There's an interesting article on Quilette about Brexit and the rise of populism, that I think misses the point.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
It's a sad reality for people like me but there is truth to what you are saying. I'm not an advocate for this but it's probably more popular than Green/Trump/Abramovich.
You can have some advice from an old git for free. Take apocalyptic warnings from media people with a pinch of salt. Check who is issuing it and remember ... cui bono. Politicians brief for party advantage, others sometimes brief for financial advantage, pressure groups brief … well that's the job. They are advocates, not scientists. the media take up stories if they are exciting (they call this being newsworthy), but they don't have to be accurate.
Even good old Dicky Attenborough can make headlines with apocalyptic warning. Global warming could be worst disaster ever for humanity? He was around in October 1962, when we were a hairs-breath away from all out nuclear war. But I suppose the cockroaches would have survived so that's alright then.
Well-considered science or factual analysis can be boring and will only e considered if they can put a sensational spin on it. Oh, and 'up to' 1,000 can also mean zero.
Yeah but this time they really mean it! You are right about climate hysteria. They’ve cried wolf so many times, that if the wolf really is present, it’s barely more than a random event that this time they’ve managed to get it right.
What was it they said about vince cable predicting eight of the last two recessions?
If you predict the end of the world enough, you might end up being right once.
Well-considered science or factual analysis can be boring and will only be considered if they can put a sensational spin on it. Oh, and 'up to' 1,000 can also mean zero.
That's the problem.
The Fake News merchants, those who have "had enough of experts" insist that it is always zero.
That lie is dangerous, and we will pay a price for allowing that to become the norm.
Mr. Jessop, saw yesterday the 1,000mph car project has been axed due to lack of funding. Bit of a shame.
Automated cars seem nuts to me. It's more difficult to sit there doing nothing, whilst being 100% alert to grab the wheel at split second notice if the automated system suddenly goes wonky, than it is to just drive in the first place.
Yeah but this time they really mean it! You are right about climate hysteria. They’ve cried wolf so many times, that if the wolf really is present, it’s barely more than a random event that this time they’ve managed to get it right.
What was it they said about vince cable predicting eight of the last two recessions?
If you predict the end of the world enough, you might end up being right once.
Spectacularly missed the point.
The issue is not that some predictions are bad, the Fake News merchants claim that all predictions in any scenario are worthless.
Well-considered science or factual analysis can be boring and will only be considered if they can put a sensational spin on it. Oh, and 'up to' 1,000 can also mean zero.
That's the problem.
The Fake News merchants, those who have "had enough of experts" insist that it is always zero.
That lie is dangerous, and we will pay a price for allowing that to become the norm.
Because much of it is fake news and much of what presents itself as expertise is just confident bluster. But you are right because we are presented with hyperbolic certainties by people talking out of the backside a lot of the time doesn’t mean we should ignore risk or expertise about the outcomes of courses of action.
Yeah but this time they really mean it! You are right about climate hysteria. They’ve cried wolf so many times, that if the wolf really is present, it’s barely more than a random event that this time they’ve managed to get it right.
What was it they said about vince cable predicting eight of the last two recessions?
If you predict the end of the world enough, you might end up being right once.
Spectacularly missed the point.
The issue is not that some predictions are bad, the Fake News merchants claim that all predictions in any scenario are worthless.
Mr. Jessop, saw yesterday the 1,000mph car project has been axed due to lack of funding. Bit of a shame.
Automated cars seem nuts to me. It's more difficult to sit there doing nothing, whilst being 100% alert to grab the wheel at split second notice if the automated system suddenly goes wonky, than it is to just drive in the first place.
That's why Waymo (aka Google) are aiming for full level-5 autonomy, where there are no controls for a human to take over. Others are taking an easier, step-by-step approach.
Except for Tesla, who massively over-sell their 'autopilot' system to a ridiculous and (IMO) dangerous level.
I heard about the Bloodhound project. Such a shame.
