Major economic trends
This is dull but true. There is a secret department in the Home Office called "DNE" (no, I don't know what it means even though I worked there for 12 years) whose job it is to manufacture macro economic effects for the government of the day on to an unsuspecting public (and sometimes and an unsuspecting government).

Example 1: In 1979 when Mrs. T came to power the country was broke. There was no chance of manufacturing our way out of it because the far east was cheaper and better at it than we were. So how do you magic up wealth? One way was to monetise the crumbling housing stock we owned. DNE created MFI and Texas Homecare and started the early days of DIY TV and the 'property porn' industry you have now. You see by making home improvement fashionable, people WANTED to own houses. This drove up the market and borrowing and related services. One of our successes that one, but we honestly didn't think that DIY would ever become fashionable - we actually laughed about it when we were testing it in Whitehall. It's also a great example to prove the point as for many years it was a very British thing to do indeed and wasn't replicated elsewhere for many years. Before my time the same thing had been done with cars (we made Haynes manuals) before the numbers told us that independent garages would make more money.

Example 2: Binge drinking in the late 80's was restricted to wide boys and dodgy clubs that stayed open after the pubs had shut. However, by maximising this effect you created thousands of jobs in the F+B industry. Also you could beef up your police force under the pretext of controlling town centres (there is another backstory here too serious for b3ta). Deregulation meant that anyone could binge drink 7 days a week and spend the money they earned getting legless. We particularly aimed this at women who used to drink (and spend) far less than they do now. However we did not expect everyone to switch from beers to sugary/caffine laden drinks - this gave them more energy and wasn't factored in. We advised the government to give control to the local councils once this effect had been established.

There are tons of others. I am writing my memoirs.
(prescottsflu infected you at, Sat 29 Aug 2009, 1:35, 10 replies)

your ISP has been logged
we are on our way.
(knackerz is skinning up, Sat 29 Aug 2009, 3:17, closed)

"(there is another backstory here too serious for b3ta)"
No it isn't. Please elaborate.
(St Sepulchre's Belle tolled for thee on, Sat 29 Aug 2009, 3:20, closed)

DNE?
Does Not Exist, you loon.
(Captain Skippy pooed in a bag and left it on your doorstep, Sat 29 Aug 2009, 6:35, closed)

'clicks'
more please!
(orangejuicejohns, Sat 29 Aug 2009, 7:31, closed)

the way this is written
i assume is feign serious intent - a bit like that wonderful TV institution 'call my bluff'

B&Q stands for Block and Quayle - the two blokes who founded it not 'bureaucrat' and 'quango' and my wifes parents spent time on holiday with the couple who had made their millions starting Texas Homecare as a small hardware store

DNE indeed. nice try.
( spimf ™ is whoever you want him to be, Sat 29 Aug 2009, 12:52, closed)

DNE
I never knew what DNE stood for. Obviously we had hundreds of stand-by answers.
The police thing is more about economics in terms of public workers and tax incomes - clearly if the tax if generated by alcohol that gives you more lee-way.

Finally yes of course private companies took the money with BQ etc. How do you think Mike Ashley or Richard branson made money? We needed a patsy and we chose them.
(prescottsflu infected you at, Sat 29 Aug 2009, 16:38, closed)

Really?
HUNDREDS of standby answers for a SECRET Home Office department? Not just one particularly plausible answer with a cohesive backstory which all staff would know inside and out should they get grilled?

You've not thought this through.

And the patsy thing? Too obvious. There's not a chance in hell Branson is a dupe. "External Operations Director" would have been more credible. Make him the genius behind the outfit, but given resources by his government backers. A perk of the job making him set for life.
(Captain Skippy pooed in a bag and left it on your doorstep, Sat 29 Aug 2009, 17:54, closed)

grilled?
We were economists not James Bond - who wass going to grill us?
Hundreds is an exaggeration though. My favourite was Don't No Enything.
Patsys - Most of them just took the money and sat back. Not all though.
(prescottsflu infected you at, Sun 30 Aug 2009, 2:08, closed)

Pfft.
Loon.
(Captain Skippy pooed in a bag and left it on your doorstep, Sun 30 Aug 2009, 9:57, closed)

Also
The theory that suffragettes/womens right etc were started to effectively double the higher earning workforce of the country.

If everyone earns a decentwage then they have more to spend and be taxed i guess.

I'd rather she was back keeping my bloody house clean!
(Jimmy Large Is huffing Jenkem on, Wed 2 Sep 2009, 22:13, closed)