For anyone wanting a numbers workout ahead of teh budget, More or Less is interesting.
Debunking claims about road safety of Old Drivers vs Young Drivers, and to my eye talking about prison overcrowding whilst entirely ignoring the nearly 20% of the prison population are on remand: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0024f2y
I'm offski. See you at the Kludget .. er Budget.
Another genius cost saving from the coalition/conservative govts, cutting court days...
on the subject of BBC missing the elephant in the room, file on four just did ticket-touting without mentioning that ticketmaster own ticket re-selling websites. An acquaintance who worked for them a while ago explained that TM's commercial bids for ticketing would include the proposed % of tickets held back for sale on the secondary market.
Back on America for a moment, Harris will win. I did say "and it won't be close". OK maybe not a slam dunk now as it looked. But the hypothesis is simple:
The Trump campaign is a giant gas bag. Self-reinforcing and self-inflating, a vast echo chamber promoted and enhanced on Twitter and Fux and Newsmax and Lies Social. Where EVERYONE you speak to and interact with is voting Trump and thinks like you and has the same fears as you and wants the same Murica as you. EVERYONE.
We know the pollsters have had to correct in favour of Trump. Because they must be missing his voters considering that EVERYONE is voting Trump and the data isn't showing that without correction. So it looks closer now because its been corrected to look closer.
Counter to that, we know that women are more likely to vote than men. We know that whilst the core Trump vote is ANGRY, the rest are just caught up and usually don't vote. Women - and proper men who don't belittle women - are angry at Trump and the GOP, have been registering in large numbers and are motivated.
Don't drink the Trump cool-aid. That is literally what the Trump Musk campaign is wanting you to do.
I'll put my neck out here and be gladly ridiculed if I am wrong - I don't think it's close, not even by a million miles. I think Trump will win 'bigly' and we will all be shocked by the scale of his victory.
I'd be less certain re the House but I think the Senate we may be looking at 53-54 GOP seats,
I think that the plausible outcomes range from a Trump landslide in the EC, to a Harris EC landslide, though the popular vote will probably be only 2% to Harris. The swing states are very likely to swing the same way.
It all hinges on turnout IMO.
That is the main straw I am now clinging to. Harris has pumped serious money and time into a truly massive GOTV operation in the swing states, in Pennsylvania in particular. Trump basically hasn't with Musk's efforts generally being laughed at. The professionals generally claim GOTV can be worth 2-3%. If that is true Harris wins PA, MI, WI and very probably NC, GA and NV as well.
In the UK I criticise most such efforts as not as vital as people think. If it is worth 2-3% though that is more than enough as that covers about 7 states.
This GOTV operation seems to have gone to sleep in Nevada and North Carolina. Perhaps it’s different elsewhere.
The path surely has to be through the rust belt for Harris. I just don't see how she's not motivating registered Democrats to get out to vote in Nevada (Which I *think* would correlate with Arizona...) yet simultaneously switching Reps and Inds over to her side. Perhaps she is, but I'd be shitting my pants if I had a big short on Trump now tbh. Objectively I do think Harris is the value overall mind.
If Trump wins Nevada, he almost certainly wins Arizona. If he wins them big, probably both Senate seats switch.
And, no. Rural Republicans, in Nevada, are not turning out in droves to vote for Harris.
But, as you say, there’s still a path to victory for Harris, if she holds the Rustbelt - even if Georgia flips.
The Harris path is WI, MI, PA.
I don't see another path but Harris campaign chief says there's lots. Hmmm...
Anything else is wishcasting now, IMHO.
Ralston detests Trump - but he seems very close to calling Nevada for him. Silver detests Trump, but rates his chances of winning at 53%. Trende, I strongly suspect, is a never-Trump Republican, but he gives him the edge. And, some weeks ago, he wrote of the Washington State primary that it implied that Trump and Harris would poll about 48% each, if historic patterns of voting continued.
Understand thar it's Budget day, but not much comment so far on the Barrow-in-Furness shipyard fire. I find it to be a little concerning, as there're also been several fires at military-linked areas in Germany recently.
And at a Slovakian 155mm artillery munitions factory.
Yes
Not much coverage so far, but I find it to be a concern. I can see also that the only previous documented fire was a much smaller one, on a ship area.
Russia is exporting all those careless smokers ?
Can I place a bet, at 3/5, that the cause is welding?
If the Tories were delivering this budget I can guarantee all the people saying it is wrong for taxes to go up would be cheering this on.
Well we have examples from the recent past. When Sunak was introducing NI++ and putting NI up, those right leaning were most definitely not cheering. The reaction was WTF is he doing, absolute muppet.
So what would they do differently?
We have done this loads previously. The obvious things to do, you get rid of the cliff edges at £50-60k and £100-120k, you merge NI/ IC, if you do this the right way you get more tax from the top edge, you get rid of the current system that nudges people to work / earn less.
But my question would be, why did they not do this in the 14 years they were in government?
Because they bottled it, then Brexit, then COVID. Combining NI / IC is a big move. However, the cliff edges there were no excuses.
But your original post was right leaning people would be cheering previous government raising NI, they most certainly weren't.
The problem is that Labour will now just play the “you had 14 years and look what you did” card.
I don’t know much about combining NI and IC but as I am very close to a cliff edge as you call it, it does intrigue me.
The problem is it would create winners and losers. The obvious losers being pensioners (who don't pay NI) and thy are far more likely to resent the change than the winners are to be grateful.
Here's something I prepared earlier on NIC/IT consolidation:
1) Small impact on pensioners as most do not have incomes that are affected by top rates of income tax 2) People on top 10% income are the group hit most significantly 3) Middle/high incomes (deciles 5-9) do much better 4) Overall, over 50% of households better off 5) Great for in-work households with dependent children, particularly single parents 6) Significant drop in Universal Credit bill as tax burden is reduced for low/medium earners with children (again, a big chunk of this is single parents) 7) Increase in child poverty because median incomes increase while those with no earnings don't benefit (perverse effect of the relative poverty calculation)
However, don't think that flat percentage increase in income tax is sensible because it bumps lots of high earners into >50% marginal tax rates. You'd need to moderate it, so the effects described above would be watered down somewhat.
This is a bit of a myth, it's actually the pensioners on £12k-£50k that would be hardest hit. (It's still the fair thing to do though.)
Combined ICT and NI rates are as follows (ignoring the personal allowance and CB cliff-edges for the moment):
For employees under 66 (State Retirement Age): Up to £12,570pa 0% £12,570 - £50,270 28% (20% ICT + 8% NI) £50,270 - £125,140 42% (40% ICT + 2% NI) >£125,140 47% (45% ICT + 2% NI)
For people over 66 and all those living off unearned income: Up to £12,570pa 0% £12,570 - £50,270 20% £50,270 - £125,140 40% >£125,140 45%
Yep, it's just that the income distribution of pensioners means that relatively few end up being caught up by tax. The reason they appear up be "rich" is because their outgoings tend to be much smaller, no dependent children, enormous assets.
I see we are getting the Chess fake news story again,
Rachel Reeves: Playing Labour's first big gambit
Reeves played chess from an early age, with her father teaching her the key moves. She became a national under-14 champion, and would "quietly thrash" any boys who might think they were in for an easy game, according to Ellie.
It is bizarrely poor reporting. Reeves has never claimed to have won the tournament (she actually reached the Round of 16 in the UK Under-14s Girls Chess Championship as I understand it). It's not clear to me why the BBC have got this simple fact wrong. Sloppy.
