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If young voters actually voted then be afraid – politicalbetting.com

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  • WillGWillG Posts: 1,993

    MattW said:

    Cookie said:

    Anyway there is a very basic reason why young people are disillusioned, it's because Thatcher's model of a capitalist property-owning democracy doesn't apply to them.

    Young people can't accumulate capital because they're paying 30-40% of their income in rent. Young people can't buy property because housebuilding hasn't kept up with demand. Young people have voted the "wrong" way in every election or referendum since 2010 and were overruled by the elderly who won't have to live with the long term consequences of those decisions.

    Incorporate young people into the capitalist property-owning democratic model by resolving these problems.

    I believe wholeheartedly in the capitalist property owning democratic model, and 100% agree with this. To cite an arbitrary baseline, if a 25 year old teacher can't afford to buy a three bed semi in somewhere like Timperley without an inheritance - as would have been the case in the early 80s - the system isn't workimg
    Any realistic increase in building won't fix affordability in less than a generation, as it will only add an extra small fraction of a % each year to supply. IMO the larger problem is with a broken market which allows a house to be a tax free investment.

    Given that rents have been falling relative to CPI inflation for years and years - according to the official surveys of what people actually pay, rather than the advertised rentals for the 0.x% of properties currently on the market used by media outrage-bots for their articles, I'm quite skeptical about the affordability claim. Perhaps London is a outlier, but then London is always a outlier.
    British houses are amongst the smallest in the West. There’s huge latent demand for housing which cannot be serviced.

    Supply is the core problem, but I agree that interest rates and the tax system present as the nearest and most addressable issues.
    Supply has been increasingly quickly. It is just demand is increasing even more quickly. I struggle to see how you conclude that is a "supply issue".
  • Good afternoon

    Catching up on the thread I have been attacked by @Gardenwalker for having to have the temerity to point out the misleading nature of Starmer's 6 month energy offer and by @Mexicanpete over beergate

    As far as Starmer and labour are concerned they do not get a free pass and indeed those who are really knowledgeable on the subject have called out the reliance on the windfall tax including @Richard_Tyndall who works in the industry

    It is a myth that I said Starmer's beergate was a million miles worse than Johnson and indeed I did not say he was guilty of an offence. Beergate was discussed by many on here and it was entirely appropriate Durham Police investigated it and I'm sure nobody questions their decision

    I do find at times this forum is almost like a NEC meeting with no tolerance of dissenting views of Starmer and labour, and I am sure that would be a terrible thing to happen

    I sought Johnson's loss of office for months and finally now Truss is PM of course I support her and will not give Starmer or labour a free pass

    I do my best to be honest and if wrong I do apologise

    Maybe I do not need to defend myself but things were said this pm when I was not present that were personal and an exaggeration so I wanted to put the record straight

    No harm in being Chief PB Cheerleader for Truss. Some of the rest of us are not quite on that page yet.
    It's hilarious to read the ramping after her being PM for less than a week!

    Remember this lot saying they might vote Labour! ROFL :D
    I did vote Labour previously and talking of ramping is surreal coming from Starmer's chief of ramping on here
    Are you going to apologise for abusing me yesterday yet?
    I may have liked a critical comment of you from @ISHMAELZ but then you have said far worse in your time

    I suggest we leave this conversation here before other posters tell us to
    Yeah fuck off, good shout.
    It does not take you long to return to type does it
    You're a pathetic hypocrite. Now goodbye mate.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    https://news.sky.com/story/amp/liz-truss-to-join-king-charles-on-uk-tour-during-national-mourning-period-12695016

    Sky reporting the tour that never was at 1421 today. Looks a bit behind the curve.
  • HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    HYUFD said:

    Sean_F said:

    HYUFD said:

    Cookie said:

    Anyway there is a very basic reason why young people are disillusioned, it's because Thatcher's model of a capitalist property-owning democracy doesn't apply to them.

    Young people can't accumulate capital because they're paying 30-40% of their income in rent. Young people can't buy property because housebuilding hasn't kept up with demand. Young people have voted the "wrong" way in every election or referendum since 2010 and were overruled by the elderly who won't have to live with the long term consequences of those decisions.

    Incorporate young people into the capitalist property-owning democratic model by resolving these problems.

    I believe wholeheartedly in the capitalist property owning democratic model, and 100% agree with this. To cite an arbitrary baseline, if a 25 year old teacher can't afford to buy a three bed semi in somewhere like Timperley without an inheritance - as would have been the case in the early 80s - the system isn't workimg
    Or, in London, it a 20-something doctor or lawyer can’t afford the local equivalent.

    I know lawyers FFS who don’t believe they’ll ever get onto the property ladder.
    Unless they live in Central London they almost certainly will and even there if they become QC or partner in a corporate law firm they would too
    Most lawyers don’t become QC or corporate law firm partners, you very silly man.
    Property prices in London are crazy.

    A solicitor in his late twenties in London, probably ought to be able to get onto the property ladder, but it will likely be a flat in a not very salubrious area, unless they work for the magic circle, in which case their quality of life will be awful.
    That’s precisely my point.
    Now think about all the other professionals: junior doctors, teachers, civil servants, management consultants.

    And that’s out top tier, What do we offer those below them?

    Everyone knows it’s out of control, well - every except HYUFD.
    If they live outside of London and the Home counties they almost certainly can get on the property ladder, certainly by 35
    Property in Gainsborough is quite cheap 👍
    Bit difficult to be a London solicitor, though, when living there.
    Perfectly possible to be a Gainsborough solicitor though
    But not to be a London solicitor, which is the point. Don't you lot in Epping need solicitors when you rob banks, are fitted up by the police, sell dodgy whelks, etc. etc.?
    If you want to live as well as work in London, then yes you get to live in the biggest global city in Western Europe but you also have to accept the high prices that come with that
    Why?
    Extremely high demand from all over the world
    Most of the middle class jobs are in London (remever levelling-up?) so your policies are complacently condemning generations to servitude to rentiers, and in turn, screwing the UK economy.
  • Still think there is a reasonable chance of a Tory lead with Opinium in September.
  • Cyclefree said:

    A bit of class by Princess Anne with a deep curtsey as the coffin with her mother entered Holyrood.

    Anne is a class act.
    Yes she is.

    A few random thoughts having watched just the last bit: -

    1. How beautiful is Edinburgh.
    2. The tractors all lined up in a field. Surprisingly touching.
    3. The quietness of the crowds. There was a restraint very appropriate for HMQ.
    4. Very few people making the sign of the cross. I realise this is the Italian Catholic in me but I was taught that when you see a funeral cortège that's what you do and I always have done. Not a criticism of those not doing it. Just something I noticed.
    5. The commendable self-discipline of the police officers with their backs to the cortège and not turning round to get a look.

    And, finally, everyone raising their phones. I really do not get this. Why not experience the moment rather than think you can only experience it by trying to capture it (badly) on something the size of a postage stamp which I'll bet no-one ever looks at again.

    Probably I'm showing my age .....
    The thing with phones is really odd. I went to an End Sheeran concert at Wembley recently and so many of the audience seemed to spend most of the concert looking at it through their phones then presumably posting stuff immediately on social media rather than just looking directly at the concert!
    I remember thinking in the early nineties how strange Japanese tourists were in that they would spend far more of their holiday taking photos of it than actually seeming to enjoy being on holiday. What a waste I thought.

    It turns out that they were the forerunners of modern life, where documenting your experiences is more important than living your experiences. I still can't really understand it properly but accept that it is most peoples preference.
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 26,279

    Only two hours until we get the Swedish exit polls.

    Looking forward to some election night action!
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,259
    WillG said:

    rcs1000 said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    I love the idea that you since university education is some sort of lie of guaranteed advancement, we should simply cut university education.

    Fucking bonkers.

    Except that for every other good and service known to mankind, restricting supply tends to push up price

    The extremely large number of software developers in Silicon Valley has not resulted in them earning less than their peers. Quite the opposite in fact.
    Mainly helped by VC and PE ploughing money into any old firm that says it's a Tech company. Now that interest rates are rising and the era of free money is dead, I suspect many of those developers are going to struggle.

    I suspect they will struggle less than those without a university education.
    You really don't need a university education to develop software. It could be (and probably is for all I know) taught sufficiently at GCSE level.
  • bondegezoubondegezou Posts: 7,140

    Good afternoon

    Catching up on the thread I have been attacked by @Gardenwalker for having to have the temerity to point out the misleading nature of Starmer's 6 month energy offer and by @Mexicanpete over beergate

    As far as Starmer and labour are concerned they do not get a free pass and indeed those who are really knowledgeable on the subject have called out the reliance on the windfall tax including @Richard_Tyndall who works in the industry

    It is a myth that I said Starmer's beergate was a million miles worse than Johnson and indeed I did not say he was guilty of an offence. Beergate was discussed by many on here and it was entirely appropriate Durham Police investigated it and I'm sure nobody questions their decision

    I do find at times this forum is almost like a NEC meeting with no tolerance of dissenting views of Starmer and labour, and I am sure that would be a terrible thing to happen

    I sought Johnson's loss of office for months and finally now Truss is PM of course I support her and will not give Starmer or labour a free pass

    I do my best to be honest and if wrong I do apologise

    Maybe I do not need to defend myself but things were said this pm when I was not present that were personal and an exaggeration so I wanted to put the record straight

    No harm in being Chief PB Cheerleader for Truss. Some of the rest of us are not quite on that page yet.
    It's hilarious to read the ramping after her being PM for less than a week!

    Remember this lot saying they might vote Labour! ROFL :D
    Credit where it is true. Truss has been solid since the death of the Queen. I wouldn't vote for her but she is doing fine under difficult circumstance.

    Johnson must have been hoping Truss would fall on her arse and he would be called back to put the show back on the road (temporarily) for the funeral. She hasn't.

    Imagine the distaste the Queen must have had for Johnson's tomfoolery that she made it over the line to avert the humiliation he would undoubtedly have dealt her and the nation.

    Ma'am we salute you!
    Been solid? It’s not exactly a difficult job to follow protocol, no great judgement reuiqred… and Penny Mordaunt was clearly way better than Truss at the London proclamation.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,706

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    HYUFD said:

    Carnyx said:

    HYUFD said:

    Sean_F said:

    HYUFD said:

    Cookie said:

    Anyway there is a very basic reason why young people are disillusioned, it's because Thatcher's model of a capitalist property-owning democracy doesn't apply to them.