In France as well as elsewhere in Europe we’re seeing the hard bigotry of unjustified high expectations. It’s reasonable to have aspirations. It’s not reasonable to expect those aspirations to be met without a strongly growing productive economy.
Governments can’t magic such economies up. They can lay the groundwork but as M. Le Président is finding out, that groundwork is itself unpopular. The public have to decide what compromises they will make to realise their aspirations - or to change their aspirations.
I don't want to get into a discussion on climate change, but I'd be interested in a few facts about confounding factors, known and unknown. Consistency of measurements and how do they account for population change around the measurement locations spring to mind. Curiosity only.
I could google, but I suspect someone here has already done that.
I wrote my response to David's article before reading the Guardian piece but I see it makes some of the same points. Where I disagree with it is the political spin at the end. It seems to be suggesting that it was Tory policy that drove these unequal distributions. I think that there are many more complex reasons, many of them beyond any government's ability to control or even offset.
There's an interesting article on Quilette about Brexit and the rise of populism, that I think misses the point.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
It's a sad reality for people like me but there is truth to what you are saying. I'm not an advocate for this but it's probably more popular than Green/Trump/Abramovich.
Over egged of course, but FWIW my brother although - in law - an “owner” regards himself as a trustee for the wider family (about 1,200). Fortunately he only has to work a 10 hour day plus entertaining 3 nights a week and gets the weekends off, so it’s a relatively relaxed lifestyle compared to his peers
In France as well as elsewhere in Europe we’re seeing the hard bigotry of unjustified high expectations. It’s reasonable to have aspirations. It’s not reasonable to expect those aspirations to be met without a strongly growing productive economy.
Governments can’t magic such economies up. They can lay the groundwork but as M. Le Président is finding out, that groundwork is itself unpopular. The public have to decide what compromises they will make to realise their aspirations - or to change their aspirations.
Entitlement is second to nostalgia in breaking our politics.
There's an interesting article on Quilette about Brexit and the rise of populism, that I think misses the point.
Essentially, it makes the case that Brexit and the like are really all about how "the elites" are out of touch, and make decisions for their own benefits rather than the population as a whole, and that "national populism" is the correct response to this.
Really, it's about distrust of experts.
But here's the thing I think it misses. You see, the most successful economies in the last two decades have actually been the ones with the technocratic and out of touch leaders: China and Singapore, being the most obvious examples.
The reason that Britain and other places have seen slowing growth is not because the elites are out of touch, but because demographic drag means slowing economic growth, and the rise of technology means that highly skilled workers produce so much more than the average.
Populism - to me - is claiming there are simple answers to complex problems.
If you want to solve the UK's problems, you need to take Germany or Switzerland's education systems (with their strong emphasis on apprenticeships and on preparing all for the world of work), you need to change the benefits system so it encourages work, you need to raise the retirement age, and you need to move away from a taxation system that discourages saving. These are long term solutions to the UK's problems. But they are not "populist". Quite the opposite.
Did I hear on the radio that apprentceships had fallen by 25% in the last year? That's not good.
Mr. P, people have already seen the original 'Project Fear' prophecies of doom proved false. You'd be better off blaming those who claimed immediate catastrophe with overblown predictions, which were (correctly) disbelieved, than the electorate for not believing them then or believing forecasts of the Apocalypse now.
You encapsulate the Remain problem. "They refuse to listen to reason, or facts." Exactly. There are people who don't share your views, so they are obviously wrong. Populism is something popular with which you disagree. But you only disagree because you know better.
It must be awful to live among such ignorant people. You have my sympathies.
Oh dear. This is exactly the point.
Before the vote there were predictions that we would suffer economically as a result. Which is what happened. That is objective fact.
Because the scale of the hit does not match the most apocalyptic predictions, Leave voters dismiss ALL the predictions, even the ones that were objectively correct.
Now we are facing disruption in medical supplies. The Government is buying fridges like it's Black Friday. That is objective fact.
But leavers insist there is no risk to medical supplies. Not that the scale of the risk is exaggerated, that there is zero risk, that any risk is Fake News.