A couple of years off - they're only just starting to build the battery manufacturing - but Ford might actually deliver a cheap, mass market EV.
Ford's Goal For 'Game-Changer' Electric Truck: Match China's EVs CEO Jim Farley says Ford's midsize electric truck will be able to match the Chinese automakers at the most elusive challenge yet: cost https://insideevs.com/news/739153/ford-ceo-simplification-evs/
If the Tories were delivering this budget I can guarantee all the people saying it is wrong for taxes to go up would be cheering this on.
Well we have examples from the recent past. When Sunak was introducing NI++ and putting NI up, those right leaning were most definitely not cheering. The reaction was WTF is he doing, absolute muppet.
So what would they do differently?
We have done this loads previously. The obvious things to do, you get rid of the cliff edges at £50-60k and £100-120k, you merge NI/ IC, if you do this the right way you get more tax from the top edge, you get rid of the current system that nudges people to work / earn less.
But my question would be, why did they not do this in the 14 years they were in government?
Because they bottled it, then Brexit, then COVID. Combining NI / IC is a big move. However, the cliff edges there were no excuses.
But your original post was right leaning people would be cheering previous government raising NI, they most certainly weren't.
The problem is that Labour will now just play the “you had 14 years and look what you did” card.
I don’t know much about combining NI and IC but as I am very close to a cliff edge as you call it, it does intrigue me.
The problem is it would create winners and losers. The obvious losers being pensioners (who don't pay NI) and thy are far more likely to resent the change than the winners are to be grateful.
Here's something I prepared earlier on NIC/IT consolidation:
1) Small impact on pensioners as most do not have incomes that are affected by top rates of income tax 2) People on top 10% income are the group hit most significantly 3) Middle/high incomes (deciles 5-9) do much better 4) Overall, over 50% of households better off 5) Great for in-work households with dependent children, particularly single parents 6) Significant drop in Universal Credit bill as tax burden is reduced for low/medium earners with children (again, a big chunk of this is single parents) 7) Increase in child poverty because median incomes increase while those with no earnings don't benefit (perverse effect of the relative poverty calculation)
However, don't think that flat percentage increase in income tax is sensible because it bumps lots of high earners into >50% marginal tax rates. You'd need to moderate it, so the effects described above would be watered down somewhat.
One reason that politicians will give you for having NI separate is so that the taxation*sounds* less. See the bit about income tax going over 50% when you merge in NI...
That's not the case now because employee NICs is regressive - you only pay 2% on earnings over £50,000. So the current system does keep most overall marginal rates below 50%.
My illustrative example was very simple - abolish NICs, flat percentage increase in all income tax rates. There's no way the Treasury would actually do that.
Reducing complexity is "unprofessional".
I still remember the kind of horror in the voice of Diane Feinstein, when she commented (at a Senate Committee hearing) that for the NASA Commercial Cargo project, she wasn't receiving enough detailed documentation on the internals of the project to *keep her staff busy*.
I see we are getting the Chess fake news story again,
Rachel Reeves: Playing Labour's first big gambit
Reeves played chess from an early age, with her father teaching her the key moves. She became a national under-14 champion, and would "quietly thrash" any boys who might think they were in for an easy game, according to Ellie.
It is bizarrely poor reporting. Reeves has never claimed to have won the tournament (she actually came 16th in the British Under-14s Girls tournament as I understand it). It's not clear to me why the BBC have got this simple fact wrong. Sloppy.
I imagine it is a little bit like the infamous FT, government will spend £200bn on COVID kit. It is reported somewhere, journalists just repeat it among themselves, on twitter, etc, before you know it is in loads of articles across reliable media outlet. Then when a new journalist is tasked with write an article that gives us some background, they google and get the articles and summarise them.
Joe Marler’s call for the haka to be “binned” has sparked a fierce backlash in New Zealand, with the country’s government questioning his intelligence and Maori groups accusing him of a lack of respect.
Marler posted on X and said the haka was ‘ridiculous’, advocating for it to be scrapped. He added: “It’s only any good when teams actually front it with some sort of reply. Like the [rugby] league boys did last week.” By Wednesday morning, he had deactivated his account.
While some backed Marler’s comments, the reaction in New Zealand was strong, with ACT leader David Seymour leading the charge.
“I love the haka. It wouldn’t be the All Blacks if they didn’t do the haka,” Seymour told reporters. “Who is this Joe Marler guy, I’ve never heard of him? Well, in my experience I have met a few props with very high IQ, but very few of them. So it could be something in that area.”
Or any day if I had my way. Sort of nonsense you hear. Grrrr.
Kamala's head in your picture occupies exactly the same amount of space as your morbidly overweight cat if you put them side by side (or one above the other as per your profile).
I am struck by how much the lady on benefits gets. £33k a year. You would have to earn nearly £50k a year to take home that much, which is more than most of all the other people in that case study.
She doesn't get £33k a year. Her landlord gets £11k, her carers get £10k, she gets the rest from which she'll have to cover bills and any difference between rent+care and hb+pip
You can't separate out landlord like that. We pretty much all pay the landlord or the bank for housing....
What I don't understand is why people in her situation haven't been moved into local authority owned housing ASAP so the state isn't paying these ridiculous sums for rent and she has a much more stable landlord who won't increase the rent overnight etc...
Right to buy. Councils blocked from reinvesting.
And now 41% of Right to Buy homes are being rented out privately.
At higher rents with (and this is just anecdotes) little maintenance because the landlords don't care and can't offered to do them.
A serious reform which is needed, but which is quite technical, is that Landlord Registration in England needs to be regional or national not per Council, and there is huge scope for efficiency saving.
In Scotland the national scheme is something like £80 per landlord plus £18 per property for 3 years for a typical rental property.
In England it will typically be more like £500-£800 per property for 5 years.
(Lots of discounts etc around the edges, and complication, but in England each Council with a significant scheme builds a huge bureaucracy.)
That all comes out of the rent, and is money which could go on something else such as maintenance or a modest lowering of rent levels - as in each local area it affects all properties in the market.
Under the last Labour government, the local hospital (Victorian buildings) was sold off for housing development, and a replacement built, under a PFI contract.
The usual lock in on maintenance at silly prices, etc., for 30 years. And after 30 years, the hospital become the property of the PFI contract guys (or whichever foreign investor bought out the contract).
I work in this area and this is categorically not the case with most PFI schemes.
ARE YOU SAYING THAT OUR NIGEL HAS YET AGAIN SWALLOWED SOMETHING OFF THE INTERNET HOOK LINE AND SINKER AND IS NOW REPRESENTING IT ON PB AS FACT?
I am struck by how much the lady on benefits gets. £33k a year. You would have to earn nearly £50k a year to take home that much, which is more than most of all the other people in that case study.
She doesn't get £33k a year. Her landlord gets £11k, her carers get £10k, she gets the rest from which she'll have to cover bills and any difference between rent+care and hb+pip
You can't separate out landlord like that. We pretty much all pay the landlord or the bank for housing....
What I don't understand is why people in her situation haven't been moved into local authority owned housing ASAP so the state isn't paying these ridiculous sums for rent and she has a much more stable landlord who won't increase the rent overnight etc...
Right to buy. Councils blocked from reinvesting.
And now 41% of Right to Buy homes are being rented out privately.
