So Far, Britain’s Employers Have Been Winning the Class War Over Inflation
Since inflation started rising, British capitalists have been raking in massive profits while workers have suffered a disastrous wage slump. Yet the Bank of England still wants to boost unemployment in case workers develop their fighting strength.
Striking junior doctors and consultants organized by the British Medical Association are joined by members of the UNITE trade union, on strike for more pay against the East London NHS Foundation Trust, September 20, 2023, in London, England. (Guy Smallman / Getty Images)
The question of who pays for inflation is fundamentally a distributional question. In other words, it’s about class.
When prices increase, that additional cost has to be absorbed by someone, whether by capitalists in the form of lower margins and profits, or by consumers in the form of higher prices. Those consumers are also workers, and if they win above-inflation wage increases, the cost can then be pushed back onto the capitalists.
Inflation in the UK has been above the Bank of England’s 2 percent target rate for two years now. That is sufficient time to give an assessment of which class — the capitalists or the workers — has absorbed the costs of inflation.
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