That is not true, and those sort of lies are dangerous.
Until we actually experience flights grounded and medication stranded in Calais Brexiteers have every right to claim 'fake news' and 'project fear'. Anything other than full blown cliff edge Brexit too can be excused by the Brexiteers as a sell out or a dilution of the dream.
The Brexiteers may well be right and the reality of no deal really is no big deal. However if it does turn out that the fake news or project fear were in fact true, Johnson and Mogg, Davis and Raab will have some explaining to do.
Johnson and friends will either all be shown up as the political geniuses and saviours of the nation they claim or more likely as scoundrels and charlatans.
Yeah but this time they really mean it! You are right about climate hysteria. They’ve cried wolf so many times, that if the wolf really is present, it’s barely more than a random event that this time they’ve managed to get it right.
What was it they said about vince cable predicting eight of the last two recessions?
If you predict the end of the world enough, you might end up being right once.
Spectacularly missed the point.
The issue is not that some predictions are bad, the Fake News merchants claim that all predictions in any scenario are worthless.
That is a dangerous lie.
The people who sell the forecasts are at fault as well.
(Illustrative figures)
Government says “we will invest 1bn per year” doesn’t get many headlines.
Government says “we will invest £50bn*
* over 50 years
gets a lot more attention
But hyperbole in one direction encourages hyperbole on the other
The Brexiteers may well be right and the reality of no deal really is no big deal. However if it does turn out that the fake news or project fear were in fact true, Johnson and Mogg, Davis and Raab will have some explaining to do.
Johnson and friends will either all be shown up as the political geniuses and saviours of the nation they claim or more likely as scoundrels and charlatans.
Which doesn't help those who couldn't get their medical supplies in time.
Because the scale of the hit does not match the most apocalyptic predictions, Leave voters dismiss ALL the predictions, even the ones that were objectively correct.
This is a big problem, and it's related to the incentives for sharing information, both in legacy media and social media. If you have 100 scientists making a claim, the media will run with - and people will click and share - the most extreme ones: some tit saying there will be no more snow from 5 years on or whatever - and then egg it up some more. Then people will understandably notice that it's still snowing and say, clearly these scientists are full of shit.
A heuristic people often then use is just to take the various conflicting claims they hear from different sides and assume the truth must be somewhere in the middle, but recently people - Trump especially, but not just Trump - have learned to game this by telling ever more audacious lies. This works particularly well with social media because you no longer have the anchoring effect you had with conflicting media, where they all had at least some interest in being taken seriously, and they had recognizable biases that you could triangulate from.
I don't really know the solution to this, but I reckon at least part of it is in things like prediction markets and betting challenges that create a cost to pushing bullshit.
(Blokquote fail) We’ve already had this discussion. In which I beat you mercilessly. But let’s go again. It isn’t about been awash with cash. It’s comparing like with like and comparing trends. Poverty rates across the board generally dropped during the boom years, some flatlined a little and some saw significant reductions. This pattern carried on through the crash and bottomed out in about 2015. Lowest recorded levels of poverty and inequality for over thirty years on pretty much all levels. Since then there has been a mild increase on a couple of measures and a continuing plataue on others.
Everyday life in the uk is pretty good for everyone. In 2007 British society reached the most prosperous it had ever been, it took until about 2015/16, after inflation etc to get back to the same level.
For many there’s been an eroding of the value of their salary, this is more so in the better paying public sector jobs. At the bottom end however there’s been substantial improvements in income, way in excess of anything gained higher up.
That’s the mistake labour make. They miss this. If you are not working, life is still grim, if you are on a middle income job you’ve probably seen your standard of living freeze, but working on low wages you’ve seen a substantial post inflation growth in your income.
You kid yourself, you produced some tractor production statistics, but that does not beat reality, lots and lots of people are worse off on any scale. Even though I am not affected by it I can still see the reality of it from my affluent bubble.
There's an interesting article on Quilette about Brexit and the rise of populism, that I think misses the point.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
It's a sad reality for people like me but there is truth to what you are saying. I'm not an advocate for this but it's probably more popular than Green/Trump/Abramovich.