At higher rents with (and this is just anecdotes) little maintenance because the landlords don't care and can't offered to do them.
A serious reform which is needed, but which is quite technical, is that Landlord Registration in England needs to be regional or national not per Council, and there is huge scope for efficiency saving.
In Scotland the national scheme is something like £80 per landlord plus £18 per property for 3 years for a typical rental property.
In England it will typically be more like £500-£800 per property for 5 years.
(Lots of discounts etc around the edges, and complication, but in England each Council with a significant scheme builds a huge bureaucracy.)
That all comes out of the rent, and is money which could go on something else such as maintenance or a modest lowering of rent levels - as in each local area it affects all properties in the market.
Or any day if I had my way. Sort of nonsense you hear. Grrrr.
Kamala's head in your picture occupies exactly the same amount of space as your morbidly overweight cat if you put them side by side (or one above the other as per your profile).
Make of that what you will.
Back to beans soon. Or maybe I should do it now because her poll lead started eroding at the exact time I did the change.
I am struck by how much the lady on benefits gets. £33k a year. You would have to earn nearly £50k a year to take home that much, which is more than most of all the other people in that case study.
She doesn't get £33k a year. Her landlord gets £11k, her carers get £10k, she gets the rest from which she'll have to cover bills and any difference between rent+care and hb+pip
You can't separate out landlord like that. We pretty much all pay the landlord or the bank for housing....
What I don't understand is why people in her situation haven't been moved into local authority owned housing ASAP so the state isn't paying these ridiculous sums for rent and she has a much more stable landlord who won't increase the rent overnight etc...
Right to buy. Councils blocked from reinvesting.
And now 41% of Right to Buy homes are being rented out privately.
At higher rents with (and this is just anecdotes) little maintenance because the landlords don't care and can't offered to do them.
A serious reform which is needed, but which is quite technical, is that Landlord Registration in England needs to be regional or national not per Council, and there is huge scope for efficiency saving.
In Scotland the national scheme is something like £80 per landlord plus £18 per property for 3 years for a typical rental property.
In England it will typically be more like £500-£800 per property for 5 years.
(Lots of discounts etc around the edges, and complication, but in England each Council with a significant scheme builds a huge bureaucracy.)
That all comes out of the rent, and is money which could go on something else such as maintenance or a modest lowering of rent levels - as in each local area it affects all properties in the market.
I see we are getting the Chess fake news story again,
Rachel Reeves: Playing Labour's first big gambit
Reeves played chess from an early age, with her father teaching her the key moves. She became a national under-14 champion, and would "quietly thrash" any boys who might think they were in for an easy game, according to Ellie.
It is bizarrely poor reporting. Reeves has never claimed to have won the tournament (she actually came 16th in the British Under-14s Girls tournament as I understand it). It's not clear to me why the BBC have got this simple fact wrong. Sloppy.
I imagine it is a little bit like the infamous FT, government will spend £200bn on COVID kit. It is reported somewhere, journalists just repeat it among themselves, on twitter, etc, before you know it is in loads of articles across reliable media outlet. Then when a new journalist is tasked with write an article that gives us some background, they google and get the articles and summarise them.
Yes, it's the same flaw of train-and-repeat that is bedevilling LLMs: previous reporting becomes data, despite the fact that the previous reporting is wrong. I suspect Reeves finds the mistake embarrassing, not least because she might one day be blamed for it.
I see we are getting the Chess fake news story again,
Rachel Reeves: Playing Labour's first big gambit
Reeves played chess from an early age, with her father teaching her the key moves. She became a national under-14 champion, and would "quietly thrash" any boys who might think they were in for an easy game, according to Ellie.
It is bizarrely poor reporting. Reeves has never claimed to have won the tournament (she actually reached the Round of 16 in the UK Under-14s Girls Chess Championship as I understand it). It's not clear to me why the BBC have got this simple fact wrong. Sloppy.
Where's the BBC's misinformation expert when you need her?
I am struck by how much the lady on benefits gets. £33k a year. You would have to earn nearly £50k a year to take home that much, which is more than most of all the other people in that case study.
She doesn't get £33k a year. Her landlord gets £11k, her carers get £10k, she gets the rest from which she'll have to cover bills and any difference between rent+care and hb+pip
You can't separate out landlord like that. We pretty much all pay the landlord or the bank for housing....
What I don't understand is why people in her situation haven't been moved into local authority owned housing ASAP so the state isn't paying these ridiculous sums for rent and she has a much more stable landlord who won't increase the rent overnight etc...
Right to buy. Councils blocked from reinvesting.
And now 41% of Right to Buy homes are being rented out privately.
At higher rents with (and this is just anecdotes) little maintenance because the landlords don't care and can't offered to do them.
A serious reform which is needed, but which is quite technical, is that Landlord Registration in England needs to be regional or national not per Council, and there is huge scope for efficiency saving.
In Scotland the national scheme is something like £80 per landlord plus £18 per property for 3 years for a typical rental property.
In England it will typically be more like £500-£800 per property for 5 years.
(Lots of discounts etc around the edges, and complication, but in England each Council with a significant scheme builds a huge bureaucracy.)
That all comes out of the rent, and is money which could go on something else such as maintenance or a modest lowering of rent levels - as in each local area it affects all properties in the market.
A couple of years off - they're only just starting to build the battery manufacturing - but Ford might actually deliver a cheap, mass market EV.
Ford's Goal For 'Game-Changer' Electric Truck: Match China's EVs CEO Jim Farley says Ford's midsize electric truck will be able to match the Chinese automakers at the most elusive challenge yet: cost https://insideevs.com/news/739153/ford-ceo-simplification-evs/
As a Ford driver I would not bet against them. They make excellent and reliable vehicles.
Joe Marler’s call for the haka to be “binned” has sparked a fierce backlash in New Zealand, with the country’s government questioning his intelligence and Maori groups accusing him of a lack of respect.
Marler posted on X and said the haka was ‘ridiculous’, advocating for it to be scrapped. He added: “It’s only any good when teams actually front it with some sort of reply. Like the [rugby] league boys did last week.” By Wednesday morning, he had deactivated his account.
While some backed Marler’s comments, the reaction in New Zealand was strong, with ACT leader David Seymour leading the charge.
“I love the haka. It wouldn’t be the All Blacks if they didn’t do the haka,” Seymour told reporters. “Who is this Joe Marler guy, I’ve never heard of him? Well, in my experience I have met a few props with very high IQ, but very few of them. So it could be something in that area.”
Under the last Labour government, the local hospital (Victorian buildings) was sold off for housing development, and a replacement built, under a PFI contract.
The usual lock in on maintenance at silly prices, etc., for 30 years. And after 30 years, the hospital become the property of the PFI contract guys (or whichever foreign investor bought out the contract).
So they are paid generously over thirty years, and then they get to keep the building at the end? What am I missing here?
An explanation for governmental stupidity ?
Government simply doesn't think much beyond the next election. At most the one beyond that - then it's someone else's problem.
Perhaps we should be grateful that we didn't get 40 new hospitals under the Tories.
I see we are getting the Chess fake news story again,
Rachel Reeves: Playing Labour's first big gambit
Reeves played chess from an early age, with her father teaching her the key moves. She became a national under-14 champion, and would "quietly thrash" any boys who might think they were in for an easy game, according to Ellie.
It is bizarrely poor reporting. Reeves has never claimed to have won the tournament (she actually reached the Round of 16 in the UK Under-14s Girls Chess Championship as I understand it). It's not clear to me why the BBC have got this simple fact wrong. Sloppy.
