“the English word civilisation comes from the 16th-century French civilisé ("civilized"), from Latin civilis ("civil"), related to civis ("citizen") and civitas ("city").”
If we let our cities die, then our civilisation dies with it
Get back in the office you fucking plebs
Says the man who by his own admission has never done a day's work in an office in his life. 🤔
Clearly I am being provocative
But the sad emptiness of central Denver does strike me as a real problem. We may have casually made a tragic mistake by moving to WFH without working out the consequences
Plus, if my experience of the Inland Revenue is anything to go by then WFH is a calamity for productivity
If you lived in Colorado though, with some of the most beautiful natural scenery in the world, would you really want to work in Denver every day rather than work at home and admire the view? If you want a big city lifestyle you would move to New York or Chicago or LA
But they don’t live up in the sometimes-lovely mountains. They all live in endless identikit suburbs that sprawl around Denver city/downtown. I’ve seen them. Sometimes they come in at night to drink but by day it is a zombie city and - so the guide told me - city businesses that held out during the pandemic hoping things would return are now giving up
A culture that abandons its city centres is in secular decline. It’s what happened to Roman Britain in the 4th century just before Rome quit for good
It’s paradoxical. Americans all say they want a lovable walkable city that is more like Europe. But they don’t do anything to make that happen, they do the opposite. And they insist on driving private cars, which ultimately kills cities
The contrast with happily bustling central Seville a few weeks ago is stark
Try NYC on an average weeknight or afternoon and it would still be bustling I expect. As I said, Denver is just the biggest city in Colorado, it is not a global metropolis
But how much of that in NYC is tourists? That's treating a city as a museum exhibit to be gawked at, rather than a real living thing.
I know that of my family in NYC quite a few of them are still working at home a fair bit. It's definitely a change. Not convinced that it's the death of western civilisation that Leon thinks it is, but I have no problem admitting to being frequently wrong.
NYC is ever bustling but also incredibly noisy and very dirty. Nice to visit, to live - not so sure.
When comparing US and European stats, don’t be misled by the average. Always ask to see the comparison of the medians. Therein lies the story.
Philip Blond is utterly deluded. The Tories the Party of the working class? My arse.
Sheffield Hallam and Hampstead are Labour seats. West Bromwich and Stoke-on-Trent are Tory seats atm.
Hampstead is the weirdest seat in the country...rich but full of virtue seeking woke liberals who use virtue seeking about gender and race to cover for their guilt about the tremendous class inequality Hampstead represents
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
Drones, grifters, egoists, apparatchiks & other assorted dross were around then and still are off course.
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
A little of it might be down to us getting older and grumpier and not liking being ruled by youngsters, for sure.
But dig out recordings of parliamentary debates or election campaigns or political TV programmes from 40 or 50 years ago and it immediately strikes you how today things are so dumbed down.
In the end I guess the market will determine if WFH is the future. Societies that WFH will prosper or not against societies that keep a more traditional work structure with buzzing city centres
My bet is that the more traditional arrangement will prove the more productive. People need people for ideas
But it’s an enormous and unprecedented experiment and no one can do more than guess
I have no desire to snort heroin off a 19 year old hooker's naked body, and I would regard such behaviour as tawdry and boorish, but believe people should have the freedom to do that, so long as everyone is a consenting adult.
Not even a little? I did more or less this just to say I'd done it and don't regret it a bit.
If you lived in Colorado though, with some of the most beautiful natural scenery in the world, would you really want to work in Denver every day rather than work at home and admire the view? If you want a big city lifestyle you would move to New York or Chicago or LA
Denver exists for people who like to spend their entire time in the mountains, but have day jobs.
Almost everyone I know there has a second place - usually just a two or three room cabin - out in the mountains.
Seattle is quite similar. With boating as alternative to mountaineering.
Also similar issue regarding downtown.
Though we do get a LOT of tourists, most visibly in relation to cruise ships to Alaska & back. Their returning to business has helped downtown SEA.
BTW, Leon, have you been to the State Capitol yet? Always wanted to go there & stand at the Mile High marker!
I went in 2011
Good for you, dude! AND was it as thrilling as you'd always imagined it would be?
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
Drones, grifters, egoists, apparatchiks & other assorted dross were around then and still are off course.
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
Yes compare nigel lawson with say george osborne...lawson was a serious economic thinker who actually wrote a great book the view from no 11
In the end I guess the market will determine if WFH is the future. Societies that WFH will prosper or not against societies that keep a more traditional work structure with buzzing city centres
My bet is that the more traditional arrangement will prove the more productive. People need people for ideas
But it’s an enormous and unprecedented experiment and no one can do more than guess
The productivity benefits of waiting on a dark station platform as your second Southern train is cancelled are overrated in my opinion.
“the English word civilisation comes from the 16th-century French civilisé ("civilized"), from Latin civilis ("civil"), related to civis ("citizen") and civitas ("city").”
If we let our cities die, then our civilisation dies with it
Get back in the office you fucking plebs
Who knew civilization was so tied to the survival of the sandwich bar?
Great cities need to transition to being centres of tourism, not work.
At least the very worse off are getting a Brexit payrise, though.
Do you have the same chart for Greeks, Germans and other Europeans?
Its entirely possible that people are having both a Brexit payrise and a decline in real wages considering there is huge global inflation - but that the decline in real wages would have been much worse without their Brexit payrise to help cushion the blow.
Inflation is eroding real wages everywhere.
What I can't get my head around is that the median US worker is hardly paid more than thirty years ago, in real terms, despite economic growth over that period. It's worth noting that US growth per head has only been slightly higher than our own, over that period, but a bit more of our growth has filtered down to median workers than in the US.
As much as I want an immediate GE, it’s simply not going to happen. The Tories are smart enough to play the long game. Starmar is pretty hopeless as the YouGov net favourability ratings show; yes, he may be significantly better than the actors from the filth that is Tory party but the guy has zero political awareness.
On your first point, I'm inclined to agree although listening to Rory Stewart on the Rest is Politics earlier he relayed an exchange with a Tory MP who admonished him for constantly saying that MPs will do whatever they can to avoid a GE in order to cling onto their seats. The Tory MP claimed that many first time MPs were sick of the whole thing and wanted out. I'm not 100% convinced because there's a big difference between not wanting to do a job and imminently making yourself unemployed. However, it should certainly be factored into predictions.
On your second, I reckon Starmer's very good at politics.
For the average Tory redwall MP the £84,144 MPs salary is probably the most they have or will ever earn even if some Home Counties Tory MPs might be able to make more money outside
No wealthy people in the 'red wall' then?
Redwall seats have below the national average earnings and a below the national average median houseprice
You're exhibiting a typical southerner's knowledge of the north. I live in County Durham and earn more than £84,144, and although my political judgment is better than my MP (Richard Holden - if he and others had listened to people like me saying vote Kemi none of this nonsense would have happened) I haven't the slightest doubt he is capable of significantly higher earnings. We probably have more disposable income than you tbh - most of us own our own homes without having to rely on inheritance, for a start.
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
A little of it might be down to us getting older and grumpier and not liking being ruled by youngsters, for sure.
But dig out recordings of parliamentary debates or election campaigns or political TV programmes from 40 or 50 years ago and it immediately strikes you how today things are so dumbed down.
Compare a Brian Walden interview with a Piers Morgan interview for example
So. She's better off wiping the arses of the soon to die rather adding a superb value to the generation to come. Keeping them out of jail and paying tax in gainful employment. Choices made.
That doesn't mean that Wisconsin doesn't have a serious obesity problem, since obesity is a serious problem almost everywhere in the United States. (It's worst in American Samoa, by the way.)
(Since WW II, the United States has acquired a problem that a century or more ago would have been unimaginable: obese poor people. I suppose that's better than the reverse, but it is still a problem we should do more about.)
I always laugh when I see the plaudits for Jacinda Ardern.
People on social media love her. I mean they don't know anything about NZ or the politics there, but they completely buy into the idea she must be great just because.
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
I’m a Brexiteer and I have never worshipped the US model - ever
In fact I don’t know many that do. It was Singapore on Thames for a reason. It wasn’t Los Angeles on Thames
Indeed Brexiteers have mostly looked to Australia. “Australian points system” etc etc
That is to say: a Western European social security framework, but with more national sovereignty and better control of the borders - and English common law, Westminster Parliamentary democracy, and the monarchy etc
It will be hard to do as well as Australia (which has so many natural advantages). But it is still worth trying
Copying America would be mental. Every country knows that now
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
A little of it might be down to us getting older and grumpier and not liking being ruled by youngsters, for sure.
