It is common to see the report used as evidence of the size of deficit that would befall an independent Scotland but this would only be the case if one imagines public finances being set up exactly as they are within the rest of the UK. An independent Scotland would almost certainly look to control tax, spending and borrowing powers differently than the current set up, and that makes it more difficult to predict what the country’s finances would look like.
Scotland has everything that it takes to be an extremely prosperous and successful independent nation, and more. Scotland with only 8.4% of the UK population possesses 34% of the UK’s natural wealth.
This prompts the question – why does a naturally wealthy nation with a strong, resilient and diverse onshore economy, booming exports, a highly educated population, low unemployment, a wealth of oil and renewables, and a wide range of strong economic sectors have a set of accounts (GERS) that suggest that Scotland’s finances are weak? That is a trick question, it doesn’t. GERS is not a set of accounts for spending in Scotland it contains spending outside of Scotland that doesn’t benefit Scotland economy and that Scotland didn’t generate. GERS also contains clear evidence of mechanisms for removing wealth from Scotland’s accounts which then creates a phoney deficit. There are actually several hidden mechanisms for stealthily removing Scotland’s wealth.