Where's the BBC's misinformation expert when you need her?
Too busy looking up whackos on twitter for hardly any followers.
A couple of years off - they're only just starting to build the battery manufacturing - but Ford might actually deliver a cheap, mass market EV.
Ford's Goal For 'Game-Changer' Electric Truck: Match China's EVs CEO Jim Farley says Ford's midsize electric truck will be able to match the Chinese automakers at the most elusive challenge yet: cost https://insideevs.com/news/739153/ford-ceo-simplification-evs/
As a Ford driver I would not bet against them. They make excellent and reliable vehicles.
Their problem, on cost, in the US is the vast financial liabilities they are dragging round with them.
The US health care system just keeps on giving....
I see we are getting the Chess fake news story again,
Rachel Reeves: Playing Labour's first big gambit
Reeves played chess from an early age, with her father teaching her the key moves. She became a national under-14 champion, and would "quietly thrash" any boys who might think they were in for an easy game, according to Ellie.
It is bizarrely poor reporting. Reeves has never claimed to have won the tournament (she actually reached the Round of 16 in the UK Under-14s Girls Chess Championship as I understand it). It's not clear to me why the BBC have got this simple fact wrong. Sloppy.
Where's the BBC's misinformation expert when you need her?
A couple of years off - they're only just starting to build the battery manufacturing - but Ford might actually deliver a cheap, mass market EV.
Ford's Goal For 'Game-Changer' Electric Truck: Match China's EVs CEO Jim Farley says Ford's midsize electric truck will be able to match the Chinese automakers at the most elusive challenge yet: cost https://insideevs.com/news/739153/ford-ceo-simplification-evs/
As a Ford driver I would not bet against them. They make excellent and reliable vehicles.
Their problem, on cost, in the US is the vast financial liabilities they are dragging round with them.
The US health care system just keeps on giving....
I did the sums yesterday, their state public healthcare costs are ~ 80% of ours per person so far as I could work out.
Under the last Labour government, the local hospital (Victorian buildings) was sold off for housing development, and a replacement built, under a PFI contract.
The usual lock in on maintenance at silly prices, etc., for 30 years. And after 30 years, the hospital become the property of the PFI contract guys (or whichever foreign investor bought out the contract).
I work in this area and this is categorically not the case with most PFI schemes.
How long have you been doing so ?
I can’t say too much for obvious reasons but my firm advises in respect of the end of (and hand back), and termination of, PFI schemes
If Sunak had been a person - like this - rather than an angry robot during the GE, the Tories would have done a lot better.
I have no idea who was advising him as PM, but they were terrible. I know that the man is warm and personable and yet he came across as such a tetchy idiot.
Under the last Labour government, the local hospital (Victorian buildings) was sold off for housing development, and a replacement built, under a PFI contract.
The usual lock in on maintenance at silly prices, etc., for 30 years. And after 30 years, the hospital become the property of the PFI contract guys (or whichever foreign investor bought out the contract).
I work in this area and this is categorically not the case with most PFI schemes.
How long have you been doing so ?
I can’t say too much for obvious reasons but my firm advises in respect of the end of (and hand back), and termination of, PFI schemes
Interesting. I was just curious about how long you'd been doing so, that's all. There's well over a quarter century of these schemes now - some OK, some very definitely not OK.
Do you tend to work for the private sector, or government (if you're allowed to say) ?
A couple of years off - they're only just starting to build the battery manufacturing - but Ford might actually deliver a cheap, mass market EV.
Ford's Goal For 'Game-Changer' Electric Truck: Match China's EVs CEO Jim Farley says Ford's midsize electric truck will be able to match the Chinese automakers at the most elusive challenge yet: cost https://insideevs.com/news/739153/ford-ceo-simplification-evs/
As a Ford driver I would not bet against them. They make excellent and reliable vehicles.
Their problem, on cost, in the US is the vast financial liabilities they are dragging round with them.
The US health care system just keeps on giving....
I did the sums yesterday, their state public healthcare costs are ~ 80% of ours per person so far as I could work out.
And companies either take on a vast load or there are problems - the current system is predicated on your job providing healthcare, pretty much.
I am struck by how much the lady on benefits gets. £33k a year. You would have to earn nearly £50k a year to take home that much, which is more than most of all the other people in that case study.
She doesn't get £33k a year. Her landlord gets £11k, her carers get £10k, she gets the rest from which she'll have to cover bills and any difference between rent+care and hb+pip
You can't separate out landlord like that. We pretty much all pay the landlord or the bank for housing....
What I don't understand is why people in her situation haven't been moved into local authority owned housing ASAP so the state isn't paying these ridiculous sums for rent and she has a much more stable landlord who won't increase the rent overnight etc...
Right to buy. Councils blocked from reinvesting.
And now 41% of Right to Buy homes are being rented out privately.
At higher rents with (and this is just anecdotes) little maintenance because the landlords don't care and can't offered to do them.
A serious reform which is needed, but which is quite technical, is that Landlord Registration in England needs to be regional or national not per Council, and there is huge scope for efficiency saving.
In Scotland the national scheme is something like £80 per landlord plus £18 per property for 3 years for a typical rental property.
In England it will typically be more like £500-£800 per property for 5 years.
(Lots of discounts etc around the edges, and complication, but in England each Council with a significant scheme builds a huge bureaucracy.)
That all comes out of the rent, and is money which could go on something else such as maintenance or a modest lowering of rent levels - as in each local area it affects all properties in the market.
It won't all come out of rent at all. Landlords charge mostly on what the market will bear, not cost + margin.
Since it is an input cost which applies across the market in a geographical market area, it will affect the dynamics of the market.
Agreed but if the charge is 500-800, rents don't go up by that. I would be surprised if they went up by half that.
It's rather complex. That is the fee, then all the material has to be collected for the form and 10 or more attachments, and a professional to check that the Council aren't trying (by deliberation or incompetence) to add in all sorts of duties that they have no legal right to enforce, and push back (this is routine). Where they have tried this, it has often taken legal action at High Court or Appeal Court to stop it.
The cost burden / benefit goes 3 ways - lower / higher rents, investment / not-investment in the property, and increased / decreased profits for LL, as determined by the (imperfect) market.
For a normal simple privately rental property on the fee part of the number (eg single family tenancy) it represents an extra overhead of perhaps £9-15 per month in England (say 1-1.5% of rent), and perhaps 0.2-0.3% of rent in Scotland.
Either way, it's an extra overhead in England, and a massively over-complex system introduced by Housing Act 2005 - which is when I started tracking the issue, and something very ripe for reform indeed. There has been an absolute mountain of case law about it, which has made 10s of millions for lawyers.
If Sunak had been a person - like this - rather than an angry robot during the GE, the Tories would have done a lot better.
I have no idea who was advising him as PM, but they were terrible. I know that the man is warm and personable and yet he came across as such a tetchy idiot.
It has been noticed, on several occasions, that exPMs are better performers in the House of Commons, after they leave office.
If Sunak had been a person - like this - rather than an angry robot during the GE, the Tories would have done a lot better.
I have no idea who was advising him as PM, but they were terrible. I know that the man is warm and personable and yet he came across as such a tetchy idiot.
The corporate tax roadmap will be one of the bright spots and has been well consulted. Aside from possible employer NI rises this one is looking pretty decent for companies, all things considered.