But dig out recordings of parliamentary debates or election campaigns or political TV programmes from 40 or 50 years ago and it immediately strikes you how today things are so dumbed down.
As a teenager, I found it fascinating to listen to people like Sir Robin Day and Brian Walden interviewing top politicians. In political terms, it was the equivalent of watching AJP Taylor. You were seeing people a the top of their game. But now...?
“the English word civilisation comes from the 16th-century French civilisé ("civilized"), from Latin civilis ("civil"), related to civis ("citizen") and civitas ("city").”
If we let our cities die, then our civilisation dies with it
Get back in the office you fucking plebs
Says the man who by his own admission has never done a day's work in an office in his life. 🤔
Clearly I am being provocative
But the sad emptiness of central Denver does strike me as a real problem. We may have casually made a tragic mistake by moving to WFH without working out the consequences
Plus, if my experience of the Inland Revenue is anything to go by then WFH is a calamity for productivity
Had you dealt with them pre-Covid? They've always been bloody useless.
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
Drones, grifters, egoists, apparatchiks & other assorted dross were around then and still are off course.
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
Yes compare nigel lawson with say george osborne...lawson was a serious economic thinker who actually wrote a great book the view from no 11
Our brightest and best now tend to go into finance or tech not politics.
However the 1970s UK was filled with heavyweight politicians but a country in deep decline and economic strife
“the English word civilisation comes from the 16th-century French civilisé ("civilized"), from Latin civilis ("civil"), related to civis ("citizen") and civitas ("city").”
If we let our cities die, then our civilisation dies with it
Get back in the office you fucking plebs
Says the man who by his own admission has never done a day's work in an office in his life. 🤔
Clearly I am being provocative
But the sad emptiness of central Denver does strike me as a real problem. We may have casually made a tragic mistake by moving to WFH without working out the consequences
Plus, if my experience of the Inland Revenue is anything to go by then WFH is a calamity for productivity
HMRC's issues are much more likely to be far too few staff answering calls (due to 'efficiency savings') than their actual location.
It's very easy to monitor a call agent's productivity and indeed work times, wherever they are located. I can't be certain HMRC do that because they may well have 'saved' on the monitoring tools but if they don't they won't have a clue what their call agents are doing whether in the office or not.
You know a lot about a lot of things but I suspect you might be making some ill-informed assumptions about WFH and productivity.
But yeah, I get that you were being provocative. Keep up the good work, we'd miss it!
“the English word civilisation comes from the 16th-century French civilisé ("civilized"), from Latin civilis ("civil"), related to civis ("citizen") and civitas ("city").”
If we let our cities die, then our civilisation dies with it
Get back in the office you fucking plebs
Says the man who by his own admission has never done a day's work in an office in his life. 🤔
Clearly I am being provocative
But the sad emptiness of central Denver does strike me as a real problem. We may have casually made a tragic mistake by moving to WFH without working out the consequences
Plus, if my experience of the Inland Revenue is anything to go by then WFH is a calamity for productivity
Had you dealt with them pre-Covid? They've always been bloody useless.
Yes I did deal with them pre-covid
As my agent said today (and she has multiple clients facing identical problems to me) - “before covid HMRC was shambolic, now it is a total meltdown”
If you lived in Colorado though, with some of the most beautiful natural scenery in the world, would you really want to work in Denver every day rather than work at home and admire the view? If you want a big city lifestyle you would move to New York or Chicago or LA
But they don’t live up in the sometimes-lovely mountains. They all live in endless identikit suburbs that sprawl around Denver city/downtown. I’ve seen them. Sometimes they come in at night to drink but by day it is a zombie city and - so the guide told me - city businesses that held out during the pandemic hoping things would return are now giving up
A culture that abandons its city centres is in secular decline. It’s what happened to Roman Britain in the 4th century just before Rome quit for good
It’s paradoxical. Americans all say they want a lovable walkable city that is more like Europe. But they don’t do anything to make that happen, they do the opposite. And they insist on driving private cars, which ultimately kills cities
The contrast with happily bustling central Seville a few weeks ago is stark
Try NYC on an average weeknight or afternoon and it would still be bustling I expect. As I said, Denver is just the biggest city in Colorado, it is not a global metropolis
But how much of that in NYC is tourists? That's treating a city as a museum exhibit to be gawked at, rather than a real living thing.
I know that of my family in NYC quite a few of them are still working at home a fair bit. It's definitely a change. Not convinced that it's the death of western civilisation that Leon thinks it is, but I have no problem admitting to being frequently wrong.
NYC is ever bustling but also incredibly noisy and very dirty. Nice to visit, to live - not so sure.
When comparing US and European stats, don’t be misled by the average. Always ask to see the comparison of the medians. Therein lies the story.
While you have a point re: the Big Apple, there is a LOT of New York within the city limits. Have two friends who lived in NYC, one on Staten Island, other on City Island off the Bronx.
Less gritty, dirty, crowded both those places, than in most of Greater London, urban Midlands, etc., etc.
Actually, much of NYC outside of Manhattan sorta reminds me of The Smoke, just with straighter streets.
I always laugh when I see the plaudits for Jacinda Ardern.
People on social media love her. I mean they don't know anything about NZ or the politics there, but they completely buy into the idea she must be great just because.
Jeez. Imagine how much more damage she could cause than Liz Truss. Shall we suggest a NZ referendum on a swap? I'm sure that would be an overwhelming vote.
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children in private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
Drones, grifters, egoists, apparatchiks & other assorted dross were around then and still are off course.
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
The kindest thing that CCHQ ever did was telling me to get lost when I applied to join the candidates list. I would have hated it.
Conversely, I think sometimes the worst thing you can do to a person is give them what they ask for.
So. She's better off wiping the arses of the soon to die rather adding a superb value to the generation to come. Keeping them out of jail and paying tax in gainful employment. Choices made
Who should we get to do the arse wiping instead? Looking after old people requires a bit of nouse, too.
Perhaps all those people in sandwich bars that Leon is lamenting need to change job.
A little of it might be down to us getting older and grumpier and not liking being ruled by youngsters, for sure.
But dig out recordings of parliamentary debates or election campaigns or political TV programmes from 40 or 50 years ago and it immediately strikes you how today things are so dumbed down.
I think I've mentioned before catching an old episode of I think it was Arena that was about Monty Python. So a trivial subject in a way, but I could not believe how seriously it was treated and how slowly it was presented. It was the polar opposite of how TV companies would make a documentary about a comedy show today. No stupid interviews, no gimmicks, not a clip show, or a top 10. Just let the people involved talk about their work at length. You would barely get a science programme as well made today.
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
A little of it might be down to us getting older and grumpier and not liking being ruled by youngsters, for sure.
But dig out recordings of parliamentary debates or election campaigns or political TV programmes from 40 or 50 years ago and it immediately strikes you how today things are so dumbed down.
As a teenager, I found it fascinating to listen to people like Sir Robin Day and Brian Walden interviewing top politicians. In political terms, it was the equivalent of watching AJP Taylor. You were seeing people a the top of their game. But now...?
Now you have the Home Secretary performatively railing against “tofu-eaters” in Parliament.
At least I think it’s performative. Because the alternative would be that she’s thicker than pig-shit.
“the English word civilisation comes from the 16th-century French civilisé ("civilized"), from Latin civilis ("civil"), related to civis ("citizen") and civitas ("city").”
If we let our cities die, then our civilisation dies with it
Get back in the office you fucking plebs
No.
{de-lurks after three years}
Make our cities affordable to actually be able to live in the centre. Like Seville.
Then, and only then, will our cities be vibrant and livable.
“the English word civilisation comes from the 16th-century French civilisé ("civilized"), from Latin civilis ("civil"), related to civis ("citizen") and civitas ("city").”
If we let our cities die, then our civilisation dies with it
Get back in the office you fucking plebs
Says the man who by his own admission has never done a day's work in an office in his life. 🤔
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
Drones, grifters, egoists, apparatchiks & other assorted dross were around then and still are off course.
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
The kindest thing that CCHQ ever did was telling me to get lost when I applied to join the candidates list. I would have hated it.
Conversely, I think sometimes the worst thing you can do to a person is give them what they ask for.
Don’t you feel offended, though, when you see the pure loon-bags who made it through?
