Expand the gig economy or deliver worthwhile jobs with viable pay packets?

Expanding Britain’s manufacturing base would deliver worthwhile jobs and viable pay packets for those who are precariously surviving in the gig economy.  

Torsten Bell (right), the chief executive of the Resolution Foundation, an independent think-tank, has written an article extolling Britain’s ‘broad-based services economy’, which includes musicians and those working in information and communications technology and marketing:

“No one celebrates it, but the UK is the second largest exporter of services in the world. And our service specialism does not lie behind our recent underperformance: on average, services-led economies are richer than manufacturing ones”.

The foundation’s aim of improving the living standards of those on low-to-middle incomes is at odds with Bell’s list of peripheral services which cater for wants, not needs

The service sector does not directly feed, clothe and transport us, manufacture the goods we need, care for the sick, repair our gas, water and electricity services or insulate/heat/cool our homes.  Yet those essential services are carried out by the target beneficiaries of the Resolution Foundation.

The onlooker would expect this foundation to be focussing on the pay levels and conditions of work of ‘those on low-to-middle incomes’ – instead of directing them towards inessential occupations.

Barrington Carpenter is worried that Bell seems to rule out the wider development of the manufacturing sector largely “outsourced” to China and Asia. Carpenter recommends that entrepreneurs prepared to set up small factories, assisted by tax breaks and financial support to recruit and train a new labour force, opening up technical apprenticeships for young people rather than sending all to college or university.

Most important of all – but ignored in this exchange – are the opportunities for a manufacturing renaissance provided by implementing the Green New Deal’s programme.

Scottish Greens are calling for a Scottish Green New Deal that uses every lever available to the Scottish Government to deliver massive reductions in our emissions and refocus our economy so that it works for people and planet. The transition to a zero-carbon economy is a major opportunity to re-energise manufacturing in Scotland, creating thousands of well-paid, lasting and unionised jobs. This paper by Patrick Harvie MSP puts forward a series of policy proposals to ensure Scotland takes this takes this opportunity

This will build a sustainable society based on a green manufacturing foundation. 

 

 

 

 

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