    Young people can't accumulate capital because they're paying 30-40% of their income in rent. Young people can't buy property because housebuilding hasn't kept up with demand. Young people have voted the "wrong" way in every election or referendum since 2010 and were overruled by the elderly who won't have to live with the long term consequences of those decisions.

    Incorporate young people into the capitalist property-owning democratic model by resolving these problems.

    I believe wholeheartedly in the capitalist property owning democratic model, and 100% agree with this. To cite an arbitrary baseline, if a 25 year old teacher can't afford to buy a three bed semi in somewhere like Timperley without an inheritance - as would have been the case in the early 80s - the system isn't workimg
    Or, in London, it a 20-something doctor or lawyer can’t afford the local equivalent.

    I know lawyers FFS who don’t believe they’ll ever get onto the property ladder.
    Unless they live in Central London they almost certainly will and even there if they become QC or partner in a corporate law firm they would too
    Most lawyers don’t become QC or corporate law firm partners, you very silly man.
    Property prices in London are crazy.

    A solicitor in his late twenties in London, probably ought to be able to get onto the property ladder, but it will likely be a flat in a not very salubrious area, unless they work for the magic circle, in which case their quality of life will be awful.
    That’s precisely my point.
    Now think about all the other professionals: junior doctors, teachers, civil servants, management consultants.

    And that’s out top tier, What do we offer those below them?

    Everyone knows it’s out of control, well - every except HYUFD.
    If they live outside of London and the Home counties they almost certainly can get on the property ladder, certainly by 35
    Property in Gainsborough is quite cheap 👍
    Bit difficult to be a London solicitor, though, when living there.
    Perfectly possible to be a Gainsborough solicitor though
    But not to be a London solicitor, which is the point. Don't you lot in Epping need solicitors when you rob banks, are fitted up by the police, sell dodgy whelks, etc. etc.?
    If you want to live as well as work in London, then yes you get to live in the biggest global city in Western Europe but you also have to accept the high prices that come with that
    Why?
    Extremely high demand from all over the world
    Most of the middle class jobs are in London (remever levelling-up?) so your policies are complacently condemning generations to servitude to rentiers, and in turn, screwing the UK economy.
    There are plenty of middle class jobs in the South outside London, Manchester, Edinburgh, Cardiff, Birmingham, Newcastle etc.

    The UK does not just begin and end in London. In New York City too most rent
  • 169 - 9
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715

    Good afternoon

    Catching up on the thread I have been attacked by @Gardenwalker for having to have the temerity to point out the misleading nature of Starmer's 6 month energy offer and by @Mexicanpete over beergate

    As far as Starmer and labour are concerned they do not get a free pass and indeed those who are really knowledgeable on the subject have called out the reliance on the windfall tax including @Richard_Tyndall who works in the industry

    It is a myth that I said Starmer's beergate was a million miles worse than Johnson and indeed I did not say he was guilty of an offence. Beergate was discussed by many on here and it was entirely appropriate Durham Police investigated it and I'm sure nobody questions their decision

    I do find at times this forum is almost like a NEC meeting with no tolerance of dissenting views of Starmer and labour, and I am sure that would be a terrible thing to happen

    I sought Johnson's loss of office for months and finally now Truss is PM of course I support her and will not give Starmer or labour a free pass

    I do my best to be honest and if wrong I do apologise

    Maybe I do not need to defend myself but things were said this pm when I was not present that were personal and an exaggeration so I wanted to put the record straight

    No harm in being Chief PB Cheerleader for Truss. Some of the rest of us are not quite on that page yet.
    It's hilarious to read the ramping after her being PM for less than a week!

    Remember this lot saying they might vote Labour! ROFL :D
    I did vote Labour previously and talking of ramping is surreal coming from Starmer's chief of ramping on here
    Are you going to apologise for abusing me yesterday yet?
    I may have liked a critical comment of you from @ISHMAELZ but then you have said far worse in your time

    I suggest we leave this conversation here before other posters tell us to
    Yeah fuck off, good shout.
    Now, now children. Play nicely!
  • ohnotnowohnotnow Posts: 2,800
    Cookie said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    Completely understandable and you have my sympathy.
    It shouldn't be the case. Let's take accountancy: how it should work is that a graduate with a relevant degree should be better placed than an 18 year old school leaver - but not better off than someone who left school at 18 and got three years of relevant experience. But sadly HR departments are often not sophisticated enough for thus to be the case.
    This isn't the fault of Bournville and his generarion, it's the fault of the generation offering them jobs (or not).
    Hopefully the current labour shortage will force recruiters to be a bit more open minded.
    I know at my place we've gone from a rather snobby (though understandable as it's a HE institution) "You must have a degree" to now "Please, for the love of god, just anyone apply. Please!"
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 26,279
    edited September 2022

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    But an intelligent person shouldn't have a problem understanding that if 45% of people have university degrees it won't be worth as much as when only 10% or 20% of people had one. That shouldn't come as a surprise to people.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 44,049
    edited September 2022
    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives. I don't blame them. Work is often a grind, indeed that is why people have to be paid to do it.
  • Good afternoon

    Catching up on the thread I have been attacked by @Gardenwalker for having to have the temerity to point out the misleading nature of Starmer's 6 month energy offer and by @Mexicanpete over beergate

    As far as Starmer and labour are concerned they do not get a free pass and indeed those who are really knowledgeable on the subject have called out the reliance on the windfall tax including @Richard_Tyndall who works in the industry

    It is a myth that I said Starmer's beergate was a million miles worse than Johnson and indeed I did not say he was guilty of an offence. Beergate was discussed by many on here and it was entirely appropriate Durham Police investigated it and I'm sure nobody questions their decision

    I do find at times this forum is almost like a NEC meeting with no tolerance of dissenting views of Starmer and labour, and I am sure that would be a terrible thing to happen

    I sought Johnson's loss of office for months and finally now Truss is PM of course I support her and will not give Starmer or labour a free pass

    I do my best to be honest and if wrong I do apologise

    Maybe I do not need to defend myself but things were said this pm when I was not present that were personal and an exaggeration so I wanted to put the record straight

    No harm in being Chief PB Cheerleader for Truss. Some of the rest of us are not quite on that page yet.
    It's hilarious to read the ramping after her being PM for less than a week!

    Remember this lot saying they might vote Labour! ROFL :D
    I did vote Labour previously and talking of ramping is surreal coming from Starmer's chief of ramping on here
    Are you going to apologise for abusing me yesterday yet?
    I may have liked a critical comment of you from @ISHMAELZ but then you have said far worse in your time

    I suggest we leave this conversation here before other posters tell us to
    Yeah fuck off, good shout.
    Now, now children. Play nicely!
    How are you OKC
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,259
    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
  • 169 all out England need 130
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,835
    130 to win.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 44,049

    MattW said:

    Cookie said:

    Anyway there is a very basic reason why young people are disillusioned, it's because Thatcher's model of a capitalist property-owning democracy doesn't apply to them.

    Young people can't accumulate capital because they're paying 30-40% of their income in rent. Young people can't buy property because housebuilding hasn't kept up with demand. Young people have voted the "wrong" way in every election or referendum since 2010 and were overruled by the elderly who won't have to live with the long term consequences of those decisions.

    Incorporate young people into the capitalist property-owning democratic model by resolving these problems.

    I believe wholeheartedly in the capitalist property owning democratic model, and 100% agree with this. To cite an arbitrary baseline, if a 25 year old teacher can't afford to buy a three bed semi in somewhere like Timperley without an inheritance - as would have been the case in the early 80s - the system isn't workimg
    Any realistic increase in building won't fix affordability in less than a generation, as it will only add an extra small fraction of a % each year to supply. IMO the larger problem is with a broken market which allows a house to be a tax free investment.

    Given that rents have been falling relative to CPI inflation for years and years - according to the official surveys of what people actually pay, rather than the advertised rentals for the 0.x% of properties currently on the market used by media outrage-bots for their articles, I'm quite skeptical about the affordability claim. Perhaps London is a outlier, but then London is always a outlier.
    British houses are amongst the smallest in the West. There’s huge latent demand for housing which cannot be serviced.

    Supply is the core problem, but I agree that interest rates and the tax system present as the nearest and most addressable issues.
    Even so they are expensive to build. Low rise flats as seen in other developed countries can be much better value to build.
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715

    Good afternoon

    Catching up on the thread I have been attacked by @Gardenwalker for having to have the temerity to point out the misleading nature of Starmer's 6 month energy offer and by @Mexicanpete over beergate

    As far as Starmer and labour are concerned they do not get a free pass and indeed those who are really knowledgeable on the subject have called out the reliance on the windfall tax including @Richard_Tyndall who works in the industry

    It is a myth that I said Starmer's beergate was a million miles worse than Johnson and indeed I did not say he was guilty of an offence. Beergate was discussed by many on here and it was entirely appropriate Durham Police investigated it and I'm sure nobody questions their decision

    I do find at times this forum is almost like a NEC meeting with no tolerance of dissenting views of Starmer and labour, and I am sure that would be a terrible thing to happen

    I sought Johnson's loss of office for months and finally now Truss is PM of course I support her and will not give Starmer or labour a free pass

    I do my best to be honest and if wrong I do apologise

    Maybe I do not need to defend myself but things were said this pm when I was not present that were personal and an exaggeration so I wanted to put the record straight

    No harm in being Chief PB Cheerleader for Truss. Some of the rest of us are not quite on that page yet.
    It's hilarious to read the ramping after her being PM for less than a week!

    Remember this lot saying they might vote Labour! ROFL :D
    I did vote Labour previously and talking of ramping is surreal coming from Starmer's chief of ramping on here
    Are you going to apologise for abusing me yesterday yet?
    I may have liked a critical comment of you from @ISHMAELZ but then you have said far worse in your time

    I suggest we leave this conversation here before other posters tell us to
    Yeah fuck off, good shout.
    Now, now children. Play nicely!
    How are you OKC
    Thank you for asking Horse! Looking forward to meeting a surgeon at the end of the week who just might give me some prospect of getting my hands back.
    So that I don't have to dictate on this, and go back with fiddly corrections!
  • ohnotnowohnotnow Posts: 2,800
    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives. I don't blame them. Work is often a grind, indeed that is why people have to be paid to do it.
    I can't remember which party it was - but for a while they had a policy of 'When you turn 18 we will give/loan you £X-thousand pounds. You can use it for education, training, starting a firm of your own (with some sanity checks), [-insert a few other things-]. You choose." I think they could also defer for a few years if they weren't ready.