As much as I want an immediate GE, it’s simply not going to happen. The Tories are smart enough to play the long game. Starmar is pretty hopeless as the YouGov net favourability ratings show; yes, he may be significantly better than the actors from the filth that is Tory party but the guy has zero political awareness.
On your first point, I'm inclined to agree although listening to Rory Stewart on the Rest is Politics earlier he relayed an exchange with a Tory MP who admonished him for constantly saying that MPs will do whatever they can to avoid a GE in order to cling onto their seats. The Tory MP claimed that many first time MPs were sick of the whole thing and wanted out. I'm not 100% convinced because there's a big difference between not wanting to do a job and imminently making yourself unemployed. However, it should certainly be factored into predictions.
On your second, I reckon Starmer's very good at politics.
For the average Tory redwall MP the £84,144 MPs salary is probably the most they have or will ever earn even if some Home Counties Tory MPs might be able to make more money outside
No wealthy people in the 'red wall' then?
Redwall seats have below the national average earnings and a below the national average median houseprice
You're exhibiting a typical southerner's knowledge of the north. I live in County Durham and earn more than £84,144, and although my political judgment is better than my MP (Richard Holden - if he and others had listened to people like me saying vote Kemi none of this nonsense would have happened) I haven't the slightest doubt he is capable of significantly higher earnings. We probably have more disposable income than you tbh - most of us own our own homes without having to rely on inheritance, for a start.
You still earn less and those of us who own property in the Home counties have double the assets you do. Though I accept it is cheaper to get on the property level in the first place up North.
Holden was just a special adviser before becoming an MP, not a QC or CEO
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
Drones, grifters, egoists, apparatchiks & other assorted dross were around then and still are off course.
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
Yes compare nigel lawson with say george osborne...lawson was a serious economic thinker who actually wrote a great book the view from no 11
Our brightest and best now tend to go into finance or tech not politics.
However the 1970s UK was filled with heavyweight politicians but a country in deep decline and economic strife
There is some truth to that. I reckon I have probably had a more rewarding, positive impact on the world in my digital career than I would ever had had as an MP or bog standard minister.
That doesn't mean that Wisconsin doesn't have a serious obesity problem, since obesity is a serious problem almost everywhere in the United States. (It's worst in American Samoa, by the way.)
(Since WW II, the United States has acquired a problem that a century or more ago would have been unimaginable: obese poor people. I suppose that's better than the reverse, but it is still a problem we should do more about.)
Speaking of Wisconsin . . . see IF you can surmise where it's located based on this map:
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children and private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
How would you know? I’m my experience, a vast chunk of Americans - especially in places like Denver - live a quality of life simply out of reach to much of Britain.
In return they have to put up with desolate strip malls for entertainment, but that seems to be the trade-off.
I always laugh when I see the plaudits for Jacinda Ardern.
People on social media love her. I mean they don't know anything about NZ or the politics there, but they completely buy into the idea she must be great just because.
The two main opposition parties are heading for around 50% of the vote according to the latest polls in NZ.
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
Drones, grifters, egoists, apparatchiks & other assorted dross were around then and still are off course.
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
Yes compare nigel lawson with say george osborne...lawson was a serious economic thinker who actually wrote a great book the view from no 11
Our brightest and best now tend to go into finance or tech not politics.
However the 1970s UK was filled with heavyweight politicians but a country in deep decline and economic strife
I think the "decline" post 1950, was a myth. We lost an Empire, and gained a level of growth that we he had never experienced before . Millions of people were lifted out of poverty, could afford to buy their own homes, and enjoyed a lifestyle that their parents could never have dreamed of. And in the end, we beat the Communists.
I always laugh when I see the plaudits for Jacinda Ardern.
People on social media love her. I mean they don't know anything about NZ or the politics there, but they completely buy into the idea she must be great just because.
The two main opposition parties are heading for around 50% of the vote according to the latest polls in NZ.
Yes, but so are the two (and a bit) government parties. Hah!
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
Drones, grifters, egoists, apparatchiks & other assorted dross were around then and still are off course.
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
The kindest thing that CCHQ ever did was telling me to get lost when I applied to join the candidates list. I would have hated it.
Conversely, I think sometimes the worst thing you can do to a person is give them what they ask for.
Don’t you feel offended, though, when you see the pure loon-bags who made it through?
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
Drones, grifters, egoists, apparatchiks & other assorted dross were around then and still are off course.
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
Yes compare nigel lawson with say george osborne...lawson was a serious economic thinker who actually wrote a great book the view from no 11
Our brightest and best now tend to go into finance or tech not politics.
However the 1970s UK was filled with heavyweight politicians but a country in deep decline and economic strife
I think the "decline" post 1950, was a myth. We lost an Empire, and gained a level of growth that we he had never experienced before . Millions of people were lifted out of poverty, could afford to buy their own homes, and enjoyed a lifestyle that their parents could never have dreamed of. And in the end, we beat the Communists.
“the English word civilisation comes from the 16th-century French civilisé ("civilized"), from Latin civilis ("civil"), related to civis ("citizen") and civitas ("city").”
If we let our cities die, then our civilisation dies with it
Get back in the office you fucking plebs
Says the man who by his own admission has never done a day's work in an office in his life. 🤔
Clearly I am being provocative
But the sad emptiness of central Denver does strike me as a real problem. We may have casually made a tragic mistake by moving to WFH without working out the consequences
Plus, if my experience of the Inland Revenue is anything to go by then WFH is a calamity for productivity
tbf I had a similar experience in Baton Rouge pre covid. Downtown was deserted, but the university area was thriving.
“the English word civilisation comes from the 16th-century French civilisé ("civilized"), from Latin civilis ("civil"), related to civis ("citizen") and civitas ("city").”
If we let our cities die, then our civilisation dies with it
Get back in the office you fucking plebs
Says the man who by his own admission has never done a day's work in an office in his life. 🤔
Clearly I am being provocative
But the sad emptiness of central Denver does strike me as a real problem. We may have casually made a tragic mistake by moving to WFH without working out the consequences
Plus, if my experience of the Inland Revenue is anything to go by then WFH is a calamity for productivity
HMRC's issues are much more likely to be far too few staff answering calls (due to 'efficiency savings') than their actual location.
It's very easy to monitor a call agent's productivity and indeed work times, wherever they are located. I can't be certain HMRC do that because they may well have 'saved' on the monitoring tools but if they don't they won't have a clue what their call agents are doing whether in the office or not.
You know a lot about a lot of things but I suspect you might be making some ill-informed assumptions about WFH and productivity.
But yeah, I get that you were being provocative. Keep up the good work, we'd miss it!
Except that the accountant in my agent’s office was specifically told, on the quiet, by someone at HMRC, that many of the problems HMRC are facing are because of WFH - eg the rubber stamp issue
Let’s hope they sort it out or they ain’t getting no more of my taxes
“the English word civilisation comes from the 16th-century French civilisé ("civilized"), from Latin civilis ("civil"), related to civis ("citizen") and civitas ("city").”
If we let our cities die, then our civilisation dies with it
Get back in the office you fucking plebs
Says the man who by his own admission has never done a day's work in an office in his life. 🤔
Clearly I am being provocative
But the sad emptiness of central Denver does strike me as a real problem. We may have casually made a tragic mistake by moving to WFH without working out the consequences
Plus, if my experience of the Inland Revenue is anything to go by then WFH is a calamity for productivity
Had you dealt with them pre-Covid? They've always been bloody useless.
I can confirm that the letter Leon has asked HMRC for used to take about 10 days. It does require an agent to read through one’s tax history and sign a declaration, so there is presumably a minimum pay grade required. But it’s not rocket science.
As much as I want an immediate GE, it’s simply not going to happen. The Tories are smart enough to play the long game. Starmar is pretty hopeless as the YouGov net favourability ratings show; yes, he may be significantly better than the actors from the filth that is Tory party but the guy has zero political awareness.
On your first point, I'm inclined to agree although listening to Rory Stewart on the Rest is Politics earlier he relayed an exchange with a Tory MP who admonished him for constantly saying that MPs will do whatever they can to avoid a GE in order to cling onto their seats. The Tory MP claimed that many first time MPs were sick of the whole thing and wanted out. I'm not 100% convinced because there's a big difference between not wanting to do a job and imminently making yourself unemployed. However, it should certainly be factored into predictions.
On your second, I reckon Starmer's very good at politics.
For the average Tory redwall MP the £84,144 MPs salary is probably the most they have or will ever earn even if some Home Counties Tory MPs might be able to make more money outside
No wealthy people in the 'red wall' then?