Over egged of course, but FWIW my brother although - in law - an “owner” regards himself as a trustee for the wider family (about 1,200). Fortunately he only has to work a 10 hour day plus entertaining 3 nights a week and gets the weekends off, so it’s a relatively relaxed lifestyle compared to his peers
I don't want to get into a discussion on climate change, but I'd be interested in a few facts about confounding factors, known and unknown. Consistency of measurements and how do they account for population change around the measurement locations spring to mind. Curiosity only.
I could google, but I suspect someone here has already done that.
It helps that two-thirds of the Earth's surface is ocean and therefore some distance from changes in population.
On our appliances, we have a system called CrashData that lets us search for UK cars. It brings up a blown up diagram, highlights any hazards such as airbags, seat belt tensioners, batteries, HV cables, isolators and that sort of thing so that when we roll up to a vehicle incident, one of us can pull up the details to see what we're facing. I was playing with it only this week, and found these weird little beauties listed in the UK section. There are no other driverless vehicles on the system.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
Careful Charles, that sounds awfully like you are describing citizens of nowhere there. Some people find that incredibly offensive.
I wrote my response to David's article before reading the Guardian piece but I see it makes some of the same points. Where I disagree with it is the political spin at the end. It seems to be suggesting that it was Tory policy that drove these unequal distributions. I think that there are many more complex reasons, many of them beyond any government's ability to control or even offset.
Perhaps David, but the Tories are the biggest culprits in the mix.
There's an interesting article on Quilette about Brexit and the rise of populism, that I think misses the point.
Essentially, it makes the case that Brexit and the like are really all about how "the elites" are out of touch, and make decisions for their own benefits rather than the population as a whole, and that "national populism" is the correct response to this.
Really, it's about distrust of experts.
But here's the thing I think it misses. You see, the most successful economies in the last two decades have actually been the ones with the technocratic and out of touch leaders: China and Singapore, being the most obvious examples.
The reason that Britain and other places have seen slowing growth is not because the elites are out of touch, but because demographic drag means slowing economic growth, and the rise of technology means that highly skilled workers produce so much more than the average.
Populism - to me - is claiming there are simple answers to complex problems.
If you want to solve the UK's problems, you need to take Germany or Switzerland's education systems (with their strong emphasis on apprenticeships and on preparing all for the world of work), you need to change the benefits system so it encourages work, you need to raise the retirement age, and you need to move away from a taxation system that discourages saving. These are long term solutions to the UK's problems. But they are not "populist". Quite the opposite.
And no Brexit. Definitely no Brexit. As an own goal, that's off the scale.
So last thread reports were May will decide on Monday whether to hold the vote. Which probably means no. Even with all the can kicking I cannot quite believe she would be so stupid as to let all mps off the hook and silly enough to think that achieves anything.
There's an interesting article on Quilette about Brexit and the rise of populism, that I think misses the point.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
It's a sad reality for people like me but there is truth to what you are saying. I'm not an advocate for this but it's probably more popular than Green/Trump/Abramovich.
Over egged of course, but FWIW my brother although - in law - an “owner” regards himself as a trustee for the wider family (about 1,200). Fortunately he only has to work a 10 hour day plus entertaining 3 nights a week and gets the weekends off, so it’s a relatively relaxed lifestyle compared to his peers
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
Catching up with the thread, and saw this, which I 100% agree with. When globalisation swept away most trade barriers, I thought at the time that the global inequalities were going to prove unsustainable and some painful adjustments in the West were coming as jobs migrated to the developing world (or people from the developing world would come to us and accept low pay). What I'd not foreseen is how differently the effect was on different classes - the highly-educated and the financial experts float effortlessly on the tide, while everyone vulnerable to competition from the developing world at best stagnates. Redistributing from the very wealthy to the viuctims of the process is simply a sensible precaution, as Southam observes.