Is it ? Well over half the anticipated tax increases fall on employers - and the well above inflation minimum wage rise will also drive up employment costs. Businesses employing few people will do fairly well; the rest get something of a caning.
Whether that all works out depends a lot on what's done on the spending side.
Obviously teh workers will pay for it , private companies do not have a magic money treee like the public sector. Means either employing less people or no wage rises till they make up the losses. Economics for idiots.
Business employing fewer people and increasing efficiency is actually a good thing for our economy if you look at it from a macro perspective.
So long as:
1. Efficiency actually rises, rather than the company contracting or failing to expand overall. 2. The changes don’t lead to an increase in unemployment.
There is huge unfulfilled demand for staff in several sectors, including health care, care and construction. Now the reality is a lot of people don't want those jobs but I think we are a long way from significant unemployment regardless.
NHS employment is at an all time high (I believe) - 1.3M FTE and up 30% since 2009.
Have we all got that much sicker over time? What are all those people doing?
Dealing with us getting older. And older, and older.
It's a contributory factor, but a small one. This is one of the few things I know quite a bit about.
Most assessments of UK health spending find that increased chronic conditions and better technology (keeping people alive) are the reasons it's increasing so much. England's demographics are actually quite balanced due to immigration, yet their spending has increased just as much as ours has in Scotland.
Most demographic-linked spending in the UK is made in the last 12 months or so of life. You-only-die-once, so that doesn't matter too much except in the 2030s when we have lots of Boomers reaching their 80s. But a small blip, relatively.
That's disingenuous to suggest most are made in the last 12 months without accounting for when the remainder of the expenditure is made.
Exclude the last 12 months and the remaining roughly 50% is not spread evenly across the rest of your life. Apart from childbirth, which on average is now happening less than once per adult, it's vastly disproportionately in your later years.
That later years expenditure is happening in increasing amounts on top of, not instead of, last 12 month expenditure.
That's true. The point is that that relatively minor changes to the age profile of the population cannot explain the massive increase in health spending over the last few decades. It's increased from about 25% of all government spending in 2000 to about 45% now.
The UKs demographic changes are not relatively minor though. The amount of over 90s in the UK since 2000 has nearly trebled.
Similar changes have happened with other elderly profile groups.
We lost my grandfather earlier this year aged 94. Yes the final 12 months would have cost considerably more (he was in a hospital bed most of final few months) but that's not to say the prior years would have been cheap by any shot of the imagination.
Call a news conference. Biden apologies if his comments were mis-interpreted and at the same time they show clips of the NY rally to show why he was so incensed .
Some of the other speakers were horrific , one called for Dems to be slaughtered , one said Harris had pimp handlers and one called her the anti-Christ . The media so far has concentrated on the Puerto Rico joke and much of the public might be unaware of some of the other comments .
At this point I don’t see how this can’t help shine the light back onto the Trump campaign.
If Sunak had been a person - like this - rather than an angry robot during the GE, the Tories would have done a lot better.
I have no idea who was advising him as PM, but they were terrible. I know that the man is warm and personable and yet he came across as such a tetchy idiot.
I presume it was Crosby's mini-me. The whole Tory campaign was bonkers, coming up with National Service policy seemingly out of nowhere at 9pm for a Telegraph exclusive, leaving the D-Day memorial early to speak to ITV, etc.
If Sunak had been a person - like this - rather than an angry robot during the GE, the Tories would have done a lot better.
I have no idea who was advising him as PM, but they were terrible. I know that the man is warm and personable and yet he came across as such a tetchy idiot.
He came across quite poorly in the leadership election process in fairness. Some people are not cut out to be the front man. In a same world, he’d be impressing us all on telly with his grasp of detail as a long standing Chief Sec to the Treasury. But the lure of the greasy pole is always too much.
Call a news conference. Biden apologies if his comments were mis-interpreted and at the same time they show clips of the NY rally to show why he was so incensed .
Some of the other speakers were horrific , one called for Dems to be slaughtered , one said Harris had pimp handlers and one called her the anti-Christ . The media so far has concentrated on the Puerto Rico joke and much of the public might be unaware of some of the other comments .
At this point I don’t see how this can’t help shine the light back onto the Trump campaign.
The Puerto Rico "joke" sounds almost like a dead cat, compared to the other stuff.
I gather that another "joke" got vetoed that involved calling Harris a c*nt.
Call a news conference. Biden apologies if his comments were mis-interpreted and at the same time they show clips of the NY rally to show why he was so incensed .
Some of the other speakers were horrific , one called for Dems to be slaughtered , one said Harris had pimp handlers and one called her the anti-Christ . The media so far has concentrated on the Puerto Rico joke and much of the public might be unaware of some of the other comments .
At this point I don’t see how this can’t help shine the light back onto the Trump campaign.
The problem is it just draws more attention to how pathetic the sitting president has become. And that until very recently everyone was casually insisting he could serve until 2028. Most voters would see a qualitative difference between a comment by sitting president and a largely unknown comedian or whoever else. What she really needs is a big fat dead cat. But time is running out.
I see we are getting the Chess fake news story again,
Rachel Reeves: Playing Labour's first big gambit
Reeves played chess from an early age, with her father teaching her the key moves. She became a national under-14 champion, and would "quietly thrash" any boys who might think they were in for an easy game, according to Ellie.
It is bizarrely poor reporting. Reeves has never claimed to have won the tournament (she actually reached the Round of 16 in the UK Under-14s Girls Chess Championship as I understand it). It's not clear to me why the BBC have got this simple fact wrong. Sloppy.
Where's the BBC's misinformation expert when you need her?
She is just a pawn in the bigger picture, mate.
Either that or she was hungover after a knight out
Call a news conference. Biden apologies if his comments were mis-interpreted and at the same time they show clips of the NY rally to show why he was so incensed .
Some of the other speakers were horrific , one called for Dems to be slaughtered , one said Harris had pimp handlers and one called her the anti-Christ . The media so far has concentrated on the Puerto Rico joke and much of the public might be unaware of some of the other comments .
At this point I don’t see how this can’t help shine the light back onto the Trump campaign.
The Puerto Rico "joke" sounds almost like a dead cat, compared to the other stuff.
I gather that another "joke" got vetoed that involved calling Harris a c*nt.
Americans don't play to the same rules on politeness, fair play, sarcasm and irony (no laughing at the back) that we do, so what would shock and horrify us wouldn't necessarily do so them.
The corporate tax roadmap will be one of the bright spots and has been well consulted. Aside from possible employer NI rises this one is looking pretty decent for companies, all things considered.
Is it ? Well over half the anticipated tax increases fall on employers - and the well above inflation minimum wage rise will also drive up employment costs. Businesses employing few people will do fairly well; the rest get something of a caning.
Whether that all works out depends a lot on what's done on the spending side.
Obviously teh workers will pay for it , private companies do not have a magic money treee like the public sector. Means either employing less people or no wage rises till they make up the losses. Economics for idiots.
Business employing fewer people and increasing efficiency is actually a good thing for our economy if you look at it from a macro perspective.
So long as:
1. Efficiency actually rises, rather than the company contracting or failing to expand overall. 2. The changes don’t lead to an increase in unemployment.
There is huge unfulfilled demand for staff in several sectors, including health care, care and construction. Now the reality is a lot of people don't want those jobs but I think we are a long way from significant unemployment regardless.
NHS employment is at an all time high (I believe) - 1.3M FTE and up 30% since 2009.
