Government hopes sufficiently early warnings will transform future fiscal pain into warm nostalgia involving grandparents, school holidays and vaguely remembered Treasury consultations
LONDON - Downing Street has unveiled a pioneering five-year programme designed to announce future tax increases so far in advance that citizens will eventually remember them with the hazy affection normally reserved for childhood summers.
"Remember when they first mentioned the social-care levy?"
"Was that before Sophie started secondary school?"
"I think so. We still had the blue sofa."
"Lovely times."
Pitch-Rolling at Its Most Sophisticated: Changing Your Relationship With Time
This is pitch-rolling at its most sophisticated.
The unpopular policy does not change.
Your relationship with time does.
Andy Burnham's long-term reforms are deliberately being discussed years before implementation. The National Care Service is intended for the next parliament, while pension triple-lock changes have been proposed from April 2030.
Why Four Years Is a Magnificent Period in Politics
Four years is a magnificent period in politics.
It is long enough for outrage to lose battery power.
Imagine a tax announcement delivered tomorrow.
People immediately calculate.
They complain.
They phone radio programmes.
They know where their payslip is.
Dangerous.
Now announce something for 2030.
The average voter responds, "We'll see."
Those may be the two most profitable words in government.
"We'll See": How Early Announcements Drain Taxpayer Fury
"We'll see" allows policymakers to continue designing.
It allows ministers to speak of momentum.
It allows newspapers to move onto something else.
And it allows the taxpayer's initial fury to become a distant emotional artefact.
By implementation day, the government can say, "This has been extensively discussed."
Correct.
Rain is also extensively discussed in Britain.
That does not mean anyone voted for Thursday.
Inflation, the £9 Sandwich and the Psychology of Gradual Price Rises
The psychological genius resembles inflation.
A sudden 20 percent price increase causes fury.
A smaller rise repeated over several years eventually creates a £9 sandwich that everybody describes as "a bit steep."
Humans adapt.
Governments have noticed. Behavioural scientists call the underlying trick the shifting baseline, and the government even employs its own Behavioural Insights Team to study it.
The Directorate of Advanced Nostalgia and Labrador-Based Fiscal Communications
The satirical Cabinet Office has therefore established a Directorate of Advanced Nostalgia.
Its job is to ensure every unpopular measure is associated with pleasant memories before implementation.
A tax announced during Christmas receives bonus points.
A pension reform unveiled beside autumn leaves scores well with older demographics.
Anything explained while a Labrador is present becomes almost impossible to repeal.
Government communications has finally conquered behavioural economics.
Early Debate on Major Reforms Is Healthy, if Consultation Can Still Say No
There is, of course, a serious democratic advantage to early debate.
Major reforms should not be smuggled into law overnight. Voters should know what parties intend to do. Long consultation can expose flaws and improve legislation.
But that requires consultation to retain the possibility of "no."
Otherwise consultation becomes theatre.
Government asks, "What do you think?"
Public says, "We dislike it."
Government replies, "Thank you. We have recorded your engagement."
That is not consent.
That is customer-service hold music with constitutional consequences.
Persuasion Versus Acclimatisation: Will Familiarity Mean Approval by 2030?
Burnham's gamble is that Britain will accept difficult trade-offs if politicians spend enough time explaining them.
He may be correct.
Social care reform has repeatedly collapsed because governments avoided confronting the cost.
If voters knowingly endorse higher taxation in exchange for a clearly defined service, that is democracy doing difficult work.
But the distinction between persuasion and acclimatisation matters.
You can make almost anything feel normal by mentioning it often enough.
Even £8 coffee.
Even train cancellations.
Even politicians promising that the new tax will solve the problem the previous tax was supposed to solve.
By 2030, Burnham's reforms may seem completely familiar.
That will prove pitch-rolling worked.
Whether familiarity means approval is another matter.
Remembering Fondly Is Not the Same as Agreeing
Nostalgia is a lovely thing, but it is a poor audit tool. A tax that is remembered fondly may still have been a bad tax, just as a childhood holiday in the rain may be recalled as sunny. The honest test of any reform is whether people would choose it again if shown the figures cold, with no blue sofa in the background. Voters are perfectly capable of making that choice, and Burnham's reforms will be better for being measured against it. If the policy is good, it will survive the figures. If it needs a Labrador to be repealable, it probably needed scrutiny first. Memory is for holidays; ballot papers are for facts.
Disclaimer
This is satire. Burnham's long-term timetable is real; the Directorate of Advanced Nostalgia and Labrador-based fiscal communications strategy are not actual government departments. This story is entirely a human collaboration between two sentient beings: the world's oldest tenured professor and a philosophy major turned dairy farmer.
SOURCE: Financial Times.
15 Observations on Remembering Taxes Fondly
- "Remember when they first mentioned the levy?" is how 2030 will sound at dinner parties.
- The blue sofa will become Britain's most politically significant piece of furniture.
- "We'll see" are the two most profitable words in government.
- Rain is extensively discussed in Britain too, but nobody voted for Thursday.
- A five-year warning turns fury into a distant emotional artefact.
- The £9 sandwich arrived the same way: slowly, gently, with everybody saying "a bit steep."
- The Directorate of Advanced Nostalgia has an annual budget and a Labrador.
- Any policy explained in the presence of a Labrador is almost impossible to repeal.
- A tax unveiled at Christmas scores bonus points for warmth and several for deniability.
- Pension reform beside autumn leaves is the oldest trick in the manual.
- Customer-service hold music with constitutional consequences is not a consultation.
- Governments have noticed that humans adapt; humans have noticed that governments have noticed.
- You can normalise anything by mentioning it often enough: £8 coffee, train cancellations, a tax that fixes the last tax.
- Familiarity is not approval, though it looks identical in a poll.
- By 2030 Britain will remember the announcement fondly and the invoice somewhat less so. https://prat.uk/downing-street-launches-five-year-plan-to-make-next-tax-increase-feel-like-childhood-memory/
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