The dominance of this belief system is so complete that we no longer find it extraordinary. We were warned last week that business leaders think the honeymoon is over between business and New Labour. The Government's crime, it seems, is that the increase in health spending announced in the Budget is judged to so have increased government spending that interest rates might have to be raised to curb inflation. Worse, it is playing with the idea of introducing paid maternity and paternity leave as a statutory right in its manifesto. No more heinous offence could be imagined.
Business is over-reaching itself.
But the pendulum has swung too far. Even reasoned regulation or extension of public authority are regarded hysterically. Taxation is universally regarded as an insufferable burden that should be reduced to minimal levels. Business thunders that it will migrate abroad rather than make any contribution to the society of which it is part. Indeed, as they sit immobile in some traffic jam as a direct result of the philosophy they champion, they will have more than paused - they will not be moving at all.