Redwall seats have below the national average earnings and a below the national average median houseprice
You're exhibiting a typical southerner's knowledge of the north. I live in County Durham and earn more than £84,144, and although my political judgment is better than my MP (Richard Holden - if he and others had listened to people like me saying vote Kemi none of this nonsense would have happened) I haven't the slightest doubt he is capable of significantly higher earnings. We probably have more disposable income than you tbh - most of us own our own homes without having to rely on inheritance, for a start.
You still earn less and those of us who own property in the Home counties have double the assets you do. Though I accept it is cheaper to get on the property level in the first place up North.
Holden was just a special adviser before becoming an MP, not a QC or CEO
One has to adjust for purchasing power and property prices. I'd say that a professional person in Leeds, Newcastle, or Stockton has a better lifestyle than his counterpart in London or the Home Counties.
“the English word civilisation comes from the 16th-century French civilisé ("civilized"), from Latin civilis ("civil"), related to civis ("citizen") and civitas ("city").”
If we let our cities die, then our civilisation dies with it
Get back in the office you fucking plebs
Says the man who by his own admission has never done a day's work in an office in his life. 🤔
Clearly I am being provocative
But the sad emptiness of central Denver does strike me as a real problem. We may have casually made a tragic mistake by moving to WFH without working out the consequences
Plus, if my experience of the Inland Revenue is anything to go by then WFH is a calamity for productivity
Had you dealt with them pre-Covid? They've always been bloody useless.
Yes I did deal with them pre-covid
As my agent said today (and she has multiple clients facing identical problems to me) - “before covid HMRC was shambolic, now it is a total meltdown”
Public Services are falling apart. What we need is substantial real term cuts in expenditure. That'll sort it. While some obsess about bathrooms, we don't have a single functioning lock on a toilet door in a special school. Cuts now!
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
Drones, grifters, egoists, apparatchiks & other assorted dross were around then and still are off course.
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
Yes compare nigel lawson with say george osborne...lawson was a serious economic thinker who actually wrote a great book the view from no 11
Our brightest and best now tend to go into finance or tech not politics.
However the 1970s UK was filled with heavyweight politicians but a country in deep decline and economic strife
I think the "decline" post 1950, was a myth. We lost an Empire, and gained a level of growth that we he had never experienced before . Millions of people were lifted out of poverty, could afford to buy their own homes, and enjoyed a lifestyle that their parents could never have dreamed of. And in the end, we beat the Communists.
By the 1970s however we were a strike ridden nation of high inflation and declining nationalised industries, high tax and a dirty, grimy capital city with a brain drain it took Thatcher to save
I always laugh when I see the plaudits for Jacinda Ardern.
People on social media love her. I mean they don't know anything about NZ or the politics there, but they completely buy into the idea she must be great just because.
Jeez. Imagine how much more damage she could cause than Liz Truss. Shall we suggest a NZ referendum on a swap? I'm sure that would be an overwhelming vote.
It's not whether she is any good, it's the presumption that she is, whilst simultaneously knowing nothing about her politics. In its own way it's as silly as thinking "Trump's a business man, he'll be a great President", people who knew even a tiny bit about Trump knew that the whole "business titan" schtick was nonsense, and that he'd be bloody awful.
I just find it interesting that the image people form of a person can be enough to settle their view, when they know basically nil about what actually matters.
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children in private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
Things like lack of holidays and no maternity pay and many more issues make life for the average American somewhat worse than life for the average west European - even tho the American is richer on paper. Yet Americans also have hard to define advantages: more freedom space and mobility
But America has many more VERY rich people who do extremely nicely (and spend a lot of time in Europe…)
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
Drones, grifters, egoists, apparatchiks & other assorted dross were around then and still are off course.
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
Yes compare nigel lawson with say george osborne...lawson was a serious economic thinker who actually wrote a great book the view from no 11
Our brightest and best now tend to go into finance or tech not politics.
However the 1970s UK was filled with heavyweight politicians but a country in deep decline and economic strife
I think the "decline" post 1950, was a myth. We lost an Empire, and gained a level of growth that we he had never experienced before . Millions of people were lifted out of poverty, could afford to buy their own homes, and enjoyed a lifestyle that their parents could never have dreamed of. And in the end, we beat the Communists.
By the 1970s however we were a strike ridden nation of high inflation and declining nationalised industries, high tax and a dirty, grimy capital city with a brain drain it took Thatcher to save
It was really 1973-75 when everything went to pot. The Miners' strike, the worst of the violence in Northern Ireland, the oil shock, rampant inflation and recession. Not to mention, the fall of Indochina, and Portugese Africa to Communism. The rest of the 1970's were fine. People were still 30% better off, in real terms, in 1980 than in 1970.
I'd have no problem with the triple lock being swapped to finance higher defence spending.
In fact, I'd view it as wholly appropriate.
I agree however just 4 minutes ago.
NEW: Cabinet Office Minister Brendan Clarke-Smith tells @JPonpolitics on @TimesRadio pensioners can breathe easily tonight on a their pensions being up-rated inline with with inflation:
"We want to look after our pensioners. The triple lock was a manifesto commitment"
Doesn’t mean they can't be taxed. (Or does it; I've never bothered to understand it)
They could be but they won't. The Tories will never attack what they perceive as their client vote. At least I don't think they will. Hunt may prove me wrong in which case more power to him.
What is daft is that there will be a significant portion of those pensioners and near pensioners who can look beyond their own self interest and realise their benefits come at the expense of their children and grandchildren. I actually think the smack back against any government who got rid of the triple lock or starting taxing pensioners would be no where near as bad as politicians and pundits think. I would love to be proved right on this but I doubt I will get the chance.
As I wrote earlier, Dick, Hunt has a once in a generation opportunity to rid us of the Lock. I think he'll do it, but you may be right so I won't fall off my bathchair if he doesn't.
Indeed. I do desperately want to be wrong about this and see a politician do something because it is the right thing to do for the country rather even though they think it will be politically damaging to them. Hunt, for all the criticism directed at him in the past, might be the person to grasp this rare opportunity.
Who knows, he might even get to like the idea and start taking some more of the electorally damaging but correct decisions for the long term good of the country.
In this discussion Hunt is being assigned agency he does not have. There are not the votes in the Commons to remove the triple lock. Labour will vote against as would at least 50 Tory MPs, probably a lot more.
I am not so sure about that. Of course you may well be right but I think the mood at the moment is such that he could get away with it. Indeed it is worth remembering that when the vote on the Triple lock came before the house last September, Labour did not support retaining it. Instead they abstained. So there is at least some element of realism at work there.
We all know how a budget vote on ending the triple lock will turn out. Labour will decide, after careful consideration, that making poor, vulnerable pensioners with scarcely two pennies to rub together pay the cost of the Kamikwazi budget and multi-million pound bonuses for evil City bankers is abhorrent, and vote against.
All the Tory backbenchers will then be made to leave their fingerprints on the bloody knife. They do it, bye bye grey vote. They refuse, general election. Checkmate, crown Starmer King.
There hasn't been quite enough discussion about what SKS and Labour would actually do when in government about the impossible task facing them - much the same as the impossible task facing Hunt's government. Winning the next GE is the easy bit.
i remember last time labour got in and the tories were wiped out nationalist parties like the bnp and later ukip started to have electoral success. The BNP made big breakthroughs in the 2002 to 2006 period when the Tories were moribund...now we have a much worse economic situation so something like that could well happen again this time on a bigger scale
I went to the local election pages of the BBC to see the extent of this BNP surge:
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children and private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
How would you know? I’m my experience, a vast chunk of Americans - especially in places like Denver - live a quality of life simply out of reach to much of Britain.
In return they have to put up with desolate strip malls for entertainment, but that seems to be the trade-off.
However they also have no public healthcare, state schools of not great standard compared to other OECD nations and if they lose their job little to no welfare state.
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
Drones, grifters, egoists, apparatchiks & other assorted dross were around then and still are off course.
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
Yes compare nigel lawson with say george osborne...lawson was a serious economic thinker who actually wrote a great book the view from no 11
Our brightest and best now tend to go into finance or tech not politics.
However the 1970s UK was filled with heavyweight politicians but a country in deep decline and economic strife
I think the "decline" post 1950, was a myth. We lost an Empire, and gained a level of growth that we he had never experienced before . Millions of people were lifted out of poverty, could afford to buy their own homes, and enjoyed a lifestyle that their parents could never have dreamed of. And in the end, we beat the Communists.