  • ohnotnow said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives. I don't blame them. Work is often a grind, indeed that is why people have to be paid to do it.
    I can't remember which party it was - but for a while they had a policy of 'When you turn 18 we will give/loan you £X-thousand pounds. You can use it for education, training, starting a firm of your own (with some sanity checks), [-insert a few other things-]. You choose." I think they could also defer for a few years if they weren't ready.

    Was the LDs
  • geoffwgeoffw Posts: 8,092
    Here's a mystery for those who followed the cortege from Balmoral to Holyrood House.

    When the hearse came out of the gates at Balmoral the side window displayed the name of funeral directors "William Purves". On arrival at Holyrood House this could no longer be seen. At what point in the journey was it removed?

    It may seen a bit nerdish to notice this, but we did because a daughter of the Purves family took piano lessons from my wife a couple of decades ago.
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715
    edited September 2022
    Foxy said:

    MattW said:

    Cookie said:

    Anyway there is a very basic reason why young people are disillusioned, it's because Thatcher's model of a capitalist property-owning democracy doesn't apply to them.

    Young people can't accumulate capital because they're paying 30-40% of their income in rent. Young people can't buy property because housebuilding hasn't kept up with demand. Young people have voted the "wrong" way in every election or referendum since 2010 and were overruled by the elderly who won't have to live with the long term consequences of those decisions.

    Incorporate young people into the capitalist property-owning democratic model by resolving these problems.

    I believe wholeheartedly in the capitalist property owning democratic model, and 100% agree with this. To cite an arbitrary baseline, if a 25 year old teacher can't afford to buy a three bed semi in somewhere like Timperley without an inheritance - as would have been the case in the early 80s - the system isn't workimg
    Any realistic increase in building won't fix affordability in less than a generation, as it will only add an extra small fraction of a % each year to supply. IMO the larger problem is with a broken market which allows a house to be a tax free investment.

    Given that rents have been falling relative to CPI inflation for years and years - according to the official surveys of what people actually pay, rather than the advertised rentals for the 0.x% of properties currently on the market used by media outrage-bots for their articles, I'm quite skeptical about the affordability claim. Perhaps London is a outlier, but then London is always a outlier.
    British houses are amongst the smallest in the West. There’s huge latent demand for housing which cannot be serviced.

    Supply is the core problem, but I agree that interest rates and the tax system present as the nearest and most addressable issues.
    Even so they are expensive to build. Low rise flats as seen in other developed countries can be much better value to build.
    The citizens of Epping, and other places in Essex, Hertfordshire and so on are very much against such buildings!
  • DriverDriver Posts: 4,522
    129 overs for three completed innings, which is ridiculous.
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 44,049

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,835
    Dropped off first ball!
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715
    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    As a pharmacist, Dr F., I only wish that many of your colleagues had similar, broadminded, views!
  • Andy_JSAndy_JS Posts: 26,279
    A two day test match. They could play two test matches in five days.
  • Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.
  • Carnyx said:

    Scotland isn't going to become a republic.

    These crowds are vast, and outside of one or two mad Nits in Edinburgh (roundly jeered by others) there have been no protests.

    Self-selected. But also, not a matter of current political debate anyway.
    Dunno, we've not had many positive cases for the Union lately, the cult of the queenly corpse might be a winner.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    geoffw said:

    Here's a mystery for those who followed the cortege from Balmoral to Holyrood House.

    When the hearse came out of the gates at Balmoral the side window displayed the name of funeral directors "William Purves". On arrival at Holyrood House this could no longer be seen. At what point in the journey was it removed?

    It may seen a bit nerdish to notice this, but we did because a daughter of the Purves family took piano lessons from my wife a couple of decades ago.

    So that numberplate is a half arsed personalised job. Just when you think it can’t get worse.
  • WhisperingOracleWhisperingOracle Posts: 8,480
    edited September 2022

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Sounds familiar. Someone rang into Radio 4 the other day with quite a convincing story that the Queen had told him The Full Monty was one of her favourite films, and that she used to watch it with her mother when it was raining, after he had made a joke s that the equerry's trousers with their velcro looked like stripper's trousers, and thought she would be offended when overheard.

    Her viewing habits weren't elite. Don't forget her education was rarefied only on constitutional rather than cultural matters. A lot she simply learnt and absorbed herself, as anyone with a natural intelligence would, from the thousands of people she was around, both everyday and elite.
  • It's not a T20 game calm down England!
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Well, you couldn't record programs then could you!
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,259
    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
  • geoffw said:

    Here's a mystery for those who followed the cortege from Balmoral to Holyrood House.

    When the hearse came out of the gates at Balmoral the side window displayed the name of funeral directors "William Purves". On arrival at Holyrood House this could no longer be seen. At what point in the journey was it removed?

    It may seen a bit nerdish to notice this, but we did because a daughter of the Purves family took piano lessons from my wife a couple of decades ago.

    Hah, William Purves buried my mother.
    I'm feeling all warm and royalisty now.
  • Jim_MillerJim_Miller Posts: 2,395
    rcs1000 - Here's the first paragraph from a 1996 paper put out by Brookings: "Since 1970, out-of-wedlock birth rates have soared. In 1965, 24 percent of black infants and 3.1 percent of white infants were born to single mothers. By 1990 the rates had risen to 64 percent for black infants, 18 percent for whites. Every year about one million more children are born into fatherless families. If we have learned any policy lesson well over the past 25 years, it is that for children living in single-parent homes, the odds of living in poverty are great. The policy implications of the increase in out-of-wedlock births are staggering."
    source: https://www.brookings.edu/research/an-analysis-of-out-of-wedlock-births-in-the-united-states/

    (You may not have heard of the first author, George A. Akerlof, but you surely have heard of the second, Janet L. Yellen.)

    Rates have risen since then, as you can find out with a quick search.
  • CookieCookie Posts: 11,182

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    I'm not sure your secomd paragraph follows from your first. Noone is denyinh the importance of primary or secondary education.
  • solarflaresolarflare Posts: 3,623
    On the phones thing, I did think it rather spoiled some of the dignity of the formal announcement on the railings in front of Buckingham Palace when you saw a crowd of people round it with their phones above their heads trying to take a picture of it. It came across a bit...tacky. Maybe that's just how things are now.
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,873

    Still think there is a reasonable chance of a Tory lead with Opinium in September.

    I think ‘events’ have made it a lot less likely, There will be a lot less politics going on to have a chance of shifting the polls.
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,259
    Cookie said:

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    I'm not sure your secomd paragraph follows from your first. Noone is denyinh the importance of primary or secondary education.
    Foxy is "as opposed to education as anyone", so he says.
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,706

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Sounds familiar. Someone rang into Radio 4 the other day with quite a convincing story that the Queen had told him The Full Monty was one of her favourite films, and that she used to watch it with her mother when it was raining, after he had made a joke s that the equerry's trousers with their velcro looked like stripper's trousers.

    Her viewing habits weren't elite. Don't forget her education was rarefied only on constitutional rather than cultural matters. A lot she simply learnt and absorbed herself from the thousands of people she was around, both everyday and elite.
    David Starkey of course infamously said the late Queen was poorly educated and philistine and uncomfortable with anyone intellectual
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2007/dec/22/monarchy.topstories3
  • CookieCookie Posts: 11,182
    MattW said:

    Cookie said:

    Cookie said:

    I love the idea that you since university education is some sort of lie of guaranteed advancement, we should simply cut university education.

    Fucking bonkers.

    Not cut it. Do it better. Focus funding to courses giving more value. Shorter, more focused courses. Enable students to add more value to themselves while aquiring less debt.
    I totally agree with that, but it was not the original argument.
    Well if you and I can agree on this we probably have the kernel of an approach which 85% of pb can broadly support.
    How would that proposal be instantiated? Things like 2 year degrees?
    Hah - don't know! We've only just come up with the conditional outputs.
  • Cyclefree said:

    A bit of class by Princess Anne with a deep curtsey as the coffin with her mother entered Holyrood.

    Anne is a class act.
    Yes she is.

    A few random thoughts having watched just the last bit: -

    1. How beautiful is Edinburgh.
    2. The tractors all lined up in a field. Surprisingly touching.
    3. The quietness of the crowds. There was a restraint very appropriate for HMQ.
    4. Very few people making the sign of the cross. I realise this is the Italian Catholic in me but I was taught that when you see a funeral cortège that's what you do and I always have done. Not a criticism of those not doing it. Just something I noticed.
    5. The commendable self-discipline of the police officers with their backs to the cortège and not turning round to get a look.

    And, finally, everyone raising their phones. I really do not get this. Why not experience the moment rather than think you can only experience it by trying to capture it (badly) on something the size of a postage stamp which I'll bet no-one ever looks at again.

    Probably I'm showing my age .....
    Good observations. Most of Scotland is rather presbyterian and, outside certain areas, making the sign of the cross would be considered strange.

    I think people feel obliged to capture seminal moments with their phones, believing that unless they do and share it with others then it never really happened. It is a sign of the times.
  • kinabalukinabalu Posts: 38,837
    Andy_JS said:

    A two day test match. They could play two test matches in five days.

    And get day one of a 3rd done too.
  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,835

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Well, you couldn't record programs then could you!
    Yes.
  • DriverDriver Posts: 4,522
    England trying to get this game won before Red Zone at 6pm...
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715
    HYUFD said:

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Sounds familiar. Someone rang into Radio 4 the other day with quite a convincing story that the Queen had told him The Full Monty was one of her favourite films, and that she used to watch it with her mother when it was raining, after he had made a joke s that the equerry's trousers with their velcro looked like stripper's trousers.

    Her viewing habits weren't elite. Don't forget her education was rarefied only on constitutional rather than cultural matters. A lot she simply learnt and absorbed herself from the thousands of people she was around, both everyday and elite.
    David Starkey of course infamously said the late Queen was poorly educated and philistine and uncomfortable with anyone intellectual
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2007/dec/22/monarchy.topstories3
    When she was young female aristocrats were not expected to be educated in the sense of university attendance.
  • WhisperingOracleWhisperingOracle Posts: 8,480
    edited September 2022
    HYUFD said:

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Sounds familiar. Someone rang into Radio 4 the other day with quite a convincing story that the Queen had told him The Full Monty was one of her favourite films, and that she used to watch it with her mother when it was raining, after he had made a joke s that the equerry's trousers with their velcro looked like stripper's trousers.

