Neoliberalism can be said to have started in the late 70s/early 80s, emblematically with noted intellectual Ronald Reagan and renowned humanitarian Margaret Thatcher who promoted massive deregulation waves and tax cuts for the rich. Ideologically, they promoted core tenets such as: government = bad, greedy individualism = good, subservience to corporations = good.

Even though we were promised it would all “trickle down” on us, wealth has instead been redistributed to the very top. This ushered in the era of the Great Regression, and when the greatest financial crisis since the Great Depression hit us, we found that state power rushed to bailout the institutions and protect the elites whose fraudulent (and deregulated) behaviour caused the crisis in the first place. Not content with that, state power told us to tighten our belts.