Have we all got that much sicker over time? What are all those people doing?
Dealing with us getting older. And older, and older.
It's a contributory factor, but a small one. This is one of the few things I know quite a bit about.
Most assessments of UK health spending find that increased chronic conditions and better technology (keeping people alive) are the reasons it's increasing so much. England's demographics are actually quite balanced due to immigration, yet their spending has increased just as much as ours has in Scotland.
Most demographic-linked spending in the UK is made in the last 12 months or so of life. You-only-die-once, so that doesn't matter too much except in the 2030s when we have lots of Boomers reaching their 80s. But a small blip, relatively.
That's disingenuous to suggest most are made in the last 12 months without accounting for when the remainder of the expenditure is made.
Exclude the last 12 months and the remaining roughly 50% is not spread evenly across the rest of your life. Apart from childbirth, which on average is now happening less than once per adult, it's vastly disproportionately in your later years.
That later years expenditure is happening in increasing amounts on top of, not instead of, last 12 month expenditure.
That's true. The point is that that relatively minor changes to the age profile of the population cannot explain the massive increase in health spending over the last few decades. It's increased from about 25% of all government spending in 2000 to about 45% now.
The UKs demographic changes are not relatively minor though. The amount of over 90s in the UK since 2000 has nearly trebled.
Similar changes have happened with other elderly profile groups.
We lost my grandfather earlier this year aged 94. Yes the final 12 months would have cost considerably more (he was in a hospital bed most of final few months) but that's not to say the prior years would have been cheap by any shot of the imagination.
Every assessment of health spending in the UK (OBR, OECD, European Commission) finds the same thing - demographic pressure has not been a big factor for spending growth. Sure, the number of 90 year olds has increased - but that is marginal compared with a total population of 67 million people and conditions and technologies that affect them.
Call a news conference. Biden apologies if his comments were mis-interpreted and at the same time they show clips of the NY rally to show why he was so incensed .
Some of the other speakers were horrific , one called for Dems to be slaughtered , one said Harris had pimp handlers and one called her the anti-Christ . The media so far has concentrated on the Puerto Rico joke and much of the public might be unaware of some of the other comments .
At this point I don’t see how this can’t help shine the light back onto the Trump campaign.
The problem is it just draws more attention to how pathetic the sitting president has become. And that until very recently everyone was casually insisting he could serve until 2028. Most voters would see a qualitative difference between a comment by sitting president and a largely unknown comedian or whoever else. What she really needs is a big fat dead cat. But time is running out.
There’s still 6 days to go . Who knows what might pop up ! Clearly Biden won’t be seen with Harris before Election Day .
I am very much for civility, politeness and constructive positivity in politics. I do start to lose sympathy with the 'last day of term' vibe you see taking over the Commons occasionally where the general attitude is 'isn't this adversarial system stilly when we're just chums and mates really' - er, no, piss off, you're running the country and doing it badly. Someone must oppose.
I am very much for civility, politeness and constructive positivity in politics. I do start to lose sympathy with the 'last day of term' vibe you see taking over the Commons occasionally where the general attitude is 'isn't this adversarial system stilly when we're just chums and mates really' - er, no, piss off, you're running the country and doing it badly. Someone must oppose.
Many of my colleagues are utterly incompetent, but that doesn’t mean I can’t get along with them from time to time.
Call a news conference. Biden apologies if his comments were mis-interpreted and at the same time they show clips of the NY rally to show why he was so incensed .
Some of the other speakers were horrific , one called for Dems to be slaughtered , one said Harris had pimp handlers and one called her the anti-Christ . The media so far has concentrated on the Puerto Rico joke and much of the public might be unaware of some of the other comments .
At this point I don’t see how this can’t help shine the light back onto the Trump campaign.
The problem is it just draws more attention to how pathetic the sitting president has become. And that until very recently everyone was casually insisting he could serve until 2028. Most voters would see a qualitative difference between a comment by sitting president and a largely unknown comedian or whoever else. What she really needs is a big fat dead cat. But time is running out.
There’s still 6 days to go . Who knows what might pop up ! Clearly Biden won’t be seen with Harris before Election Day .
The Clinton / Comey thing was 11 days before the election. Rule out Monday as there needs to be enough time for any story to spread and be absorbed. Really it’s the next 72hrs for a game changer or the dice fall where they do.
The corporate tax roadmap will be one of the bright spots and has been well consulted. Aside from possible employer NI rises this one is looking pretty decent for companies, all things considered.
Is it ? Well over half the anticipated tax increases fall on employers - and the well above inflation minimum wage rise will also drive up employment costs. Businesses employing few people will do fairly well; the rest get something of a caning.
Whether that all works out depends a lot on what's done on the spending side.
Obviously teh workers will pay for it , private companies do not have a magic money treee like the public sector. Means either employing less people or no wage rises till they make up the losses. Economics for idiots.
Business employing fewer people and increasing efficiency is actually a good thing for our economy if you look at it from a macro perspective.
So long as:
1. Efficiency actually rises, rather than the company contracting or failing to expand overall. 2. The changes don’t lead to an increase in unemployment.
There is huge unfulfilled demand for staff in several sectors, including health care, care and construction. Now the reality is a lot of people don't want those jobs but I think we are a long way from significant unemployment regardless.
NHS employment is at an all time high (I believe) - 1.3M FTE and up 30% since 2009.
Have we all got that much sicker over time? What are all those people doing?
Dealing with us getting older. And older, and older.
It's a contributory factor, but a small one. This is one of the few things I know quite a bit about.
Most assessments of UK health spending find that increased chronic conditions and better technology (keeping people alive) are the reasons it's increasing so much. England's demographics are actually quite balanced due to immigration, yet their spending has increased just as much as ours has in Scotland.
Most demographic-linked spending in the UK is made in the last 12 months or so of life. You-only-die-once, so that doesn't matter too much except in the 2030s when we have lots of Boomers reaching their 80s. But a small blip, relatively.
That's disingenuous to suggest most are made in the last 12 months without accounting for when the remainder of the expenditure is made.
Exclude the last 12 months and the remaining roughly 50% is not spread evenly across the rest of your life. Apart from childbirth, which on average is now happening less than once per adult, it's vastly disproportionately in your later years.
That later years expenditure is happening in increasing amounts on top of, not instead of, last 12 month expenditure.
That's true. The point is that that relatively minor changes to the age profile of the population cannot explain the massive increase in health spending over the last few decades. It's increased from about 25% of all government spending in 2000 to about 45% now.
The UKs demographic changes are not relatively minor though. The amount of over 90s in the UK since 2000 has nearly trebled.
Similar changes have happened with other elderly profile groups.
We lost my grandfather earlier this year aged 94. Yes the final 12 months would have cost considerably more (he was in a hospital bed most of final few months) but that's not to say the prior years would have been cheap by any shot of the imagination.
Every assessment of health spending in the UK (OBR, OECD, European Commission) finds the same thing - demographic pressure has not been a big factor for spending growth. Sure, the number of 90 year olds has increased - but that is marginal compared with a total population of 67 million people and conditions and technologies that affect them.
It's not marginal when most of the 67 million don't cost anything significant at all.
Half a million extra over 90s costs more than many millions of working age adults.
The corporate tax roadmap will be one of the bright spots and has been well consulted. Aside from possible employer NI rises this one is looking pretty decent for companies, all things considered.