By the 1970s however we were a strike ridden nation of high inflation and declining nationalised industries, high tax and a dirty, grimy capital city with a brain drain it took Thatcher to save
It seems your precious Party has closed the circle and brought us back to being a strike ridden nation of high inflation and declining nationalised industries, high tax and a capital city only the rich can afford to live in.
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children and private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
How would you know? I’m my experience, a vast chunk of Americans - especially in places like Denver - live a quality of life simply out of reach to much of Britain.
In return they have to put up with desolate strip malls for entertainment, but that seems to be the trade-off.
However they also have no public healthcare, state schools of not great standard compared to other OECD nations and if they lose their job little to no welfare state.
They pay low taxes and can afford big cars, big houses, and garages full of foot spas and jet-skis.
I agree that there are significant downsides but I think most - let’s say the middle 50/60% would quite happily trade, say, Leeds for Denver.
I'd have no problem with the triple lock being swapped to finance higher defence spending.
In fact, I'd view it as wholly appropriate.
I agree however just 4 minutes ago.
NEW: Cabinet Office Minister Brendan Clarke-Smith tells @JPonpolitics on @TimesRadio pensioners can breathe easily tonight on a their pensions being up-rated inline with with inflation:
"We want to look after our pensioners. The triple lock was a manifesto commitment"
Doesn’t mean they can't be taxed. (Or does it; I've never bothered to understand it)
They could be but they won't. The Tories will never attack what they perceive as their client vote. At least I don't think they will. Hunt may prove me wrong in which case more power to him.
What is daft is that there will be a significant portion of those pensioners and near pensioners who can look beyond their own self interest and realise their benefits come at the expense of their children and grandchildren. I actually think the smack back against any government who got rid of the triple lock or starting taxing pensioners would be no where near as bad as politicians and pundits think. I would love to be proved right on this but I doubt I will get the chance.
As I wrote earlier, Dick, Hunt has a once in a generation opportunity to rid us of the Lock. I think he'll do it, but you may be right so I won't fall off my bathchair if he doesn't.
Indeed. I do desperately want to be wrong about this and see a politician do something because it is the right thing to do for the country rather even though they think it will be politically damaging to them. Hunt, for all the criticism directed at him in the past, might be the person to grasp this rare opportunity.
Who knows, he might even get to like the idea and start taking some more of the electorally damaging but correct decisions for the long term good of the country.
In this discussion Hunt is being assigned agency he does not have. There are not the votes in the Commons to remove the triple lock. Labour will vote against as would at least 50 Tory MPs, probably a lot more.
I am not so sure about that. Of course you may well be right but I think the mood at the moment is such that he could get away with it. Indeed it is worth remembering that when the vote on the Triple lock came before the house last September, Labour did not support retaining it. Instead they abstained. So there is at least some element of realism at work there.
We all know how a budget vote on ending the triple lock will turn out. Labour will decide, after careful consideration, that making poor, vulnerable pensioners with scarcely two pennies to rub together pay the cost of the Kamikwazi budget and multi-million pound bonuses for evil City bankers is abhorrent, and vote against.
All the Tory backbenchers will then be made to leave their fingerprints on the bloody knife. They do it, bye bye grey vote. They refuse, general election. Checkmate, crown Starmer King.
There hasn't been quite enough discussion about what SKS and Labour would actually do when in government about the impossible task facing them - much the same as the impossible task facing Hunt's government. Winning the next GE is the easy bit.
i remember last time labour got in and the tories were wiped out nationalist parties like the bnp and later ukip started to have electoral success. The BNP made big breakthroughs in the 2002 to 2006 period when the Tories were moribund...now we have a much worse economic situation so something like that could well happen again this time on a bigger scale
I went to the local election pages of the BBC to see the extent of this BNP surge:
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children and private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
How would you know? I’m my experience, a vast chunk of Americans - especially in places like Denver - live a quality of life simply out of reach to much of Britain.
In return they have to put up with desolate strip malls for entertainment, but that seems to be the trade-off.
However they also have no public healthcare, state schools of not great standard compared to other OECD nations and if they lose their job little to no welfare state.
They pay low taxes and can afford big cars, big houses, and garages full of foot spas and jet-skis.
I agree that there are significant downsides but I think most - let’s say the middle 50/60% would quite happily trade, say, Leeds for Denver.
Substituting Latinos for South Asians, and tortillas for naan.
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children and private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
How would you know? I’m my experience, a vast chunk of Americans - especially in places like Denver - live a quality of life simply out of reach to much of Britain.
In return they have to put up with desolate strip malls for entertainment, but that seems to be the trade-off.
However they also have no public healthcare, state schools of not great standard compared to other OECD nations and if they lose their job little to no welfare state.
They pay low taxes and can afford big cars, big houses, and garages full of foot spas and jet-skis.
I agree that there are significant downsides but I think most - let’s say the middle 50/60% would quite happily trade, say, Leeds for Denver.
Denver is unusually nice for an American city (despite its problems). Relatively low crime etc
It is not Chicago or Pittsburgh or Baltimore or St Louis
Philip Blond is utterly deluded. The Tories the Party of the working class? My arse.
They were under Boris, he was the first Tory leader ever to win DEs, the unskilled working class and unemployed, as well as winning C2s, the skilled working class by more than he won upper middle class ABs
And what did he do for them? Falling real wages and worse conditions. Fool me once.
Got Brexit done and replaced free movement with a points system, provided furlough with Sunak and got the vaccine out.
Before Truss he was also investing in levelling up
“the English word civilisation comes from the 16th-century French civilisé ("civilized"), from Latin civilis ("civil"), related to civis ("citizen") and civitas ("city").”
If we let our cities die, then our civilisation dies with it
Get back in the office you fucking plebs
Says the man who by his own admission has never done a day's work in an office in his life. 🤔
Clearly I am being provocative
But the sad emptiness of central Denver does strike me as a real problem. We may have casually made a tragic mistake by moving to WFH without working out the consequences
Plus, if my experience of the Inland Revenue is anything to go by then WFH is a calamity for productivity
HMRC's issues are much more likely to be far too few staff answering calls (due to 'efficiency savings') than their actual location.
It's very easy to monitor a call agent's productivity and indeed work times, wherever they are located. I can't be certain HMRC do that because they may well have 'saved' on the monitoring tools but if they don't they won't have a clue what their call agents are doing whether in the office or not.
You know a lot about a lot of things but I suspect you might be making some ill-informed assumptions about WFH and productivity.
But yeah, I get that you were being provocative. Keep up the good work, we'd miss it!
Except that the accountant in my agent’s office was specifically told, on the quiet, by someone at HMRC, that many of the problems HMRC are facing are because of WFH - eg the rubber stamp issue
Let’s hope they sort it out or they ain’t getting no more of my taxes
The stamping issue did get raised with me recently. The reality is that all work requiring an EO faces a massive backlog.
“the English word civilisation comes from the 16th-century French civilisé ("civilized"), from Latin civilis ("civil"), related to civis ("citizen") and civitas ("city").”
If we let our cities die, then our civilisation dies with it
Get back in the office you fucking plebs
Says the man who by his own admission has never done a day's work in an office in his life. 🤔
Clearly I am being provocative
But the sad emptiness of central Denver does strike me as a real problem. We may have casually made a tragic mistake by moving to WFH without working out the consequences
Plus, if my experience of the Inland Revenue is anything to go by then WFH is a calamity for productivity
tbf I had a similar experience in Baton Rouge pre covid. Downtown was deserted, but the university area was thriving.
Geaux Tigers! (Which says a lot about our standard of learning!)
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children and private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
How would you know? I’m my experience, a vast chunk of Americans - especially in places like Denver - live a quality of life simply out of reach to much of Britain.
In return they have to put up with desolate strip malls for entertainment, but that seems to be the trade-off.
However they also have no public healthcare, state schools of not great standard compared to other OECD nations and if they lose their job little to no welfare state.
They pay low taxes and can afford big cars, big houses, and garages full of foot spas and jet-skis.
I agree that there are significant downsides but I think most - let’s say the middle 50/60% would quite happily trade, say, Leeds for Denver.
Is a big car and a jet-ski much to do with quality of life though?
If you really like the Rockies that much, you could spend almost as much time climbing mountains in Colorado during your 6 weeks off from Leeds than you could in your 1 week off from Denver.
