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The Party's Over: How the West Went Bust

Robert Peston

John Thynne

The Party's Over: How the West Went Bust: Episode 1

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Factual: Money

Episode 1

BBC Two - The Party's Over: How the West Went Bust, Episode 1

Robert Peston examines the decisions which brought the West's economy to crisis.

Robert Peston examines how decisions taken 30 years ago shaped the world we live in today, and concludes that the West faces a sobering wake-up call.

In the teeth of the worst financial crisis in living memory, BBC business editor Robert Peston examines how the world got to this point and how the collossal imbalances in the global economy have left the UK in need of a radical economic overhaul. 

In this first of two programmes Peston examines how, thirty years ago, momentous decisions were taken which shaped the world we live in today. In China, Deng Xiao Ping opened up the country to foreign capitalists; in Britain and America, the free market revolution was unleashed by Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. The Party's Over compares the lives of workers in a Chinese company with their co-workers in Britain. 

Robert Peston interviews bankers, politicians and economists, and concludes that the boom we enjoyed before the crash was based on an illusion, and that the world's economy is now so unbalanced that in the West we face a sobering wake-up call.

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Robert Peston examines the decisions which brought the West's economy to crisis

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The Party's Over: How the West Went Bust

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