As a globe, the process has had more winners than losers, and for all the problems of dictatorship and inequality, what's happened in China - which in living memory had famines and intense suffering right across the country - is in human terms rather magnificent. But for us here in Britain the position is rather different, and Brexit is mostly a distraction from our real issues.
You can have some advice from an old git for free. Take apocalyptic warnings from media people with a pinch of salt. Check who is issuing it and remember ... cui bono. Politicians brief for party advantage, others sometimes brief for financial advantage, pressure groups brief … well that's the job. They are advocates, not scientists. the media take up stories if they are exciting (they call this being newsworthy), but they don't have to be accurate.
Even good old Dicky Attenborough can make headlines with apocalyptic warning. Global warming could be worst disaster ever for humanity? He was around in October 1962, when we were a hairs-breath away from all out nuclear war. But I suppose the cockroaches would have survived so that's alright then.
Well-considered science or factual analysis can be boring and will only be considered if they can put a sensational spin on it. Oh, and 'up to' 1,000 can also mean zero.
PS It's David Attenborough - these old gits all look the same, don't they?
Tbf to Attenborough, global warming could be the worst disaster ever for humanity - The Cuban Missile Crisis no longer can be (fortunately).
So last thread reports were May will decide on Monday whether to hold the vote. Which probably means no. Even with all the can kicking I cannot quite believe she would be so stupid as to let all mps off the hook and silly enough to think that achieves anything.
I think that's why she has to hold the vote.
If she loses, nobody knows what happens next. Literally chaos.
Every MP must dip their hand in the blood. I would position the Chief Whip outside the NO lobby asking every MP passing "Do you feel lucky? Well, do ya punk?"
So last thread reports were May will decide on Monday whether to hold the vote. Which probably means no. Even with all the can kicking I cannot quite believe she would be so stupid as to let all mps off the hook and silly enough to think that achieves anything.
Doesn't it need a vote in order not to have the vote?
And in any case if she goes down this path she absolutely has to have an alternative proposal.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
Careful Charles, that sounds awfully like you are describing citizens of nowhere there. Some people find that incredibly offensive.
I thought about including the phrase but decided the grievance mongers would focus on that and miss the actual serious point!
If I was the EU and secretly I was prepared to renegotiate I'd still tell us I was not even prepared to discuss it until we voted on the deal they already offered us. I'd want to know how much it had been rejected by.
I wrote my response to David's article before reading the Guardian piece but I see it makes some of the same points. Where I disagree with it is the political spin at the end. It seems to be suggesting that it was Tory policy that drove these unequal distributions. I think that there are many more complex reasons, many of them beyond any government's ability to control or even offset.
Perhaps David, but the Tories are the biggest culprits in the mix.
I think its a real dilemma for governments of all stripes. To take a simple example the money invested in Crossrail makes the transport budget for the rest of the country look a joke. We argue about the extent of subsidy for rural bus services in Scotland or Yorkshire when tens of billions are being invested to help those rich Londoners get even richer. And yet from an economic perspective there is no question Crossrail will be a very good investment generating further investment, jobs and growth. Bus services, not so much.
Clearly there has to be a balance here or a recognition that the social value of keeping rural areas vibrant has worth even if it cannot be measured in pounds and pence. This government, especially since May took over, has not always got that right. Do you invest in success or do you invest to prevent failure or further decline? Both is not really an option.
There's an interesting article on Quilette about Brexit and the rise of populism, that I think misses the point.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
It's a sad reality for people like me but there is truth to what you are saying. I'm not an advocate for this but it's probably more popular than Green/Trump/Abramovich.
Over egged of course, but FWIW my brother although - in law - an “owner” regards himself as a trustee for the wider family (about 1,200). Fortunately he only has to work a 10 hour day plus entertaining 3 nights a week and gets the weekends off, so it’s a relatively relaxed lifestyle compared to his peers
He has a choice surely?
Duty not choice.
Obviously I don't know the circumstances and I'm not going to criticise.
1,200 relatives is a bloody large family though. Is your brother Prince Charles?