Actually, Asian-Americans do much better than whites, and in recent years, Indian-Americans have done especially well. In 2018, Asian-American families earned a median income about 20K higher per year than the median for white families. In 2019, the median income for Indian-American families was more than 116K. (The two tables differ, so I chose the lower one.) source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ethnic_groups_in_the_United_States_by_household_income
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children and private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
How would you know? I’m my experience, a vast chunk of Americans - especially in places like Denver - live a quality of life simply out of reach to much of Britain.
In return they have to put up with desolate strip malls for entertainment, but that seems to be the trade-off.
However they also have no public healthcare, state schools of not great standard compared to other OECD nations and if they lose their job little to no welfare state.
They pay low taxes and can afford big cars, big houses, and garages full of foot spas and jet-skis.
I agree that there are significant downsides but I think most - let’s say the middle 50/60% would quite happily trade, say, Leeds for Denver.
Is a big car and a jet-ski much to do with quality of life though?
If you really like the Rockies that much, you could spend almost as much time climbing mountains in Colorado during your 6 weeks off from Leeds than you could in your 1 week off from Denver.
Ever hear of the weekend? A great English twit invention!
Rumours about Putins next move knock about with regularity, most of them dont come to frutition.
I will say this though, I had a brief chat late yesterday with someone who should know their stuff and they said there is an increasing expectation that things are about to go into a novel gear around the Russia-Ukraine war. 'Bumpy' was the descriptive phrase.
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children in private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
Things like lack of holidays and no maternity pay and many more issues make life for the average American somewhat worse than life for the average west European - even tho the American is richer on paper. Yet Americans also have hard to define advantages: more freedom space and mobility
But America has many more VERY rich people who do extremely nicely (and spend a lot of time in Europe…)
For the bottom 10-20% America is vastly worse
Whether it's currency or no Russians or something else I don't know but the South of france has more Americans now than I've ever seen before. Many with houses there. They're certainly more obvious than the English
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children and private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
How would you know? I’m my experience, a vast chunk of Americans - especially in places like Denver - live a quality of life simply out of reach to much of Britain.
In return they have to put up with desolate strip malls for entertainment, but that seems to be the trade-off.
However they also have no public healthcare, state schools of not great standard compared to other OECD nations and if they lose their job little to no welfare state.
They pay low taxes and can afford big cars, big houses, and garages full of foot spas and jet-skis.
I agree that there are significant downsides but I think most - let’s say the middle 50/60% would quite happily trade, say, Leeds for Denver.
Denver is unusually nice for an American city (despite its problems). Relatively low crime etc
It is not Chicago or Pittsburgh or Baltimore or St Louis
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children and private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
How would you know? I’m my experience, a vast chunk of Americans - especially in places like Denver - live a quality of life simply out of reach to much of Britain.
In return they have to put up with desolate strip malls for entertainment, but that seems to be the trade-off.
However they also have no public healthcare, state schools of not great standard compared to other OECD nations and if they lose their job little to no welfare state.
They pay low taxes and can afford big cars, big houses, and garages full of foot spas and jet-skis.
I agree that there are significant downsides but I think most - let’s say the middle 50/60% would quite happily trade, say, Leeds for Denver.
Is a big car and a jet-ski much to do with quality of life though?
If you really like the Rockies that much, you could spend almost as much time climbing mountains in Colorado during your 6 weeks off from Leeds than you could in your 1 week off from Denver.
Ever hear of the weekend? A great English twit invention!
Well, yes, but I'm thinking that you probably need to do some other things, say, every other weekend.
And then the weather probably isn't suitable for a fair amount of the time either, depending on what your thing is or how high you want to go.
By which time, you might be down to 30-40 days. A bit more than our hypothetical 14k bagger from Leeds, but not vastly more.
Starmer is ok. More of a problem is the quality of the Shadow Cabinet generally.
The shadow cabinet are generally terrible.
And infinitely better at every position than the actual cabinet
Indeed. The state of British politics is shocking. Where are the the heavyweights of old?
It's easy enough to think that politicians were better when one was younger. But, I think it's true. Most modern politicians are frivolous (and it's not restricted to this country).
The French, German, and US political class are also a shadow of what they were.
Drones, grifters, egoists, apparatchiks & other assorted dross were around then and still are off course.
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
Yes compare nigel lawson with say george osborne...lawson was a serious economic thinker who actually wrote a great book the view from no 11
Our brightest and best now tend to go into finance or tech not politics.
However the 1970s UK was filled with heavyweight politicians but a country in deep decline and economic strife
I think the "decline" post 1950, was a myth. We lost an Empire, and gained a level of growth that we he had never experienced before . Millions of people were lifted out of poverty, could afford to buy their own homes, and enjoyed a lifestyle that their parents could never have dreamed of. And in the end, we beat the Communists.
By the 1970s however we were a strike ridden nation of high inflation and declining nationalised industries, high tax and a dirty, grimy capital city with a brain drain it took Thatcher to save
It seems your precious Party has closed the circle and brought us back to being a strike ridden nation of high inflation and declining nationalised industries, high tax and a capital city only the rich can afford to live in.
And Liz Truss ain't no Thatcher ...
Most industries nationalised in the 1970s are now privatised, the top rate of tax is still far lower than in the 1970s, London is now the biggest global city in Europe, with the Shard and Docklands, in the 1970s it was well behind Paris let alone New York.
Inflation may be back again but the Ukraine is a key factor in that and strikes are largely confined to the remaining public sector with at least ballots required beforehand unlike then
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children in private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
Things like lack of holidays and no maternity pay and many more issues make life for the average American somewhat worse than life for the average west European - even tho the American is richer on paper. Yet Americans also have hard to define advantages: more freedom space and mobility
But America has many more VERY rich people who do extremely nicely (and spend a lot of time in Europe…)
For the bottom 10-20% America is vastly worse
Whether it's currency or no Russians or something else I don't know but the South of france has more Americans now than I've ever seen before. Many with houses there. They're certainly more obvious than the English
If I may pick your brain, what’s the South of France like out of season in the winter? During the pandemic I found a lovely flat in Cap d’Antibes for £1200 for the month of January, but in the end I couldn’t go. Post-pandemic it’s about £2000 but still doable.
I understand that, a hundred years ago prior to AC, the winter was the peak season, but this has since inverted.
Actually, Asian-Americans do much better than whites, and in recent years, Indian-Americans have done especially well. In 2018, Asian-American families earned a median income about 20K higher per year than the median for white families. In 2019, the median income for Indian-American families was more than 116K. (The two tables differ, so I chose the lower one.) source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ethnic_groups_in_the_United_States_by_household_income
Hispanics and African Americans still behind both though in terms of average earnings
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children in private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
Things like lack of holidays and no maternity pay and many more issues make life for the average American somewhat worse than life for the average west European - even tho the American is richer on paper. Yet Americans also have hard to define advantages: more freedom space and mobility
But America has many more VERY rich people who do extremely nicely (and spend a lot of time in Europe…)
For the bottom 10-20% America is vastly worse
There have been times when the US was one of the best places to live for the average person. The 1970s and 1990s perhaps.
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children and private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
How would you know? I’m my experience, a vast chunk of Americans - especially in places like Denver - live a quality of life simply out of reach to much of Britain.
In return they have to put up with desolate strip malls for entertainment, but that seems to be the trade-off.
However they also have no public healthcare, state schools of not great standard compared to other OECD nations and if they lose their job little to no welfare state.
They pay low taxes and can afford big cars, big houses, and garages full of foot spas and jet-skis.
I agree that there are significant downsides but I think most - let’s say the middle 50/60% would quite happily trade, say, Leeds for Denver.
Is a big car and a jet-ski much to do with quality of life though?
If you really like the Rockies that much, you could spend almost as much time climbing mountains in Colorado during your 6 weeks off from Leeds than you could in your 1 week off from Denver.
Ever hear of the weekend? A great English twit invention!
Well, yes, but I'm thinking that you probably need to do some other things, say, every other weekend.
And then the weather probably isn't suitable for a fair amount of the time either, depending on what your thing is or how high you want to go.
By which time, you might be down to 30-40 days. A bit more than our hypothetical 14k bagger from Leeds, but not vastly more.
I know plenty of folks in Seattle who manage somehow to spend plenty of time outdoors out of town.
IF you can't do one thing or go somewhere, go somewhere else and do something (slightly) different there.
You'd be surprised how empty it can get on a weekend in the Emerald City. Not downtown, but out the hoods and burbs.