Is it ? Well over half the anticipated tax increases fall on employers - and the well above inflation minimum wage rise will also drive up employment costs. Businesses employing few people will do fairly well; the rest get something of a caning.
Whether that all works out depends a lot on what's done on the spending side.
Obviously teh workers will pay for it , private companies do not have a magic money treee like the public sector. Means either employing less people or no wage rises till they make up the losses. Economics for idiots.
Business employing fewer people and increasing efficiency is actually a good thing for our economy if you look at it from a macro perspective.
So long as:
1. Efficiency actually rises, rather than the company contracting or failing to expand overall. 2. The changes don’t lead to an increase in unemployment.
There is huge unfulfilled demand for staff in several sectors, including health care, care and construction. Now the reality is a lot of people don't want those jobs but I think we are a long way from significant unemployment regardless.
NHS employment is at an all time high (I believe) - 1.3M FTE and up 30% since 2009.
Have we all got that much sicker over time? What are all those people doing?
Dealing with us getting older. And older, and older.
It's a contributory factor, but a small one. This is one of the few things I know quite a bit about.
Most assessments of UK health spending find that increased chronic conditions and better technology (keeping people alive) are the reasons it's increasing so much. England's demographics are actually quite balanced due to immigration, yet their spending has increased just as much as ours has in Scotland.
Most demographic-linked spending in the UK is made in the last 12 months or so of life. You-only-die-once, so that doesn't matter too much except in the 2030s when we have lots of Boomers reaching their 80s. But a small blip, relatively.
That's disingenuous to suggest most are made in the last 12 months without accounting for when the remainder of the expenditure is made.
Exclude the last 12 months and the remaining roughly 50% is not spread evenly across the rest of your life. Apart from childbirth, which on average is now happening less than once per adult, it's vastly disproportionately in your later years.
That later years expenditure is happening in increasing amounts on top of, not instead of, last 12 month expenditure.
That's true. The point is that that relatively minor changes to the age profile of the population cannot explain the massive increase in health spending over the last few decades. It's increased from about 25% of all government spending in 2000 to about 45% now.
The UKs demographic changes are not relatively minor though. The amount of over 90s in the UK since 2000 has nearly trebled.
Similar changes have happened with other elderly profile groups.
We lost my grandfather earlier this year aged 94. Yes the final 12 months would have cost considerably more (he was in a hospital bed most of final few months) but that's not to say the prior years would have been cheap by any shot of the imagination.
Every assessment of health spending in the UK (OBR, OECD, European Commission) finds the same thing - demographic pressure has not been a big factor for spending growth. Sure, the number of 90 year olds has increased - but that is marginal compared with a total population of 67 million people and conditions and technologies that affect them.
Some links to those would be nice....
You don't mean that the off-the-cuff, one-line, all-problems-are-due-to-x is not actually the problem? I'm shocked.
The corporate tax roadmap will be one of the bright spots and has been well consulted. Aside from possible employer NI rises this one is looking pretty decent for companies, all things considered.
Is it ? Well over half the anticipated tax increases fall on employers - and the well above inflation minimum wage rise will also drive up employment costs. Businesses employing few people will do fairly well; the rest get something of a caning.
Whether that all works out depends a lot on what's done on the spending side.
Obviously teh workers will pay for it , private companies do not have a magic money treee like the public sector. Means either employing less people or no wage rises till they make up the losses. Economics for idiots.
Business employing fewer people and increasing efficiency is actually a good thing for our economy if you look at it from a macro perspective.
So long as:
1. Efficiency actually rises, rather than the company contracting or failing to expand overall. 2. The changes don’t lead to an increase in unemployment.
There is huge unfulfilled demand for staff in several sectors, including health care, care and construction. Now the reality is a lot of people don't want those jobs but I think we are a long way from significant unemployment regardless.
NHS employment is at an all time high (I believe) - 1.3M FTE and up 30% since 2009.
Have we all got that much sicker over time? What are all those people doing?
Dealing with us getting older. And older, and older.
It's a contributory factor, but a small one. This is one of the few things I know quite a bit about.
Most assessments of UK health spending find that increased chronic conditions and better technology (keeping people alive) are the reasons it's increasing so much. England's demographics are actually quite balanced due to immigration, yet their spending has increased just as much as ours has in Scotland.
Most demographic-linked spending in the UK is made in the last 12 months or so of life. You-only-die-once, so that doesn't matter too much except in the 2030s when we have lots of Boomers reaching their 80s. But a small blip, relatively.
That's disingenuous to suggest most are made in the last 12 months without accounting for when the remainder of the expenditure is made.
Exclude the last 12 months and the remaining roughly 50% is not spread evenly across the rest of your life. Apart from childbirth, which on average is now happening less than once per adult, it's vastly disproportionately in your later years.
That later years expenditure is happening in increasing amounts on top of, not instead of, last 12 month expenditure.
That's true. The point is that that relatively minor changes to the age profile of the population cannot explain the massive increase in health spending over the last few decades. It's increased from about 25% of all government spending in 2000 to about 45% now.
The UKs demographic changes are not relatively minor though. The amount of over 90s in the UK since 2000 has nearly trebled.
Similar changes have happened with other elderly profile groups.
We lost my grandfather earlier this year aged 94. Yes the final 12 months would have cost considerably more (he was in a hospital bed most of final few months) but that's not to say the prior years would have been cheap by any shot of the imagination.
Every assessment of health spending in the UK (OBR, OECD, European Commission) finds the same thing - demographic pressure has not been a big factor for spending growth. Sure, the number of 90 year olds has increased - but that is marginal compared with a total population of 67 million people and conditions and technologies that affect them.
It's not marginal when most of the 67 million don't cost anything significant at all.
Half a million extra over 90s costs more than many millions of working age adults.
I'm sure the same authors of these studies find that low skilled migration doesn't depress wages.
The corporate tax roadmap will be one of the bright spots and has been well consulted. Aside from possible employer NI rises this one is looking pretty decent for companies, all things considered.
Is it ? Well over half the anticipated tax increases fall on employers - and the well above inflation minimum wage rise will also drive up employment costs. Businesses employing few people will do fairly well; the rest get something of a caning.
Whether that all works out depends a lot on what's done on the spending side.
Obviously teh workers will pay for it , private companies do not have a magic money treee like the public sector. Means either employing less people or no wage rises till they make up the losses. Economics for idiots.
Business employing fewer people and increasing efficiency is actually a good thing for our economy if you look at it from a macro perspective.
So long as:
1. Efficiency actually rises, rather than the company contracting or failing to expand overall. 2. The changes don’t lead to an increase in unemployment.
There is huge unfulfilled demand for staff in several sectors, including health care, care and construction. Now the reality is a lot of people don't want those jobs but I think we are a long way from significant unemployment regardless.
NHS employment is at an all time high (I believe) - 1.3M FTE and up 30% since 2009.
Have we all got that much sicker over time? What are all those people doing?
Dealing with us getting older. And older, and older.
It's a contributory factor, but a small one. This is one of the few things I know quite a bit about.
Most assessments of UK health spending find that increased chronic conditions and better technology (keeping people alive) are the reasons it's increasing so much. England's demographics are actually quite balanced due to immigration, yet their spending has increased just as much as ours has in Scotland.
Most demographic-linked spending in the UK is made in the last 12 months or so of life. You-only-die-once, so that doesn't matter too much except in the 2030s when we have lots of Boomers reaching their 80s. But a small blip, relatively.
