Easing made easy

Ghastly moment, isn’t it, when at a supper party (worse, at editorial conference or in a meeting with clients) some drawling know-all asks ‘so what do you think about QE?’ Everyone at the table swivels in your direction. Your mental turbines stall, your eyeballs sweat. QE? Is that a conference centre? Cruise liner? A fashionable disease? Anyone who has been through this experience may find useful the following bull-point presentation. With the emphasis on bull.

● On hearing ‘QE’ do not say: ‘You mean that game show fronted by Stephen Fry?’ People may think you are being serious (which in fact you are, but let’s keep that quiet).

● QE stands for ‘quantitative easing’, the government’s main economic policy in response to the slump. Quantitative easing is a euphemism and like all euphemisms — ‘terminological inexactitude’, ‘sleeping with Jesus’, ‘trouser cough’ — it is not entirely honest. ‘Easing’ sounds so minor, so relaxing, doesn’t it? Yet so far there has been £375 billion of QE since March 2009. Yes, £375 billion. That is worth about 100 aircraft carriers.

● QE is sometimes compared to printing money — shades of those wheelbarrows of cash they need in Weimar Germany to buy a kartoffelwurst for lunch (soft drink not included). Printing money, as we all know, is a rotten idea. However, if you take this position you will betray yourself as a being of simple tastes. Bien-pensants are more soigné about mad public spending and bien-pensant is still the look to aim for if you wish to get ahead in modern London.