    Her viewing habits weren't elite. Don't forget her education was rarefied only on constitutional rather than cultural matters. A lot she simply learnt and absorbed herself from the thousands of people she was around, both everyday and elite.
    David Starkey of course infamously said the late Queen was poorly educated and philistine and uncomfortable with anyone intellectual
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2007/dec/22/monarchy.topstories3
    Although in fact she was very bright, and arguably also naturally wiser and with more emotional intelligence, rather than institutionally educated cleverness, than him. Thatcher is another similar case to him.
  • geoffw said:

    Here's a mystery for those who followed the cortege from Balmoral to Holyrood House.

    When the hearse came out of the gates at Balmoral the side window displayed the name of funeral directors "William Purves". On arrival at Holyrood House this could no longer be seen. At what point in the journey was it removed?

    It may seen a bit nerdish to notice this, but we did because a daughter of the Purves family took piano lessons from my wife a couple of decades ago.

    I definitely noticed that sign on the way out of the Balmoral gates. I had not noticed it had gone later, but I did think at the time - how have they been allowed to put that little sign in the window of the actual hearse.

  • dixiedeandixiedean Posts: 27,835
    edited September 2022
    HYUFD said:

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Sounds familiar. Someone rang into Radio 4 the other day with quite a convincing story that the Queen had told him The Full Monty was one of her favourite films, and that she used to watch it with her mother when it was raining, after he had made a joke s that the equerry's trousers with their velcro looked like stripper's trousers.

    Her viewing habits weren't elite. Don't forget her education was rarefied only on constitutional rather than cultural matters. A lot she simply learnt and absorbed herself from the thousands of people she was around, both everyday and elite.
    David Starkey of course infamously said the late Queen was poorly educated and philistine and uncomfortable with anyone intellectual
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2007/dec/22/monarchy.topstories3
    Perhaps she was just uncomfortable around Starkey? Most of the University was.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,111

    geoffw said:

    Here's a mystery for those who followed the cortege from Balmoral to Holyrood House.

    When the hearse came out of the gates at Balmoral the side window displayed the name of funeral directors "William Purves". On arrival at Holyrood House this could no longer be seen. At what point in the journey was it removed?

    It may seen a bit nerdish to notice this, but we did because a daughter of the Purves family took piano lessons from my wife a couple of decades ago.

    Hah, William Purves buried my mother.
    I'm feeling all warm and royalisty now.
    We looked at them for my mum but ended up with the Co-op - who were fine.
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715
    dixiedean said:

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Well, you couldn't record programs then could you!
    Yes.
    Early 90s; really? you're probably right; memory is a lying jade sometimes!
  • rcs1000 - Here's the first paragraph from a 1996 paper put out by Brookings: "Since 1970, out-of-wedlock birth rates have soared. In 1965, 24 percent of black infants and 3.1 percent of white infants were born to single mothers. By 1990 the rates had risen to 64 percent for black infants, 18 percent for whites. Every year about one million more children are born into fatherless families. If we have learned any policy lesson well over the past 25 years, it is that for children living in single-parent homes, the odds of living in poverty are great. The policy implications of the increase in out-of-wedlock births are staggering."
    source: https://www.brookings.edu/research/an-analysis-of-out-of-wedlock-births-in-the-united-states/

    (You may not have heard of the first author, George A. Akerlof, but you surely have heard of the second, Janet L. Yellen.)

    Rates have risen since then, as you can find out with a quick search.

    'Out of wedlock' is not the same as 'single parent'. I've only skimmed the article, but the authors seem to conflate the two throughout. Am I missing something, or is the entire premise of their piece, er. rubbish?
  • HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,706
    edited September 2022
    HYUFD said:

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Sounds familiar. Someone rang into Radio 4 the other day with quite a convincing story that the Queen had told him The Full Monty was one of her favourite films, and that she used to watch it with her mother when it was raining, after he had made a joke s that the equerry's trousers with their velcro looked like stripper's trousers.

    Her viewing habits weren't elite. Don't forget her education was rarefied only on constitutional rather than cultural matters. A lot she simply learnt and absorbed herself from the thousands of people she was around, both everyday and elite.
    David Starkey of course infamously said the late Queen was poorly educated and philistine and uncomfortable with anyone intellectual
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2007/dec/22/monarchy.topstories3
    Starkey however thought King Charles was intellectually curious and a good speech maker, though he is less a fan of who he has called 'Woke William'

    https://www.express.co.uk/news/royal/1633768/gb-news-prince-william-woke-david-starkey-rwanda-ont
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,259

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
    I'd regard education and technical expertise as very different things. The first is a potential route to acquiring the second - probably the most reliable route.

    Education is the process; technical expertise is often a desired outcome.
  • CookieCookie Posts: 11,182

    dixiedean said:

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Well, you couldn't record programs then could you!
    Yes.
    Early 90s; really? you're probably right; memory is a lying jade sometimes!
    Not totally inconceivable that the queen would prefer Twin Peaks to hearing Paul McCartney play live. I would imagine even for the most popular musician for every person who'd be keen to see them play live you could find four or five who'd pass.
    I remember always being baffled that Pepsi tried to tempt me to buy its product by offering the chance to win Tina Turner tickets. For exactly that reason.
  • Carnyx said:

    geoffw said:

    Here's a mystery for those who followed the cortege from Balmoral to Holyrood House.

    When the hearse came out of the gates at Balmoral the side window displayed the name of funeral directors "William Purves". On arrival at Holyrood House this could no longer be seen. At what point in the journey was it removed?

    It may seen a bit nerdish to notice this, but we did because a daughter of the Purves family took piano lessons from my wife a couple of decades ago.

    Hah, William Purves buried my mother.
    I'm feeling all warm and royalisty now.
    We looked at them for my mum but ended up with the Co-op - who were fine.
    Tbh it was the just round the corner factor, but WP were also fine.
  • Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
    I'd regard education and technical expertise as very different things. The first is a potential route to acquiring the second - probably the most reliable route.

    Education is the process; technical expertise is often a desired outcome.
    La Thatch is a good example of this.

    Her first degree was in chemistry- was that a waste of time and money, or did it make her better at the the things she did next?
  • FoxyFoxy Posts: 44,049

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Certain basic skills are certainly useful in life, but we don't just get taught the 3 Rs at primary school. We get taught to obey, to believe what authority says is true is so, that we should shut up and sit down etc.
  • WhisperingOracleWhisperingOracle Posts: 8,480
    edited September 2022
    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Sounds familiar. Someone rang into Radio 4 the other day with quite a convincing story that the Queen had told him The Full Monty was one of her favourite films, and that she used to watch it with her mother when it was raining, after he had made a joke s that the equerry's trousers with their velcro looked like stripper's trousers.

    Her viewing habits weren't elite. Don't forget her education was rarefied only on constitutional rather than cultural matters. A lot she simply learnt and absorbed herself from the thousands of people she was around, both everyday and elite.
    David Starkey of course infamously said the late Queen was poorly educated and philistine and uncomfortable with anyone intellectual
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2007/dec/22/monarchy.topstories3
    Starkey however thought King Charles was intellectually curious and a good speech maker, though he is less a fan of who he has called 'Woke William'

    https://www.express.co.uk/news/royal/1633768/gb-news-prince-william-woke-david-starkey-rwanda-ont
    He's certainly intellectually curious. Despite the appearances of dog and horse-only life, his father had a huge library, and intellectual interests, that he kept quiet about, and his mother was naturally bright. I don't think Charles was particularly academic while at Cambridge, but he was always interested in a lot of stuff. He developed his intellect a bit later on, around the time he got interested in architecture.
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715
    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Sounds familiar. Someone rang into Radio 4 the other day with quite a convincing story that the Queen had told him The Full Monty was one of her favourite films, and that she used to watch it with her mother when it was raining, after he had made a joke s that the equerry's trousers with their velcro looked like stripper's trousers.

    Her viewing habits weren't elite. Don't forget her education was rarefied only on constitutional rather than cultural matters. A lot she simply learnt and absorbed herself from the thousands of people she was around, both everyday and elite.
    David Starkey of course infamously said the late Queen was poorly educated and philistine and uncomfortable with anyone intellectual
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2007/dec/22/monarchy.topstories3
    Starkey however thought King Charles was intellectually curious and a good speech maker, though he is less a fan of who he has called 'Woke William'

    https://www.express.co.uk/news/royal/1633768/gb-news-prince-william-woke-david-starkey-rwanda-ont
    You are not seriously using the Express as a paper of record are you?
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,259
    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Sounds familiar. Someone rang into Radio 4 the other day with quite a convincing story that the Queen had told him The Full Monty was one of her favourite films, and that she used to watch it with her mother when it was raining, after he had made a joke s that the equerry's trousers with their velcro looked like stripper's trousers.

    Her viewing habits weren't elite. Don't forget her education was rarefied only on constitutional rather than cultural matters. A lot she simply learnt and absorbed herself from the thousands of people she was around, both everyday and elite.
    David Starkey of course infamously said the late Queen was poorly educated and philistine and uncomfortable with anyone intellectual
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2007/dec/22/monarchy.topstories3
    Starkey however thought King Charles was intellectually curious and a good speech maker, though he is less a fan of who he has called 'Woke William'

    https://www.express.co.uk/news/royal/1633768/gb-news-prince-william-woke-david-starkey-rwanda-ont
    Why would anyone listen to Starkey's opinion?
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,111

    rcs1000 - Here's the first paragraph from a 1996 paper put out by Brookings: "Since 1970, out-of-wedlock birth rates have soared. In 1965, 24 percent of black infants and 3.1 percent of white infants were born to single mothers. By 1990 the rates had risen to 64 percent for black infants, 18 percent for whites. Every year about one million more children are born into fatherless families. If we have learned any policy lesson well over the past 25 years, it is that for children living in single-parent homes, the odds of living in poverty are great. The policy implications of the increase in out-of-wedlock births are staggering."
    source: https://www.brookings.edu/research/an-analysis-of-out-of-wedlock-births-in-the-united-states/

    (You may not have heard of the first author, George A. Akerlof, but you surely have heard of the second, Janet L. Yellen.)

    Rates have risen since then, as you can find out with a quick search.

    'Out of wedlock' is not the same as 'single parent'. I've only skimmed the article, but the authors seem to conflate the two throughout. Am I missing something, or is the entire premise of their piece, er. rubbish?
    I wonder if they are doing a Moral Majority thing and trying to claim how awful folk who don't get proper married in church etc. are.

    Plus it doesn't say much for the referees that they missed the conflation of parents who are not married vs single parents, which happens twice in the first paragraph. If I'd been the referee, I'd have stopped and returned it to the editor with a request not to bother me about refereeing such stuff with a basic error in the first few paras till te authors sort it out there and passim.