That's disingenuous to suggest most are made in the last 12 months without accounting for when the remainder of the expenditure is made.
Exclude the last 12 months and the remaining roughly 50% is not spread evenly across the rest of your life. Apart from childbirth, which on average is now happening less than once per adult, it's vastly disproportionately in your later years.
That later years expenditure is happening in increasing amounts on top of, not instead of, last 12 month expenditure.
That's true. The point is that that relatively minor changes to the age profile of the population cannot explain the massive increase in health spending over the last few decades. It's increased from about 25% of all government spending in 2000 to about 45% now.
The UKs demographic changes are not relatively minor though. The amount of over 90s in the UK since 2000 has nearly trebled.
Similar changes have happened with other elderly profile groups.
We lost my grandfather earlier this year aged 94. Yes the final 12 months would have cost considerably more (he was in a hospital bed most of final few months) but that's not to say the prior years would have been cheap by any shot of the imagination.
Every assessment of health spending in the UK (OBR, OECD, European Commission) finds the same thing - demographic pressure has not been a big factor for spending growth. Sure, the number of 90 year olds has increased - but that is marginal compared with a total population of 67 million people and conditions and technologies that affect them.
It's not marginal when most of the 67 million don't cost anything significant at all.
Half a million extra over 90s costs more than many millions of working age adults.
You send them an email and tell them they are wrong
Are we still on this “Starmer is actually a North London luvvie” stuff? For goodness sake, no he isn’t.
Yes, he really is. And if the only place he goes for 'walking' holidays is the Lake District, then it'll just be North London on holiday: going to the same artisan shops and meeting the same sorts of people they know from home. And only, I'm guessing, in the season.
The sheer lack of imagination that causes people to go to the Lake District for walking holidays, when there's the rest of the brilliant UK to choose from, is staggering. Wainwright has a lot to answer for.
Comments
on the subject of BBC missing the elephant in the room, file on four just did ticket-touting without mentioning that ticketmaster own ticket re-selling websites.
An acquaintance who worked for them a while ago explained that TM's commercial bids for ticketing would include the proposed % of tickets held back for sale on the secondary market.
Ralston detests Trump - but he seems very close to calling Nevada for him. Silver detests Trump, but rates his chances of winning at 53%. Trende, I strongly suspect, is a never-Trump Republican, but he gives him the edge. And, some weeks ago, he wrote of the Washington State primary that it implied that Trump and Harris would poll about 48% each, if historic patterns of voting continued.
And, here were are.
Ford's Goal For 'Game-Changer' Electric Truck: Match China's EVs
CEO Jim Farley says Ford's midsize electric truck will be able to match the Chinese automakers at the most elusive challenge yet: cost
https://insideevs.com/news/739153/ford-ceo-simplification-evs/
I still remember the kind of horror in the voice of Diane Feinstein, when she commented (at a Senate Committee hearing) that for the NASA Commercial Cargo project, she wasn't receiving enough detailed documentation on the internals of the project to *keep her staff busy*.
Joe Marler’s call for the haka to be “binned” has sparked a fierce backlash in New Zealand, with the country’s government questioning his intelligence and Maori groups accusing him of a lack of respect.
Marler posted on X and said the haka was ‘ridiculous’, advocating for it to be scrapped. He added: “It’s only any good when teams actually front it with some sort of reply. Like the [rugby] league boys did last week.” By Wednesday morning, he had deactivated his account.
While some backed Marler’s comments, the reaction in New Zealand was strong, with ACT leader David Seymour leading the charge.
“I love the haka. It wouldn’t be the All Blacks if they didn’t do the haka,” Seymour told reporters. “Who is this Joe Marler guy, I’ve never heard of him? Well, in my experience I have met a few props with very high IQ, but very few of them. So it could be something in that area.”
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/rugby-union/2024/10/30/joe-marler-haka-comments-david-seymour-maori-reaction/
Make of that what you will.
In Scotland the national scheme is something like £80 per landlord plus £18 per property for 3 years for a typical rental property.
In England it will typically be more like £500-£800 per property for 5 years.
(Lots of discounts etc around the edges, and complication, but in England each Council with a significant scheme builds a huge bureaucracy.)
That all comes out of the rent, and is money which could go on something else such as maintenance or a modest lowering of rent levels - as in each local area it affects all properties in the market.
https://www.mygov.scot/renting-your-property-out/registration
eg Nottingham: https://www.nottinghamcity.gov.uk/information-for-residents/housing/private-rented-accommodation/information-for-landlords/licensing-for-landlords/selective-licensing/
https://www.examinerlive.co.uk/news/west-yorkshire-news/cost-pfi-calderdale-hospital-supposed-10753207
Never forget
The US health care system just keeps on giving....
Anyway, the funs about to start 📺
I have no idea who was advising him as PM, but they were terrible. I know that the man is warm and personable and yet he came across as such a tetchy idiot.
I was just curious about how long you'd been doing so, that's all. There's well over a quarter century of these schemes now - some OK, some very definitely not OK.
Do you tend to work for the private sector, or government (if you're allowed to say) ?
The cost burden / benefit goes 3 ways - lower / higher rents, investment / not-investment in the property, and increased / decreased profits for LL, as determined by the (imperfect) market.
For a normal simple privately rental property on the fee part of the number (eg single family tenancy) it represents an extra overhead of perhaps £9-15 per month in England (say 1-1.5% of rent), and perhaps 0.2-0.3% of rent in Scotland.
Either way, it's an extra overhead in England, and a massively over-complex system introduced by Housing Act 2005 - which is when I started tracking the issue, and something very ripe for reform indeed. There has been an absolute mountain of case law about it, which has made 10s of millions for lawyers.
Similar changes have happened with other elderly profile groups.
We lost my grandfather earlier this year aged 94. Yes the final 12 months would have cost considerably more (he was in a hospital bed most of final few months) but that's not to say the prior years would have been cheap by any shot of the imagination.
Call a news conference. Biden apologies if his comments were mis-interpreted and at the same time they show clips of the NY rally to show why he was so incensed .
Some of the other speakers were horrific , one called for Dems to be slaughtered , one said Harris had pimp handlers and one called her the anti-Christ . The media so far has concentrated on the Puerto Rico joke and much of the public might be unaware of some of the other comments .
At this point I don’t see how this can’t help shine the light back onto the Trump campaign.
lol
I gather that another "joke" got vetoed that involved calling Harris a c*nt.
Backbencher after backbencher pleading for more handouts and welfare.
Top rate back up to 50p (on the basis they're not "working people") is very possible.
(*admittedly I might have skin in this particular game)
I'm concerned about the savings/investment/pension area, with pension excluding public sector schemes.
This is an obviously prepared question on Lower Thames Crossing by the way, so I expect that will be confirmed
Enough to make me sympathise with any party.
Half a million extra over 90s costs more than many millions of working age adults.
I think Sunak was a terrible PM and ran probably the worst campaign in history but I have no doubt he’s a decent person and a hard worker.
You don't mean that the off-the-cuff, one-line, all-problems-are-due-to-x is not actually the problem? I'm shocked.
Irritating Woke takes by SKS and the BBC on being the "first Asian" PM; stuff that would cause an inner eye-roll in him, as it would me.
The sheer lack of imagination that causes people to go to the Lake District for walking holidays, when there's the rest of the brilliant UK to choose from, is staggering. Wainwright has a lot to answer for.