Why we should take Corbynomics seriously

A state-led investment programme offers a way to steer British economy away from private speculative activity to long-term sustainable growth investment

Fiscal austerity has become such a staple of conventional wisdom in the UK that anyone in public life who challenges it is written off as a dangerous leftist. Jeremy Corbyn, the current favourite to become the next leader of Britain's Labour party, is the latest victim of this chorus of disparagement. Some of his positions are untenable, but his remarks on economic policy are not foolish and they deserve proper scrutiny.

Corbyn has proposed two alternatives to the UK's current policy of austerity: a national investment bank, to be capitalised by cancelling private-sector tax relief and subsidies; and what he calls "people's quantitative easing" - in a nutshell, an infrastructure programme that the government finances by borrowing money from the Bank of England.

Related: Jeremy Corbyn is right to blame the banks, not Labour, for the financial crisis