    'Since 1970, out-of-wedlock birth rates have soared. In 1965, 24 percent of black infants and 3.1 percent of white infants were born to single mothers. By 1990 the rates had risen to 64 percent for black infants, 18 percent for whites. Every year about one million more children are born into fatherless families. If we have learned any policy lesson well over the past 25 years, it is that for children living in single-parent homes, the odds of living in poverty are great. The policy implications of the increase in out-of-wedlock births are staggering.'
  • Cyclefree said:

    A bit of class by Princess Anne with a deep curtsey as the coffin with her mother entered Holyrood.

    Anne is a class act.
    Yes she is.

    A few random thoughts having watched just the last bit: -

    1. How beautiful is Edinburgh.
    2. The tractors all lined up in a field. Surprisingly touching.
    3. The quietness of the crowds. There was a restraint very appropriate for HMQ.
    4. Very few people making the sign of the cross. I realise this is the Italian Catholic in me but I was taught that when you see a funeral cortège that's what you do and I always have done. Not a criticism of those not doing it. Just something I noticed.
    5. The commendable self-discipline of the police officers with their backs to the cortège and not turning round to get a look.

    And, finally, everyone raising their phones. I really do not get this. Why not experience the moment rather than think you can only experience it by trying to capture it (badly) on something the size of a postage stamp which I'll bet no-one ever looks at again.

    Probably I'm showing my age .....
    Good observations. Most of Scotland is rather presbyterian and, outside certain areas, making the sign of the cross would be considered strange.

    I think people feel obliged to capture seminal moments with their phones, believing that unless they do and share it with others then it never really happened. It is a sign of the times.
    It is the modern way of keeping up with the Jones’. Instead of that nice new car or holiday or kitchen that people would want to bore their neighbour about it’s that Instagram story or post that shows you’ve been doing something exciting or noteworthy, or bought something exciting or noteworthy, or are living your best life.

    It’s tedious, but I realised that once you disconnect from the social media platforms which most egregiously cater to this it improves your mental health tenfold.
  • Stuart’s purely subjective ranking of the party leaders. My assessment of their performance/effectiveness as leaders. Nothing to do with my opinion of their parties or policies.

    1. Ebba Busch (KD) 9/10, a superstar
    2. Jimmie Åkesson (SD), 9/10, the longest-serving leader and boy does that experience show
    3. Annie Lööf (C), 8/10, well-prepared and a clear communicator
    4. Nooshi Dadgostar (V) 7/10, one of the positive surprises of the campaign
    5. Prime minister Magdalena Andersson (S) 7/10, calm and dependable
    6. Ulf Kristersson (M) 4/10, dreadful strategist, but a decent communicator; irritating
    7. Johan Pehrson (L) 2/10, deary me; a giant of a man, he literally shouted down at one of the female party leaders during a leaders’ debate
    8. The two Green leaders 1/10, dunno their names; utterly invisible
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,259

    rcs1000 - Here's the first paragraph from a 1996 paper put out by Brookings: "Since 1970, out-of-wedlock birth rates have soared. In 1965, 24 percent of black infants and 3.1 percent of white infants were born to single mothers. By 1990 the rates had risen to 64 percent for black infants, 18 percent for whites. Every year about one million more children are born into fatherless families. If we have learned any policy lesson well over the past 25 years, it is that for children living in single-parent homes, the odds of living in poverty are great. The policy implications of the increase in out-of-wedlock births are staggering."
    source: https://www.brookings.edu/research/an-analysis-of-out-of-wedlock-births-in-the-united-states/

    (You may not have heard of the first author, George A. Akerlof, but you surely have heard of the second, Janet L. Yellen.)

    Rates have risen since then, as you can find out with a quick search.

    'Out of wedlock' is not the same as 'single parent'. I've only skimmed the article, but the authors seem to conflate the two throughout. Am I missing something, or is the entire premise of their piece, er. rubbish?

    The entire premise of their piece is 1996. Different times, different values.
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,873

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
    I'd regard education and technical expertise as very different things. The first is a potential route to acquiring the second - probably the most reliable route.

    Education is the process; technical expertise is often a desired outcome.
    La Thatch is a good example of this.

    Her first degree was in chemistry- was that a waste of time and money, or did it make her better at the the things she did next?
    Chemistry is an excellent base degree. High levels of critical thinking, logic etc plus a good foundation in how a lot of science works. In truth the nation doesn’t need that many practicing chemists, but that doesn’t mean we should have fewer chemistry graduates.
  • My surprise at the Macca story is simply that the Queen was into Twin Peaks.

    Would have thought it was a bit racy and weird for her, frankly. Had her down as more of a Corrie / Last of the Summer Wine / Midsomer Murders type.
  • rcs1000rcs1000 Posts: 53,766

    rcs1000 - Here's the first paragraph from a 1996 paper put out by Brookings: "Since 1970, out-of-wedlock birth rates have soared. In 1965, 24 percent of black infants and 3.1 percent of white infants were born to single mothers. By 1990 the rates had risen to 64 percent for black infants, 18 percent for whites. Every year about one million more children are born into fatherless families. If we have learned any policy lesson well over the past 25 years, it is that for children living in single-parent homes, the odds of living in poverty are great. The policy implications of the increase in out-of-wedlock births are staggering."
    source: https://www.brookings.edu/research/an-analysis-of-out-of-wedlock-births-in-the-united-states/

    (You may not have heard of the first author, George A. Akerlof, but you surely have heard of the second, Janet L. Yellen.)

    Rates have risen since then, as you can find out with a quick search.

    That in no way disagrees with what I said.

    In fact I specifically point out that the late 80s, early 90s was the worst point.

    You have missed, for example, the collapse in both teenage pregnancies (https://www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk/resource/teenage-pregnancy#background), or the collapse in the divorce rate both of which happened post 1990.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,111

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
    I'd regard education and technical expertise as very different things. The first is a potential route to acquiring the second - probably the most reliable route.

    Education is the process; technical expertise is often a desired outcome.
    La Thatch is a good example of this.

    Her first degree was in chemistry- was that a waste of time and money, or did it make her better at the the things she did next?
    Chemistry is an excellent base degree. High levels of critical thinking, logic etc plus a good foundation in how a lot of science works. In truth the nation doesn’t need that many practicing chemists, but that doesn’t mean we should have fewer chemistry graduates.
    Also, the Oxford BA [sic] in Chemistry had a 4 year course - 3 years 'normal' as the Part 1 and what was effectively a MSc by research in the Part 2, I seem to recall. No idea what happens now, though.
  • BenpointerBenpointer Posts: 31,259
    Carnyx said:

    geoffw said:

    Here's a mystery for those who followed the cortege from Balmoral to Holyrood House.

    When the hearse came out of the gates at Balmoral the side window displayed the name of funeral directors "William Purves". On arrival at Holyrood House this could no longer be seen. At what point in the journey was it removed?

    It may seen a bit nerdish to notice this, but we did because a daughter of the Purves family took piano lessons from my wife a couple of decades ago.

    Hah, William Purves buried my mother.
    I'm feeling all warm and royalisty now.
    We looked at them for my mum but ended up with the Co-op - who were fine.
    Somewhat disappointing the royal family didn't opt for the Co-op.
  • FishingFishing Posts: 4,555
    edited September 2022

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Sounds familiar. Someone rang into Radio 4 the other day with quite a convincing story that the Queen had told him The Full Monty was one of her favourite films, and that she used to watch it with her mother when it was raining, after he had made a joke s that the equerry's trousers with their velcro looked like stripper's trousers.

    Her viewing habits weren't elite. Don't forget her education was rarefied only on constitutional rather than cultural matters. A lot she simply learnt and absorbed herself from the thousands of people she was around, both everyday and elite.
    David Starkey of course infamously said the late Queen was poorly educated and philistine and uncomfortable with anyone intellectual
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2007/dec/22/monarchy.topstories3
    Starkey however thought King Charles was intellectually curious and a good speech maker, though he is less a fan of who he has called 'Woke William'

    https://www.express.co.uk/news/royal/1633768/gb-news-prince-william-woke-david-starkey-rwanda-ont
    He's certainly intellectually curious. Despite the appearances of dog and horse-only life, his father had a huge library, and intellectual interests, that he kept quiet about, and his mother was naturally bright. I don't think Charles was particularly academic while at Cambridge, but he was always interested in a lot of stuff. He developed his intellect a bit later on, around the time he got interested in architecture.
    He might get intellectual curiosity from his father. Once I was given a tour of LHR Terminal 5 before it opened for a job I was doing. The month before, they said they'd given the same tour to Prince Philip, who had been intensely interested, and had arranged to come back for another, longer tour a little later. They said that he was probably the most engaged and curious person they'd ever given a tour to.
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715
    edited September 2022
    Carnyx said:

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
    I'd regard education and technical expertise as very different things. The first is a potential route to acquiring the second - probably the most reliable route.

    Education is the process; technical expertise is often a desired outcome.
    La Thatch is a good example of this.

    Her first degree was in chemistry- was that a waste of time and money, or did it make her better at the the things she did next?
    Chemistry is an excellent base degree. High levels of critical thinking, logic etc plus a good foundation in how a lot of science works. In truth the nation doesn’t need that many practicing chemists, but that doesn’t mean we should have fewer chemistry graduates.
    Also, the Oxford BA [sic] in Chemistry had a 4 year course - 3 years 'normal' as the Part 1 and what was effectively a MSc by research in the Part 2, I seem to recall. No idea what happens now, though.
    About the only thing I remember from A-level chemistry is that we had to make various substances, and take samples of them to supply to the examiners. Among the ones we had to make was alcohol and we were encouraged to bring orange juice into school to drink with that which wasn't required as for sampling!
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,873

    Carnyx said:

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
    I'd regard education and technical expertise as very different things. The first is a potential route to acquiring the second - probably the most reliable route.

    Education is the process; technical expertise is often a desired outcome.
    La Thatch is a good example of this.

    Her first degree was in chemistry- was that a waste of time and money, or did it make her better at the the things she did next?
    Chemistry is an excellent base degree. High levels of critical thinking, logic etc plus a good foundation in how a lot of science works. In truth the nation doesn’t need that many practicing chemists, but that doesn’t mean we should have fewer chemistry graduates.
    Also, the Oxford BA [sic] in Chemistry had a 4 year course - 3 years 'normal' as the Part 1 and what was effectively a MSc by research in the Part 2, I seem to recall. No idea what happens now, though.
    About the only thing I remember from A-level chemistry is that we had to make various substances, and take samples of them to supply to the examiners. Among the ones we had to make was alcohol and we were allowed to bring orange juice into school to drink with that which wasn't required as for sampling!
    Different times, OKC. Never sign the risk assessment for that today.
  • Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack
    aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
    I'd regard education and technical expertise as very different things. The first is a potential route to acquiring the second - probably the most reliable route.

