. And as if having 4,000 well-paid people out of work doesn’t have some sort of unpleasant effect on house prices, shops, bars, the taxman. And you and me.

This may be the banks reaping what they sow. This may an exposed faultline in market capitalism. What it definitely isn’t, is a good thing.