The Tories seem to be demand deniers, in the sense that they seem oblivious to problems of weak demand. Three things make me say this.

First, Jeremy Hunt tries to justify cutting tax credits by claiming that he wants to create a culture of hard work.

Let's leave aside the fact that working long hours is often a sign a economic failure - of low productivity - and ask: what would happen if people offered to work longer?

The answer is that, in many cases their employers would reject their offers. There are already 1.28 million people who are working part-time because they cannot find full-time work. This tells us that, for very many people, the problem isn't a lack of culture of hard work but a lack of demand for their services.

Secondly, in speaking of immigration, Theresa May says:

We know that for people in low-paid jobs, wages are forced down even further while some people are forced out of work altogether...
At best the net economic and fiscal effect of high immigration is close to zero.

Let's leave aside the fact that we don't know this at all because it is wrong. Just think about elementary economics. An increased supply of labour could force its price down and if demand is price-inelastic employment won't increase much. But the solution to this is to increase aggregate demand so that wages and employment do increase. You don't need to believe me on this. Just look at what Ms May's own department says (pdf):

There is relatively little evidence that migration has caused statistically significant displacement of UK natives from the labour market in periods when the economy has been strong...
But during a recession, and when net migration volumes are high as in recent years, it appears that the labour market adjusts at a slower rate and some short-term impacts are observed.

It is not immigration that's the problem, therefore, but weak aggregate demand.The solution, therefore, is not immigration controls but better demand policies.

Thirdly, the Tories' proposed cuts in tax credits overlook one of the great trends in the economy over the last 40-odd years - that some mix of globalization and technical change has reduced demand for less-skilled labour with the result that millions of people have low pay. Proposed rises in the minimum wage will not solve this problem, not least because many of the low paid earn a little more than the minimum wage. Tax credits exist not because the Labour government was profligate, but because it recognised that topping up the incomes of the low-paid was a roughly least-bad solution to the problem of low demand for less skilled work.

These three examples raise the question: why are the Tories demand-deniers? Alex offers one answer: it's because they still believe that poverty is the fault of the individual - they are committing the fundamental attribution error.

The counterpart to this is a perhaps wilful failure to see that there are also systemic reasons for low pay - not just bad policy, but fundamental properties of the capitalist economy.