    Education is the process; technical
    expertise is often a desired outcome.
    La Thatch is a good example of this.

    Her first degree was in chemistry- was that a waste of time and money, or did it make her better at the the things she did next?
    Chemistry is an excellent base degree. High levels of critical thinking, logic etc plus a good foundation in how a lot of science works. In truth the nation doesn’t need that many practicing chemists, but that doesn’t mean we should have fewer chemistry graduates.
    Hear, hear
  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415

    Good afternoon

    Catching up on the thread I have been attacked by @Gardenwalker for having to have the temerity to point out the misleading nature of Starmer's 6 month energy offer and by @Mexicanpete over beergate

    As far as Starmer and labour are concerned they do not get a free pass and indeed those who are really knowledgeable on the subject have called out the reliance on the windfall tax including @Richard_Tyndall who works in the industry

    It is a myth that I said Starmer's beergate was a million miles worse than Johnson and indeed I did not say he was guilty of an offence. Beergate was discussed by many on here and it was entirely appropriate Durham Police investigated it and I'm sure nobody questions their decision

    I do find at times this forum is almost like a NEC meeting with no tolerance of dissenting views of Starmer and labour, and I am sure that would be a terrible thing to happen

    I sought Johnson's loss of office for months and finally now Truss is PM of course I support her and will not give Starmer or labour a free pass

    I do my best to be honest and if wrong I do apologise

    Maybe I do not need to defend myself but things were said this pm when I was not present that were personal and an exaggeration so I wanted to put the record straight

    No harm in being Chief PB Cheerleader for Truss. Some of the rest of us are not quite on that page yet.
    It's hilarious to read the ramping after her being PM for less than a week!

    Remember this lot saying they might vote Labour! ROFL :D
    I did vote Labour previously and talking of ramping is surreal coming from Starmer's chief of ramping on here
    The Lady’s not for Taxing? My Arse 🍑

    Truss policies for weak public finances REEK and SCREAM future tax hikes and high energy bills for households and business for decades.

    I’m not the one trying to mislead everyone with their postings - no Lizgasm or spin from me, I’m the one playing this situation straight.

    Plagues on BOTH you two spinners 😝
  • OldKingColeOldKingCole Posts: 31,715

    Carnyx said:

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
    I'd regard education and technical expertise as very different things. The first is a potential route to acquiring the second - probably the most reliable route.

    Education is the process; technical expertise is often a desired outcome.
    La Thatch is a good example of this.

    Her first degree was in chemistry- was that a waste of time and money, or did it make her better at the the things she did next?
    Chemistry is an excellent base degree. High levels of critical thinking, logic etc plus a good foundation in how a lot of science works. In truth the nation doesn’t need that many practicing chemists, but that doesn’t mean we should have fewer chemistry graduates.
    Also, the Oxford BA [sic] in Chemistry had a 4 year course - 3 years 'normal' as the Part 1 and what was effectively a MSc by research in the Part 2, I seem to recall. No idea what happens now, though.
    About the only thing I remember from A-level chemistry is that we had to make various substances, and take samples of them to supply to the examiners. Among the ones we had to make was alcohol and we were allowed to bring orange juice into school to drink with that which wasn't required as for sampling!
    Different times, OKC. Never sign the risk assessment for that today.
    Sad!
  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415

    Good afternoon

    Catching up on the thread I have been attacked by @Gardenwalker for having to have the temerity to point out the misleading nature of Starmer's 6 month energy offer and by @Mexicanpete over beergate

    As far as Starmer and labour are concerned they do not get a free pass and indeed those who are really knowledgeable on the subject have called out the reliance on the windfall tax including @Richard_Tyndall who works in the industry

    It is a myth that I said Starmer's beergate was a million miles worse than Johnson and indeed I did not say he was guilty of an offence. Beergate was discussed by many on here and it was entirely appropriate Durham Police investigated it and I'm sure nobody questions their decision

    I do find at times this forum is almost like a NEC meeting with no tolerance of dissenting views of Starmer and labour, and I am sure that would be a terrible thing to happen

    I sought Johnson's loss of office for months and finally now Truss is PM of course I support her and will not give Starmer or labour a free pass

    I do my best to be honest and if wrong I do apologise

    Maybe I do not need to defend myself but things were said this pm when I was not present that were personal and an exaggeration so I wanted to put the record straight

    No harm in being Chief PB Cheerleader for Truss. Some of the rest of us are not quite on that page yet.
    It's hilarious to read the ramping after her being PM for less than a week!

    Remember this lot saying they might vote Labour! ROFL :D
    I did vote Labour previously and talking of ramping is surreal coming from Starmer's chief of ramping on here
    The Lady’s not for Taxing? My Arse 🍑

    Truss policies for weak public finances REEK and SCREAM future tax hikes and high energy bills for households and business for decades.

    I’m not the one trying to mislead everyone with their postings - no Lizgasm or spin from me, I’m the one playing this situation straight.

    Plagues on BOTH you two spinners 😝
    I don’t actually mean real plague, it’s just figure of speech.

    I love you both really - the more silly the spin is, the more funny it is to read 😘
  • Good afternoon

    Catching up on the thread I have been attacked by @Gardenwalker for having to have the temerity to point out the misleading nature of Starmer's 6 month energy offer and by @Mexicanpete over beergate

    As far as Starmer and labour are concerned they do not get a free pass and indeed those who are really knowledgeable on the subject have called out the reliance on the windfall tax including @Richard_Tyndall who works in the industry

    It is a myth that I said Starmer's beergate was a million miles worse than Johnson and indeed I did not say he was guilty of an offence. Beergate was discussed by many on here and it was entirely appropriate Durham Police investigated it and I'm sure nobody questions their decision

    I do find at times this forum is almost like a NEC meeting with no tolerance of dissenting views of Starmer and labour, and I am sure that would be a terrible thing to happen

    I sought Johnson's loss of office for months and finally now Truss is PM of course I support her and will not give Starmer or labour a free pass

    I do my best to be honest and if wrong I do apologise

    Maybe I do not need to defend myself but things were said this pm when I was not present that were personal and an exaggeration so I wanted to put the record straight

    No harm in being Chief PB Cheerleader for Truss. Some of the rest of us are not quite on that page yet.
    It's hilarious to read the ramping after her being PM for less than a week!

    Remember this lot saying they might vote Labour! ROFL :D
    I did vote Labour previously and talking of ramping is surreal coming from Starmer's chief of ramping on here
    The Lady’s not for Taxing? My Arse 🍑

    Truss policies for weak public finances REEK and SCREAM future tax hikes and high energy bills for households and business for decades.

    I’m not the one trying to mislead everyone with their postings - no Lizgasm or spin from me, I’m the one playing this situation straight.

    Plagues on BOTH you two spinners 😝
    Moon at least we're not pretending. You pretend you're a leftie but you're not, let's be honest.
  • Good afternoon

    Catching up on the thread I have been attacked by @Gardenwalker for having to have the temerity to point out the misleading nature of Starmer's 6 month energy offer and by @Mexicanpete over beergate

    As far as Starmer and labour are concerned they do not get a free pass and indeed those who are really knowledgeable on the subject have called out the reliance on the windfall tax including @Richard_Tyndall who works in the industry

    It is a myth that I said Starmer's beergate was a million miles worse than Johnson and indeed I did not say he was guilty of an offence. Beergate was discussed by many on here and it was entirely appropriate Durham Police investigated it and I'm sure nobody questions their decision

    I do find at times this forum is almost like a NEC meeting with no tolerance of dissenting views of Starmer and labour, and I am sure that would be a terrible thing to happen

    I sought Johnson's loss of office for months and finally now Truss is PM of course I support her and will not give Starmer or labour a free pass

    I do my best to be honest and if wrong I do apologise

    Maybe I do not need to defend myself but things were said this pm when I was not present that were personal and an exaggeration so I wanted to put the record straight

    No harm in being Chief PB Cheerleader for Truss. Some of the rest of us are not quite on that page yet.
    It's hilarious to read the ramping after her being PM for less than a week!

    Remember this lot saying they might vote Labour! ROFL :D
    I did vote Labour previously and talking of ramping is surreal coming from Starmer's chief of ramping on here
    The Lady’s not for Taxing? My Arse 🍑

    Truss policies for weak public finances REEK and SCREAM future tax hikes and high energy bills for households and business for decades.

    I’m not the one trying to mislead everyone with their postings - no Lizgasm or spin from me, I’m the one playing this situation straight.

    Plagues on BOTH you two spinners 😝
    You are entitled to your opinion but others are available and we simply do not agree and there we are
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,873

    Carnyx said:

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
    I'd regard education and technical expertise as very different things. The first is a potential route to acquiring the second - probably the most reliable route.

    Education is the process; technical expertise is often a desired outcome.
    La Thatch is a good example of this.

    Her first degree was in chemistry- was that a waste of time and money, or did it make her better at the the things she did next?
    Chemistry is an excellent base degree. High levels of critical thinking, logic etc plus a good foundation in how a lot of science works. In truth the nation doesn’t need that many practicing chemists, but that doesn’t mean we should have fewer chemistry graduates.
    Also, the Oxford BA [sic] in Chemistry had a 4 year course - 3 years 'normal' as the Part 1 and what was effectively a MSc by research in the Part 2, I seem to recall. No idea what happens now, though.
    About the only thing I remember from A-level chemistry is that we had to make various substances, and take samples of them to supply to the examiners. Among the ones we had to make was alcohol and we were allowed to bring orange juice into school to drink with that which wasn't required as for sampling!
    Different times, OKC. Never sign the risk assessment for that today.
    Sad!
    One of my current projects is synthesising artificial capsaicins (the hot component in chillies). They are showing some promise in breast cancer screening assays, but really I want to to put them in a chilli and eat the buggers…

    No matter how careful I am in the lab, you always know you’ve made a capsaicin by the tingle on your lips. And that’s with wearing all the appropriate PPE.
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,111

    Carnyx said:

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
    I'd regard education and technical expertise as very different things. The first is a potential route to acquiring the second - probably the most reliable route.

    Education is the process; technical expertise is often a desired outcome.
    La Thatch is a good example of this.

