[TheAnimus]

But like anything political there is the other side of the coin.

For many who simply wanted to continue their work as usual found themselves involved with the consequences of a dispute of miners. Ultimately people like to choose a side to blame for catastrophes such as the 3 day working week (due to power shortages because of the coal strike, electricity had to be rationed). How much hard did that do to other industries. My grandfather at the time an electrical engineer lost his job due rather directly to the 3 day week.

For people like them Thatcher was a good thing, ultimately it was not her fault that the unions did not want to compromise on closing mines. The reaction of unions towards a shift from being a publicly subsidised industry I don't think can be described in anyway as sustainable or even 'long term OK'.

I find it someone disingenuous of certain areas to blame the government for the result, when the unions often negotiated with such a simple all or nothing mentality. Ultimately blaming her after going all-in isn't right.

[EliRivers]

Very true. An entire country held hostage by a tiny proportion of workers deciding to go on strike. I can definitely see the argument that any private body with that kind of power has to have that power removed.

[arethuza]

Except that here in the UK we've gone from being held hostage by the miners to being held hostage by bankers - why is one better than the other?

[NB Of course, I want neither!]

[EliRivers]

Did the bankers choose to simply turn off everyone's electricity in the evening? They aren't holding anyone hostage. They're just taking all the money they can get their hands on and we're choosing to hand it over.

[arethuza]

They were in a position where all the ATMs and point of sale machines would stop (Chip-n-Pin is critical in the UK). The UK goverment was actually at the stage of considering whether it would have to implement emergency powers to prevent widespread civil unrest.

So yes - we were being held hostage.

[TheAnimus]

I'm confused by why you say that?

For a start of your talking retail banking rather than trading banking?

All deposits were guaranteed up to £25k which is now £100k. Why the hell would a high street bank profit from cutting of ATM or chip and pin? Do you know how much merchant fees are!

Quite the opposite they do everything they can to make people spend more. Granted they aren't lending money as easily as they used too, but that was what created the mess we were in before.

[arethuza]

"Why the hell would a high street bank profit from cutting of ATM or chip and pin?"

They wouldn't have profited - if they hadn't been bailed out they wouldn't be operating at all (RBS was within 2 hours of closing up shop entirely).

Read Alistair Darling's autobiography for his account of the near disaster - it's really rather alarming to read.

[EliRivers]

"So yes - we were being held hostage."

Wait, so you're saying that at any time the bankers could have flipped a switch and magically the economy turns back on in a matter of seconds?

So no, we were not being held hostage.

[arethuza]

So extortion rather than holding hostages then... "Nice economy you have there, shame if something were to happen to it".

[lostlogin]

The end result went far beyond removing that power. It devastated their towns and destroyed families.

[omegaham]

This happens a lot in any industry that loses its relevance.

I grew up in Massachusetts. Cities like Lowell and Worcester are very depressed now because they lost what made them big - manufacturing. Should we have subsidized that industry despite it being overpriced and underperforming compared to its competitors? What about the horse and buggy industry when automobiles came around? The whaling industry once petroleum refineries started being built?

Those coal mines were outdated and inefficient. Unfortunately, the government subsidized them for far too long, which created dependence on them as well as the assurance that the jobs would always be there.

Sadly, there is displacement whenever there is a change. But it's far worse to cling to the status quo when it's blatantly impractical. We should be learning the opposite lesson from the hardship created by these mine closings - it's far better to bite the bullet and take the immediate effects than prop up an outdated system and finally get rid of it once it becomes too much to bear.

[lostlogin]

The change could have been done more smoothly. Or to put it another way, how could it have been worse? I don't pretend to have a perfect solution, but going to some of the areas hit by this is really depressing. The towns may never have been flash to start with but visiting mines and talking to people there is not that different to talking to someone who is describing to you a war they were in.

[pfedor]

Or to put it another way, how could it have been worse?

Easy. The coal mining industry could have continued existing for another thirty years, bringing huge losses each year, subsidized by the taxpayer. Like, say, in Poland, which is where you get your cheap labor from, and not the other way around, and the two facts are not entirely unrelated.

[omegaham]

Head out to some of the Rust Belt states - New York. Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana. You'll find towns that are just that - empty and gutted. There are cities that lost more than 80% of their manufacturing jobs in less than 10 years.

It was just the way of the future - the Southeast had lower labor costs, lower cost of land, and advantageous shipping arrangements. The cities just couldn't keep up, and they fell by the wayside.

And yes, it's pretty crappy to go to these cities and tell the people who are struggling there that their businesses deserved to go bankrupt or leave, but there's no other way to do it. The alternative is to subsidize them, and that ends up discouraging progress and also creating a culture of dependence on the government. After all, why invent new stuff if the government will increase the subsidy to keep up with your new manufacturing process?

Letting the free market purge badly competing industry is good for the country and also good for everyone in the long term.

[lostlogin]

I wouldn't call what Thatcher brought in 'free market' per se, although I dont think this is what you are saying. Many of the formerly nationalised companies that are now supposedly private depend heavily on state subsidies. Her implementation of change swapped one inefficiency for another while setting vast swaths of the country at loggerheads. Other countries have managed to implement painful change without the friction experienced in the UK. It's a sad period of history.

[devilmaycare]

I was struck by this picture of trash accumulating in london during the garbage strike: http://www.businessinsider.com/thatcher-and-the-winter-of-di...

The West was crippled by socialist excesses in the 1970s. There's a reason why Reagan and her won election in the same year.