It’s a lie promoted by the right that state help saps people of their drive | Torsten Bell

There is no sign that furlough drove people away from the labour market, and research on Roosevelt's New Deal found that big government bound the country together

Liz Truss is back in the news, but a small state is out of fashion - or at least with the punters. The new British social attitudes survey finds that seven in 10 of us think it's definitely government's job to control prices, up from three in 10 in 2006. Only 30% wanted public spending increased in 2009; now that's 55%.

This has libertarians turning in their Tufton Street graves. But they should relax. Partly that's because the surge in support for big government shouldn't be a surprise and may be temporary. The survey was carried out in autumn 2022, when people faced unpayable energy bills without government support. And it followed a pandemic posing health and economic challenges individuals couldn't hope to address alone.

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