    Her first degree was in chemistry- was that a waste of time and money, or did it make her better at the the things she did next?
    Chemistry is an excellent base degree. High levels of critical thinking, logic etc plus a good foundation in how a lot of science works. In truth the nation doesn’t need that many practicing chemists, but that doesn’t mean we should have fewer chemistry graduates.
    Also, the Oxford BA [sic] in Chemistry had a 4 year course - 3 years 'normal' as the Part 1 and what was effectively a MSc by research in the Part 2, I seem to recall. No idea what happens now, though.
    About the only thing I remember from A-level chemistry is that we had to make various substances, and take samples of them to supply to the examiners. Among the ones we had to make was alcohol and we were allowed to bring orange juice into school to drink with that which wasn't required as for sampling!
    Different times, OKC. Never sign the risk assessment for that today.
    Sad!
    One of my current projects is synthesising artificial capsaicins (the hot component in chillies). They are showing some promise in breast cancer screening assays, but really I want to to put them in a chilli and eat the buggers…

    No matter how careful I am in the lab, you always know you’ve made a capsaicin by the tingle on your lips. And that’s with wearing all the appropriate PPE.
    Hmm, eating them would be quite the bioassay - three, four or five-ring grade?
  • Jim_MillerJim_Miller Posts: 2,395
    rcs1000 - Jim Miller said: "IN THE US, life is worse for young people now than it was in the fifties, sixties, seventies, and eighties -- in some ways. And better in other ways.

    The most important way it is worse HERE is the breakdown of families. A young person is far less [likely] to have had two parents in their lives while growing up, than a young person would have IN THE FIFTIES, AND Even MOST OF The SIXTIES."
    (I bolded some of the original to make it easier to see what I said, originally.)
  • nico679nico679 Posts: 4,530
    edited September 2022
    Am I the only one who doesn’t think much of the pic of the Queen the BBC use . I don’t think it really looks like her . There were many better pics they could have used .
  • DoubleCarpetDoubleCarpet Posts: 703
    edited September 2022
    Sweden

    Good evening, I hope you are all keeping well.

    For anyone following the election, please see links below - polls close 8pm local, 7pm UK and thanks Stuart for your updates.

    https://resultat.val.se/val2022/prel/RD/rike

    https://www.svtplay.se/video/36475935/val-2022-valvakan/val-2022-valvakan-11-sep-18-15?position=2536&id=j1yM6VV (click Spela)

    https://tv.aftonbladet.se/video/346156/aftonbladets-valvaka-2022

    Also, is anyone else thinking of going to the lying in state? A former Black Rod on R5 yesterday said he thought the queue might start near Tower Bridge! - so my gut feeling is maybe a 3-6 hour wait, but maybe longer who knows? I only queued for about 30 mins in 2002 to see the Queen Mother but this is clearly on a much bigger scale and apparently 1m people saw George VI's coffin in 1952.

    Thanks,

    DC
  • turbotubbsturbotubbs Posts: 14,873
    Carnyx said:

    Carnyx said:

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
    I'd regard education and technical expertise as very different things. The first is a potential route to acquiring the second - probably the most reliable route.

    Education is the process; technical expertise is often a desired outcome.
    La Thatch is a good example of this.

    Her first degree was in chemistry- was that a waste of time and money, or did it make her better at the the things she did next?
    Chemistry is an excellent base degree. High levels of critical thinking, logic etc plus a good foundation in how a lot of science works. In truth the nation doesn’t need that many practicing chemists, but that doesn’t mean we should have fewer chemistry graduates.
    Also, the Oxford BA [sic] in Chemistry had a 4 year course - 3 years 'normal' as the Part 1 and what was effectively a MSc by research in the Part 2, I seem to recall. No idea what happens now, though.
    About the only thing I remember from A-level chemistry is that we had to make various substances, and take samples of them to supply to the examiners. Among the ones we had to make was alcohol and we were allowed to bring orange juice into school to drink with that which wasn't required as for sampling!
    Different times, OKC. Never sign the risk assessment for that today.
    Sad!
    One of my current projects is synthesising artificial capsaicins (the hot component in chillies). They are showing some promise in breast cancer screening assays, but really I want to to put them in a chilli and eat the buggers…

    No matter how careful I am in the lab, you always know you’ve made a capsaicin by the tingle on your lips. And that’s with wearing all the appropriate PPE.
    Hmm, eating them would be quite the bioassay - three, four or five-ring grade?
    Only one ring would matter…
  • FlatlanderFlatlander Posts: 3,853
    edited September 2022

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
    I'd regard education and technical expertise as very different things. The first is a potential route to acquiring the second - probably the most reliable route.

    Education is the process; technical expertise is often a desired outcome.
    La Thatch is a good example of this.

    Her first degree was in chemistry- was that a waste of time and money, or did it make her better at the the things she did next?
    I thought she worked doing food chemistry for a while? Although a formal chemistry degree probably wasn't that useful there either.
  • IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    nico679 said:

    Am I the only one who doesn’t think much of the pic of the Queen the BBC use . I don’t think it really looks like her . There were many better pics they could have used .

    The comedy hat with small dead animals on the brim? not great
  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,111
    edited September 2022

    Foxy said:

    Foxy said:

    Chris said:

    Chris said:

    re the topic, here's a thought. The single biggest driver of this is the push towards higher education amongst the young and its ripple effect.

    We've sold young people a lie, namely that if you get a degree, it's the route to riches. That was always going to be impossible given the natural small number of high paying jobs out there. All we have done is created a sullen class of individuals who are in debt, feel they have been cheated and, worse, because they view themselves as superior in knowledge, believe their views are right and that they must be accommodated to.

    In addition, those who didn't go to university are made to feel worthless, shut out of many careers even those such as nursing which they could have done before.

    Contrast that with a few decades back. If you left school at 16, you weren't automatically thought a failure. In fact, it was seen as the default in many cases. You found yourself a job and trade, and you made your own life (in many cases).

    Reverse this stupid obsession with pushing people to Higher Education.

    You might just as well say "Reverse the second
    law of thermodynamics" unfortunately.
    The problem isn’t university degrees. It is the belief that all university degrees lead to a high paid, pure white collar job.

    There are now many more mixed-mode jobs , requiring both intellectual and physical skills. In addition the pay and social class issues against such jobs have greatly changed.
    As someone actually in that generation, university isn't seen by young people as some kind of pathway to easy money, it's pretty much a basic requirement for most jobs beyond stacking shelves or delivering takeaways. If you want to be a police officer, teacher, civil servant, accountant, whatever, you need a degree. If you don't have a degree, you'll be at a disadvantage when applying for work compared
    to the 50% of your cohort who do.
    That's the problem in a nutshell.

    Go back even 30 years ago, there were many jobs that offered a decent career where you didn't need a degree.

    Hell, go back further and, with jobs like accountancy and law, it was not uncommon for people to leave school at 16, start at the bottom and then become partners. As others have said, for many jobs, it's on the job learning that counts.

    That's all gone. Now, as you said, to even be considered, you need a degree. It's become a negative motivating factor, rather than a positive ie you need to have one to avoid being blocked, not because it gives you an inherent advantage.

    And I understand completely why young people today need to do one.



    And so we throw a huge amount of resources down the drain - resources that are sorely needed for more worthwhile things (not least retraining people later in their careers) - in giving so many young people three years of (for the most part) utterly irrelevant higher education, because we've trapped ourselves in a vicious circle - in which people are arbitrarily ruled out of 50% of careers, not because they lack aptitude or ability, but purely because they haven't spent three years of their lives in higher education.
    I am as opposed to education as anyone, but just because something has not had a monetary return doesn't make it pointless.

    Students learn their subject, and critical thinking, but also broaden their minds, sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles, experiment with life generally, often having the best time in their lives.
    "I am as opposed to education as anyone" seems a strange statement.

    Then again your second para throws up some issues. All those things may be well and good but what about the majority who don'e get that opportunity to "sow wild oats, learn to live with others, try alternative lifestyles" etc.?
    Oh, I am famously anti-education. I see it as a form of social control and indoctrination into a narrow world view. Almost all of my interests have developed through self exploration of ideas, without being burdened by being taught. I see the teacher -pupil relationship as fundamentally socially wrong.

    Despite this, I have had a successful career in Medical Education and have strongly positive feedback as a trainer!
    Perhaps I am misunderstanding but imagine a world where only a small minority were taught to read.

    Universal education is a must for any society that aspires to a degree of equality.
    Education and technical expertise are not necessarily the same thing! Nor are they necessarily acquired simultaneously!
    I'd regard education and technical expertise as very different things. The first is a potential route to acquiring the second - probably the most reliable route.

    Education is the process; technical expertise is often a desired outcome.
    La Thatch is a good example of this.

    Her first degree was in chemistry- was that a waste of time and money, or did it make her better at the the things she did next?
    I thought she worked doing food chemistry for a while?
    She did. Worked for Lyon the food firm. Helped to develop Mr Whippy ice cream mix, I think. A rather curious taste sensation, as I recall.

    PS The formal degree would have been needed for good lab practice, study design, and general notion what was happening chemically. So not wasted at all.
  • MoonRabbitMoonRabbit Posts: 12,415
    edited September 2022

    Good afternoon

    Catching up on the thread I have been attacked by @Gardenwalker for having to have the temerity to point out the misleading nature of Starmer's 6 month energy offer and by @Mexicanpete over beergate

    As far as Starmer and labour are concerned they do not get a free pass and indeed those who are really knowledgeable on the subject have called out the reliance on the windfall tax including @Richard_Tyndall who works in the industry

    It is a myth that I said Starmer's beergate was a million miles worse than Johnson and indeed I did not say he was guilty of an offence. Beergate was discussed by many on here and it was entirely appropriate Durham Police investigated it and I'm sure nobody questions their decision

    I do find at times this forum is almost like a NEC meeting with no tolerance of dissenting views of Starmer and labour, and I am sure that would be a terrible thing to happen

    I sought Johnson's loss of office for months and finally now Truss is PM of course I support her and will not give Starmer or labour a free pass

    I do my best to be honest and if wrong I do apologise

    Maybe I do not need to defend myself but things were said this pm when I was not present that were personal and an exaggeration so I wanted to put the record straight

    No harm in being Chief PB Cheerleader for Truss. Some of the rest of us are not quite on that page yet.
    It's hilarious to read the ramping after her being PM for less than a week!

    Remember this lot saying they might vote Labour! ROFL :D
    I did vote Labour previously and talking of ramping is surreal coming from Starmer's chief of ramping on here
    The Lady’s not for Taxing? My Arse 🍑

    Truss policies for weak public finances REEK and SCREAM future tax hikes and high energy bills for households and business for decades.

