Sirs,
Herein the Idle Spectator seeks to suggest a most modest of proposals for the consideration of our glorious leaders that will, we believe, alleviate if not completely nullify the present pressures upon the British Economy.
Simply put the chief problem of the matter is that there a great number of unemployed members of various strata of society that place a drug upon the economy. People are unemployed, less money is made, less money is spent and more people become unemployed. Such is the way of economies and such will continue to be the way until someone actually stands up and does something.
What we here and TIS suggest is that the unemployed (and probably unwashed) masses are divided into two separate and distinct groups. These divisions should be entirely random to ensure a good spread of individuals of every level of skill in each.
Members of the first group should be told to gather in one place on one day, possibly not on a national level, perhaps subdivided by councils or constituencies. Once gathered, members of group the first shall be given spades, thoroughly briefed in the use of such spades to prevent any form of litigation, and taken to a field. Once in said field the members of this diverse group should be instructed to dig a whole. And dig they shall, for 12 hours, with an hour for the taking of vittels. For this work they shall be paid a fair wage, of £5 sterling per hour. Once the twelve hours are complete the spades will be regathered by the administrators of the project and members of the group will be informed they have the following day off.
On the following day, while the first group is sleeping off the first hard day’s work of their lives, the second group should be gathered in the same location as the first was on the previous day. Once their they too shall be thoroughly briefed in the use of spades, again to prevent any litigious members of the congregation from getting any ideas, and taken to the same location that group the first was on the previous day. Once there they shall set about filling in the hole dug by that first group, they shall be paid the same amount and work the same hours. In the unlikely event they fill in the hole, they should begin digging again and the positions of the groups reversed, in fact this would be favourable, leading to a large number of “multi-skilled” individuals on the job market.
Once the hole-digging project is in full swing and a large number of low income household are frittering away money again, more jobs will be created by the financial stimulus this puts into the economy.
TIS thanks you for your unending gratitude, for we have just solved the ‘credit crunch’ for considerably less than the cost of propping up a bank with financial balsa wood.
Yours, The Idle Spectator.
The Idle Spectator 