The Guardian view on the economy: invest for growth | Editorial
On the day that former Royal Bank of Scotland boss Fred Goodwin escaped explaining in court how he crashed the business and lost billions of pounds during the 2008 financial crash, it is timely to consider Britain's post-election economic fortunes. It is a future still defined by the banking crash that Fred "the Shred" Goodwin was so much a part of, and by the aftershocks that still weigh the government down with debt. In particular, the blow to confidence deterred businesses from making the kinds of investments needed to raise productivity and lift average wages. Britain's not a strong and stable economy, but a fundamentally weak and enfeebled one, brought low by a banking industry that lent hundreds of billions more than it should have to people it barely knew.
It is not for the want of profits that businesses have shied away from shopping for the latest ideas or buying the latest kit. Official figures show corporate profits last year were back to the peak achieved in 2008. In the last quarter, the number of companies convinced their profit forecasts were on target or likely to exceed expectations was at a three-year high. Yet in the three months before Christmas, business investment actually fell 0.9% and was flat overall during the previous year.
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