On the subject of whether a severe Tory collapse in 2024 is actually recoverable for the party - I keep saying this but I don't think many people here understand just how rotten the Tory infrastructure is, especially in "safe" seats. The coffers are dry, the campaign staff have moved on to greener pastures, activists are dying off and some areas haven't been canvassed in 15 years. They simply do not have the manpower, money or data to win those seats again once they're lost; scarce resources will be redirected to retaining the few seats that survive the tsunami (see: Scottish Labour post 2015). It's an extinction level event.
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children in private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
Things like lack of holidays and no maternity pay and many more issues make life for the average American somewhat worse than life for the average west European - even tho the American is richer on paper. Yet Americans also have hard to define advantages: more freedom space and mobility
But America has many more VERY rich people who do extremely nicely (and spend a lot of time in Europe…)
For the bottom 10-20% America is vastly worse
There have been times when the US was one of the best places to live for the average person. The 1970s and 1990s perhaps.
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children and private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
How would you know? I’m my experience, a vast chunk of Americans - especially in places like Denver - live a quality of life simply out of reach to much of Britain.
In return they have to put up with desolate strip malls for entertainment, but that seems to be the trade-off.
However they also have no public healthcare, state schools of not great standard compared to other OECD nations and if they lose their job little to no welfare state.
They pay low taxes and can afford big cars, big houses, and garages full of foot spas and jet-skis.
I agree that there are significant downsides but I think most - let’s say the middle 50/60% would quite happily trade, say, Leeds for Denver.
Is a big car and a jet-ski much to do with quality of life though?
If you really like the Rockies that much, you could spend almost as much time climbing mountains in Colorado during your 6 weeks off from Leeds than you could in your 1 week off from Denver.
Ever hear of the weekend? A great English twit invention!
Well, yes, but I'm thinking that you probably need to do some other things, say, every other weekend.
And then the weather probably isn't suitable for a fair amount of the time either, depending on what your thing is or how high you want to go.
By which time, you might be down to 30-40 days. A bit more than our hypothetical 14k bagger from Leeds, but not vastly more.
I know plenty of folks in Seattle who manage somehow to spend plenty of time outdoors out of town.
IF you can't do one thing or go somewhere, go somewhere else and do something (slightly) different there.
You'd be surprised how empty it can get on a weekend in the Emerald City. Not downtown, but out the hoods and burbs.
New York is similar.
Everyone (with means of course) buggers off for months on end in summer, employing a variety of ingenious WFH, PTO and long weekend tactics.
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children in private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
Things like lack of holidays and no maternity pay and many more issues make life for the average American somewhat worse than life for the average west European - even tho the American is richer on paper. Yet Americans also have hard to define advantages: more freedom space and mobility
But America has many more VERY rich people who do extremely nicely (and spend a lot of time in Europe…)
For the bottom 10-20% America is vastly worse
There have been times when the US was one of the best places to live for the average person. The 1970s and 1990s perhaps.
More like 1950s - 1970s
I’d say it’s still the case. Again, if you are a middle class (in the American sense) white person, it’s all set up for you.
If you lived in Colorado though, with some of the most beautiful natural scenery in the world, would you really want to work in Denver every day rather than work at home and admire the view? If you want a big city lifestyle you would move to New York or Chicago or LA
Denver exists for people who like to spend their entire time in the mountains, but have day jobs.
Almost everyone I know there has a second place - usually just a two or three room cabin - out in the mountains.
Seattle is quite similar. With boating as alternative to mountaineering.
Also similar issue regarding downtown.
Though we do get a LOT of tourists, most visibly in relation to cruise ships to Alaska & back. Their returning to business has helped downtown SEA.
BTW, Leon, have you been to the State Capitol yet? Always wanted to go there & stand at the Mile High marker!
I went in 2011
Good for you, dude! AND was it as thrilling as you'd always imagined it would be?
I actually lived and worked in Boulder (at the University), but I visited Denver a lot, given I had free travel. Unfortunately I was only there for three months, Jan to March 2011
On the subject of whether a severe Tory collapse in 2024 is actually recoverable for the party - I keep saying this but I don't think many people here understand just how rotten the Tory infrastructure is, especially in "safe" seats. The coffers are dry, the campaign staff have moved on to greener pastures, activists are dying off and some areas haven't been canvassed in 15 years. They simply do not have the manpower, money or data to win those seats again once they're lost; scarce resources will be redirected to retaining the few seats that survive the tsunami (see: Scottish Labour post 2015). It's an extinction level event.
Provided Truss is replaced with Sunak it won't be an extinction event.
Then whether Starmer and Labour stay in a decade or more or are out after a term will depend entirely on the economy. If they increase taxes on ordinary workers, inflation climbs higher, strikes get out of control and unemployment goes up it doesn't matter what the Tory activist level is there will still be a strong anti Labour swing, plus a resurgent Tory campaign fund from business donors
If you lived in Colorado though, with some of the most beautiful natural scenery in the world, would you really want to work in Denver every day rather than work at home and admire the view? If you want a big city lifestyle you would move to New York or Chicago or LA
Denver exists for people who like to spend their entire time in the mountains, but have day jobs.
Almost everyone I know there has a second place - usually just a two or three room cabin - out in the mountains.
Seattle is quite similar. With boating as alternative to mountaineering.
Also similar issue regarding downtown.
Though we do get a LOT of tourists, most visibly in relation to cruise ships to Alaska & back. Their returning to business has helped downtown SEA.
BTW, Leon, have you been to the State Capitol yet? Always wanted to go there & stand at the Mile High marker!
I went in 2011
Good for you, dude! AND was it as thrilling as you'd always imagined it would be?
I actually lived and worked in Boulder (at the University), but I visited Denver a lot, given I had free travel. Unfortunately I was only there for three months, Jan to March 2011
I do remember you posting about that. What did you think of Boulder? AND . . .
Why is CU’s Dining Hall Named After a Cannibal?
Alferd Packer Restaurant & Grill may seem like a misspelling of perhaps a wealthy donor to the CU campus, but the actual story of the name comes from a famous cannibal in Colorado. Students were asked to name the dining hall when it was being built, and the name that won in a landslide from morbid college humor was Alferd Packer.
All these things would have been annoying, but disaster really hit when the group was struck by a snowstorm in the mountains. Packer originally denied any claims of cannibalism, but later admitted that he had killed and eaten several of the men during the snowstorm while they were lost. Upon finally stumbling upon civilization in Colorado, alone, Packer first insisted that the other men had abandoned him and he had nearly starved to death. The townspeople thought this was odd considering Packer hardly looked malnourished, and they could not understand why the rest of the men would abandon him.
Packer was searching for gold in Breckenridge like many others in the 1800s, and banded himself with a small group of men that he didn’t know by lying and saying that he knew the area well (he did not). It was written that Packer was a horrible traveling companion as he did not have a rifle, he was greedy with other people’s rations, and he did not know where he was going.
Packer was confronted by the townspeople after he began making large purchases, despite starting the trip with no money, Packer finally relented, saying that he and the other men had whittled each other down and taken the money from the others until there was only Packer and one other man left, who he killed and ate.
When the bodies were found all together after winter had passed and within walking distance of the town, it seemed far more likely that Packer had killed all the men in order to steal their supplies and money, then walked into town without eating them, which explains his lack of undernourishment. Packer was sentenced to 40 years in prison, the longest prison sentence to date at the time.
The Brexiters worship the US model, but don’t actually want to live there.
🤔
Despite my last post, the US is great, for about 75% of the population.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
I would say unless you are in the top 10% by earnings and assets with private healthcare and children in private schools, the US is no better than the rest of the West and for the poorest worse (unless you come from a poor less developed country anyway)
Things like lack of holidays and no maternity pay and many more issues make life for the average American somewhat worse than life for the average west European - even tho the American is richer on paper. Yet Americans also have hard to define advantages: more freedom space and mobility
But America has many more VERY rich people who do extremely nicely (and spend a lot of time in Europe…)
For the bottom 10-20% America is vastly worse
There have been times when the US was one of the best places to live for the average person. The 1970s and 1990s perhaps.
More like 1950s - 1970s
I’d say it’s still the case. Again, if you are a middle class (in the American sense) white person, it’s all set up for you.
You need to be pretty close to the top 20% these days I'd say.
Russia is Donald Ducked. Those with half brain have already left. What's left are alcoholics and bullies. Russia (since 1990) was never a great power. It just pretended to be and we all believed it.
I think its down to immediate demand, a lot of demand earlier has now left less immediate delivery needs. Futures prices though are not falling quite as fast.