    I’m not the one trying to mislead everyone with their postings - no Lizgasm or spin from me, I’m the one playing this situation straight.

    Plagues on BOTH you two spinners 😝
    Moon at least we're not pretending. You pretend you're a leftie but you're not, let's be honest.
    I’m very confident in my own mind I am posting honest. There is a lot more to politics than left right. When I was banned you rightly pointed out have I never praised Johnson or his rubbish cabinet.

    I could seem to be a bit all over the road but maybe you assume too much all the anti Tory coalition today are the same thing on the same side. They are not, they wouldn’t be passionate about their different parties if they were.

    People socialised as Conservatives and voted Conservative can be avoiding Boris and Liz and voting Lib Dem right now. There is a big difference between Conservative ideology and right wing populism ideology and it’s poles apart.

    Right wing Populism pushes the idea of popular sovereignty above the independence of democratic institutions, and the professionalism of the representatives of those institutions, conservatism does not. populism like Trump and Boris are populist opportunism masquerading as values and agenda for government, a crusading ideology pretending it is the voice of all the people, undemocratically deaf to anyone with a different view. They have hi jacked conservatism in UK, and are trashing it. Instead of listening to criticism from CoE like Rwanda policy for example they instinctively attack the CoE, that is not UK conservatism. Likewise their undermining of civil service and attack on all the counterbalances of power - this too is not UK Conservatism.

    Meanwhile, strong in my Christian values - I am currently now in three and a half unpaid volunteering schemes - ideas like “beware apartheid of the pocket” from Lord David Steel, means I am very happy to be voting Lib Dem and supporting their policies. Apart from the Energy Bill Freeze Policy - I’m absolutely convinced now it’s the wrong road to go.
  • Jim_MillerJim_Miller Posts: 2,395
    James Doyle asked: "'Out of wedlock' is not the same as 'single parent'. I've only skimmed the article, but the authors seem to conflate the two throughout. Am I missing something, or is the entire premise of their piece, er. rubbish?"

    The two are correlated, though less strongly than they once were. You can find many US numbers in this Pew study:
    https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2018/04/25/the-changing-profile-of-unmarried-parents/
    For example: "The rise over the past half-century in the share of all U.S. parents who are unmarried and living with a child younger than 18 has been driven by increases in all types of unmarried parents. In 1968, only 1% of all parents were solo fathers; that figure has risen to 3%. At the same time, the share of all parents who are solo mothers has doubled, from 7% up to 13%. Since 1997, the first year for which data on cohabitation are available, the share of parents that are cohabiting has risen from 4% to 9%."
  • Alan Partridge wasn’t based in Norwich for nothing.


  • Alan Partridge wasn’t based in Norwich for nothing.


    It's what the Queen would have wanted, like the pedestrianisation of Norwich City Centre.
  • DynamoDynamo Posts: 651
    edited September 2022

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Interesting story I heard last night.

    Some time in the early 90s, Paul McCartney was lined up to play a private performance at Buckingham Palace, perhaps for some kind of reception.

    Paul met the Queen beforehand and said he would be playing later in the evening, and would she be in the audience?

    Oh no, said the Queen, it’ll be 8pm. I’ll be watching Twin Peaks.

    Sounds like absolute bollocks, but was related by Angelo Badalamenti based on a story from Macca himself.

    Sounds familiar. Someone rang into Radio 4 the other day with quite a convincing story that the Queen had told him The Full Monty was one of her favourite films, and that she used to watch it with her mother when it was raining, after he had made a joke s that the equerry's trousers with their velcro looked like stripper's trousers.

    Her viewing habits weren't elite. Don't forget her education was rarefied only on constitutional rather than cultural matters. A lot she simply learnt and absorbed herself from the thousands of people she was around, both everyday and elite.
    David Starkey of course infamously said the late Queen was poorly educated and philistine and uncomfortable with anyone intellectual
    https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2007/dec/22/monarchy.topstories3
    Starkey however thought King Charles was intellectually curious and a good speech maker, though he is less a fan of who he has called 'Woke William'

    https://www.express.co.uk/news/royal/1633768/gb-news-prince-william-woke-david-starkey-rwanda-ont
    He's certainly intellectually curious. Despite the appearances of dog and horse-only life, his father had a huge library, and intellectual interests, that he kept quiet about, and his mother was naturally bright. I don't think Charles was particularly academic while at Cambridge, but he was always interested in a lot of stuff. He developed his intellect a bit later on, around the time he got interested in architecture.
    Nobody serious takes Starkey the Sycophant seriously. He's a pantomime character.

    As for Charles the King, would his "intellect" have developed before or after he wrote his ludicrous 2010 book "Harmony" in which he claims that the ratio between some function or other of planetary orbits being so close to the golden section makes a strong case for design? (I posted copies of those pages here a few days ago.) In 2010 the man was 62. He graduated (with a lower second) when he was 21.

    I remember looking at the ratio and it was about 2% out. Many statements have been written about the pyramid complex at Giza, just to take one example, which check out much more closely than that. Archaeoastronomy is an interesting field, but way above that guy's head because he doesn't have the mind to distinguish between what's meaningful and what's probably coincidence. He has no intellect. He just goes "oh wow". He's a moron.

    His eyes glinted when he used the word "harmony" in his recent declaration, which he placed between "peace" and "prosperity". It was as if he was saying, "You think I'm an idiot? You laugh at me, you think I'm simple-minded? Well, I'm going to show you some harmony now, you c***s. You can't stop me!"

  • Big_G_NorthWalesBig_G_NorthWales Posts: 60,001
    edited September 2022

    Good afternoon

    Catching up on the thread I have been attacked by @Gardenwalker for having to have the temerity to point out the misleading nature of Starmer's 6 month energy offer and by @Mexicanpete over beergate

    As far as Starmer and labour are concerned they do not get a free pass and indeed those who are really knowledgeable on the subject have called out the reliance on the windfall tax including @Richard_Tyndall who works in the industry

    It is a myth that I said Starmer's beergate was a million miles worse than Johnson and indeed I did not say he was guilty of an offence. Beergate was discussed by many on here and it was entirely appropriate Durham Police investigated it and I'm sure nobody questions their decision

    I do find at times this forum is almost like a NEC meeting with no tolerance of dissenting views of Starmer and labour, and I am sure that would be a terrible thing to happen

    I sought Johnson's loss of office for months and finally now Truss is PM of course I support her and will not give Starmer or labour a free pass

    I do my best to be honest and if wrong I do apologise

    Maybe I do not need to defend myself but things were said this pm when I was not present that were personal and an exaggeration so I wanted to put the record straight

    No harm in being Chief PB Cheerleader for Truss. Some of the rest of us are not quite on that page yet.
    It's hilarious to read the ramping after her being PM for less than a week!

    Remember this lot saying they might vote Labour! ROFL :D
    I did vote Labour previously and talking of ramping is surreal coming from Starmer's chief of ramping on here
    The Lady’s not for Taxing? My Arse 🍑

    Truss policies for weak public finances REEK and SCREAM future tax hikes and high energy bills for households and business for decades.

    I’m not the one trying to mislead everyone with their postings - no Lizgasm or spin from me, I’m the one playing this situation straight.

    Plagues on BOTH you two spinners 😝
    Moon at least we're not pretending. You pretend you're a leftie but you're not, let's be honest.
    I’m very confident in my own mind I am posting honest. There is a lot more to politics than left right. When I was banned you rightly pointed out have I never praised Johnson or his rubbish cabinet.

    I could seem to be a bit all over the road but maybe you assume too much all the anti Tory coalition today are the same thing on the same side. They are not, they wouldn’t be passionate about their different parties if they were.

    People socialised as Conservatives and voted Conservative can be avoiding Boris and Liz and voting Lib Dem right now. There is a big difference between Conservative ideology and right wing populism ideology and it’s poles apart.

    Right wing Populism pushes the idea of popular sovereignty above the independence of democratic institutions, and the professionalism of the representatives of those institutions, conservatism does not. populism like Trump and Boris are populist opportunism masquerading as values and agenda for government, a crusading ideology pretending it is the voice of all the people, undemocratically deaf to anyone with a different view. They have hi jacked conservatism in UK, and are trashing it. Instead of listening to criticism from CoE like Rwanda policy for example they instinctively attack the CoE, that is not UK conservatism. Likewise their undermining of civil service and attack on all the counterbalances of power - this too is not UK Conservatism.

    Meanwhile, strong in my Christian values - I am currently now in three and a half unpaid volunteering schemes - ideas like “beware apartheid of the pocket” from Lord David Steel, means I am very happy to be voting Lib Dem and supporting their policies. Apart from the Energy Bill Freeze Policy - I’m absolutely convinced now it’s the wrong road to go.
    I would never question your honesty and I have long considered you to be a lib dem

    However, equally I post as honestly as I can and it is important for serious debate posters honesty is not really on the line but a political view point which ranges from far right to far left

    I expect neither of us are far from the centre in truth

  • CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,111

    Alan Partridge wasn’t based in Norwich for nothing.


    Very dignified.

    Just been reading John Harris in the Graun, btw, doing his on the road travels thing again (he was rather good on indyref and Brexit): very open ended conclusion:

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/sep/11/queen-death-elizabethan-britain

    "In all the coverage of the Queen’s passing, one simple historical point has been noticeably missing, perhaps because it is deemed too awkward to talk about. At the time of her coronation, the idea of a tightly bound national community with the monarch at its apex made an appealing kind of sense. [...]

    And now? The social attitudes that defined that period, and lingered into the 1990s – a strange mixture of solidarity and deference, and a widely shared optimism about the future – seem very quaint. If you are in your late teens, just about all of your memories will be of the endless turbulence that followed the financial crash of 2008. Your most visceral experience of politics will have been the opposite of consensus and harmony: the seething polarisation triggered by Brexit. For many of those aged under 40, homeownership is a distant dream, and hopes of job security seem slim. Meanwhile, perhaps because society and the economy have been in such a state of flux, space has at last been opened to talk about things that 20th-century Britain stubbornly kept under wraps: empire, systemic racism, the plain fact that so many of the institutions we are still encouraged to revere are rooted in some of the most appalling aspects of this country’s history.

    The result of that change is a kingdom with two distinct sets of voices: one that reflects Britain’s tendency to conservatism and tradition, and another that sounds altogether more irreverent and questioning. In all the coverage of the Queen’s passing, the first has been dominant: how could it be otherwise? But as the period of mourning recedes, and a new monarch tries to adapt fantastically challenging realities, that may not hold for long. The post-Elizabethan age, in other words, is going to be very interesting indeed."
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