Comments
But the sad emptiness of central Denver does strike me as a real problem. We may have casually made a tragic mistake by moving to WFH without working out the consequences
Plus, if my experience of the Inland Revenue is anything to go by then WFH is a calamity for productivity
When comparing US and European stats, don’t be misled by the average. Always ask to see the comparison of the medians. Therein lies the story.
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/world-war-two-veteran-95-28266010
But back then, the cream tended to rise, and got a chance to firm up and show something.
Today's it's more likely to rise, and get skimmed off the top and blown away by blasts of hot air.
But dig out recordings of parliamentary debates or election campaigns or political TV programmes from 40 or 50 years ago and it immediately strikes you how today things are so dumbed down.
My bet is that the more traditional arrangement will prove the more productive. People need people for ideas
But it’s an enormous and unprecedented experiment and no one can do more than guess
🤔
Great cities need to transition to being centres of tourism, not work.
What I can't get my head around is that the median US worker is hardly paid more than thirty years ago, in real terms, despite economic growth over that period. It's worth noting that US growth per head has only been slightly higher than our own, over that period, but a bit more of our growth has filtered down to median workers than in the US.
https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/08/07/for-most-us-workers-real-wages-have-barely-budged-for-decades/
Keeping them out of jail and paying tax in gainful employment.
Choices made.
It's hell if you're poor, and much harsher and more vindictive than this country is.
sources: https://www.cdc.gov/obesity/data/prevalence-maps.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obesity_in_the_United_States#Prevalence_by_state_and_territory
That doesn't mean that Wisconsin doesn't have a serious obesity problem, since obesity is a serious problem almost everywhere in the United States. (It's worst in American Samoa, by the way.)
(Since WW II, the United States has acquired a problem that a century or more ago would have been unimaginable: obese poor people. I suppose that's better than the reverse, but it is still a problem we should do more about.)
In fact I don’t know many that do. It was Singapore on Thames for a reason. It wasn’t Los Angeles on Thames
Indeed Brexiteers have mostly looked to Australia. “Australian points system” etc etc
That is to say: a Western European social security framework, but with more national sovereignty and better control of the borders - and English common law, Westminster Parliamentary democracy, and the monarchy etc
It will be hard to do as well as Australia (which has so many natural advantages). But it is still worth trying
Copying America would be mental. Every country knows that now
However the 1970s UK was filled with heavyweight politicians but a country in deep decline and economic strife
It works very well if you’re relatively middle class, are white, are not much interested in culture, and don’t get too sick.
It's very easy to monitor a call agent's productivity and indeed work times, wherever they are located. I can't be certain HMRC do that because they may well have 'saved' on the monitoring tools but if they don't they won't have a clue what their call agents are doing whether in the office or not.
You know a lot about a lot of things but I suspect you might be making some ill-informed assumptions about WFH and productivity.
But yeah, I get that you were being provocative. Keep up the good work, we'd miss it!
As my agent said today (and she has multiple clients facing identical problems to me) - “before covid HMRC was shambolic, now it is a total meltdown”
Less gritty, dirty, crowded both those places, than in most of Greater London, urban Midlands, etc., etc.
Actually, much of NYC outside of Manhattan sorta reminds me of The Smoke, just with straighter streets.
I'm sure that would be an overwhelming vote.
Conversely, I think sometimes the worst thing you can do to a person is give them what they ask for.
Perhaps all those people in sandwich bars that Leon is lamenting need to change job.
At least I think it’s performative.
Because the alternative would be that she’s thicker than pig-shit.
{de-lurks after three years}
Make our cities affordable to actually be able to live in the centre. Like Seville.
Then, and only then, will our cities be vibrant and livable.
Music (this will be a feature of my posts):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPKEIZ7wm2o
Holden was just a special adviser before becoming an MP, not a QC or CEO
https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/o030hv/map_showing_percentage_of_adults_binge_drinking/
I’m my experience, a vast chunk of Americans - especially in places like Denver - live a quality of life simply out of reach to much of Britain.
In return they have to put up with desolate strip malls for entertainment, but that seems to be the trade-off.
Let’s hope they sort it out or they ain’t getting no more of my taxes
What we need is substantial real term cuts in expenditure. That'll sort it.
While some obsess about bathrooms, we don't have a single functioning lock on a toilet door in a special school.
Cuts now!
I just find it interesting that the image people form of a person can be enough to settle their view, when they know basically nil about what actually matters.
But America has many more VERY rich people who do extremely nicely (and spend a lot of time in Europe…)
For the bottom 10-20% America is vastly worse
They did not take control of Barking and Dagenham council. Indeed, there weren't even close.
And Liz Truss ain't no Thatcher ...
I agree that there are significant downsides but I think most - let’s say the middle 50/60% would quite happily trade, say, Leeds for Denver.
If had PR, a BNP type party would probably be a permanent fixture with 10% or so of the vote.
It is not Chicago or Pittsburgh or Baltimore or St Louis
If you really like the Rockies that much, you could spend almost as much time climbing mountains in Colorado during your 6 weeks off from Leeds than you could in your 1 week off from Denver.
source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ethnic_groups_in_the_United_States_by_household_income
I will say this though, I had a brief chat late yesterday with someone who should know their stuff and they said there is an increasing expectation that things are about to go into a novel gear around the Russia-Ukraine war. 'Bumpy' was the descriptive phrase.
And then the weather probably isn't suitable for a fair amount of the time either, depending on what your thing is or how high you want to go.
By which time, you might be down to 30-40 days. A bit more than our hypothetical 14k bagger from Leeds, but not vastly more.
Inflation may be back again but the Ukraine is a key factor in that and strikes are largely confined to the remaining public sector with at least ballots required beforehand unlike then
I understand that, a hundred years ago prior to AC, the winter was the peak season, but this has since inverted.
IF you can't do one thing or go somewhere, go somewhere else and do something (slightly) different there.
You'd be surprised how empty it can get on a weekend in the Emerald City. Not downtown, but out the hoods and burbs.
Everyone (with means of course) buggers off for months on end in summer, employing a variety of ingenious WFH, PTO and long weekend tactics.
It’s been an eye-opener.
Again, if you are a middle class (in the American sense) white person, it’s all set up for you.
Then whether Starmer and Labour stay in a decade or more or are out after a term will depend entirely on the economy. If they increase taxes on ordinary workers, inflation climbs higher, strikes get out of control and unemployment goes up it doesn't matter what the Tory activist level is there will still be a strong anti Labour swing, plus a resurgent Tory campaign fund from business donors
Why is CU’s Dining Hall Named After a Cannibal?
Alferd Packer Restaurant & Grill may seem like a misspelling of perhaps a wealthy donor to the CU campus, but the actual story of the name comes from a famous cannibal in Colorado. Students were asked to name the dining hall when it was being built, and the name that won in a landslide from morbid college humor was Alferd Packer.
All these things would have been annoying, but disaster really hit when the group was struck by a snowstorm in the mountains. Packer originally denied any claims of cannibalism, but later admitted that he had killed and eaten several of the men during the snowstorm while they were lost. Upon finally stumbling upon civilization in Colorado, alone, Packer first insisted that the other men had abandoned him and he had nearly starved to death. The townspeople thought this was odd considering Packer hardly looked malnourished, and they could not understand why the rest of the men would abandon him.
Packer was searching for gold in Breckenridge like many others in the 1800s, and banded himself with a small group of men that he didn’t know by lying and saying that he knew the area well (he did not). It was written that Packer was a horrible traveling companion as he did not have a rifle, he was greedy with other people’s rations, and he did not know where he was going.
Packer was confronted by the townspeople after he began making large purchases, despite starting the trip with no money, Packer finally relented, saying that he and the other men had whittled each other down and taken the money from the others until there was only Packer and one other man left, who he killed and ate.
When the bodies were found all together after winter had passed and within walking distance of the town, it seemed far more likely that Packer had killed all the men in order to steal their supplies and money, then walked into town without eating them, which explains his lack of undernourishment. Packer was sentenced to 40 years in prison, the longest prison sentence to date at the time.
https://aboutboulder.com/blog/why-is-cus-dining-hall-named-after-a-cannibal/
SSI - the (obviously apocryphal) way I heard it, when Packer's case was tried, the judge threw the book at him:
"Packer, you goddamn cannibal! There were only four Democrats in all of Pitkin County - and you et three of 'em!"
Those with half brain have already left. What's left are alcoholics and bullies.
Russia (since 1990) was never a great power. It just pretended to be and we all believed it.