It can be easier and cheaper to travel from London to Berlin than from Brighton to Bristol.
Given how hard it is to get to Berlin by air, that's a damning statistic.
Even by train, get the boat train to Harwich, and from Holland change at Utrecht and Koln, and bingo.
There are no longer any trains serving Hook of Holland port, yet alone international expresses. While there still are trains to Harwich PQ connecting with the boat service to the Netherlands, they are not dedicated expresses, unlike 30+ years ago. Low cost air travel has killed off most rail-sea connections, both from the UK to mainland Europe and to Ireland.
Yes, you need to get the bus to Schiedam, although a light rail (or tram) link opens early next year, I believe?
So last thread reports were May will decide on Monday whether to hold the vote. Which probably means no. Even with all the can kicking I cannot quite believe she would be so stupid as to let all mps off the hook and silly enough to think that achieves anything.
Doesn't it need a vote in order not to have the vote?
And in any case if she goes down this path she absolutely has to have an alternative proposal.
I think the best course for her is to postpone the vote and take the case for the deal to the people. Say that it will be to accept or reject her deal. If it's the latter then it'll be for parliament to decide what happens next.
Emergency legislation for this could kick off by Christmas. I think it'd need an extension to A50.
I wrote my response to David's article before reading the Guardian piece but I see it makes some of the same points. Where I disagree with it is the political spin at the end. It seems to be suggesting that it was Tory policy that drove these unequal distributions. I think that there are many more complex reasons, many of them beyond any government's ability to control or even offset.
Perhaps David, but the Tories are the biggest culprits in the mix.
I think you are at a disadvantage for understanding the issues with your hatred of the Tories. I’ve always thought that even poverty has multiple causes - wages at the bottom end and demand on public services have been suppressed by mass immigration. Add in a few oligarchs moving to London and you have a rise in relative poverty. Trying to find a political answer or cause is really difficult unless you are overtly political (Labour blame Tories, Tories blame Labour, Libdems blame Tories and Nick Clegg, SNP blame Tories in England and Unionists in Scotland).
Which begs the question: who are the "ordinary people" and who are the "out of touch elite?
"Bollocks to Brexit" is a great slogan, and was the cry of the mass demonstration in London in October. It is very Populist in nature, rather like the Gillet Jaune, in that it knows what it is against rather than what it is for. Ultimately that tends to be the rock on which Populism founders. The Populists voted Brexit, against something, but have no agreed plan for what happens next. Even No Dealers are split between protectionism and free traders. Populism is a discontent, not a solution.
The problem we have is that the Brexit/Remain debate is wholly irrelevant to the issues of inequality and dispossession that underpin the discontent. At least in the US a new President has the prospect of being able to champion changes to address the real issue, even if Trump turned out to be a con. In France it was always peculiar that discontent swept such an establishment figure with mainstream economic views into power, and the backlash was only a matter of time. If reforms are needed, he needed to find a way to deliver redistributive benefit to people at the same time.
The real tragedy of Mrs M's primacy is that she appeared to recognise very well the reasons for the discontent when she came into power, and committed herself to addressing them, since when precisely nothing has been achieved through a combination of lack of will, lack of ability, and lack of imagination.
Think you're being a little harsh. She’s been spending quite a lot of time on Brexit when I’m sure she’d prefer to be doing other stuff
The rest of the government machine has hardly been stripped of all staff in order to deliver Brexit, and it hasn't taken up much parliamentary time until recently. If there was a will genuinely to address the concerns of the JAMs, or whatever they are called nowadays, we should have seen it by now.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
Careful Charles, that sounds awfully like you are describing citizens of nowhere there. Some people find that incredibly offensive.
I thought about including the phrase but decided the grievance mongers would focus on that and miss the actual serious point!
In all seriousness, the phrase as originally used was designed to focus on exactly what you describe. People who consider themselves above society and independent of it so that they do not feel a part of it or have the right to opt out when it suits them. People who put rather more emphasis on their talents as a source of their success and less on the society that created the opportunities to use those talents. It is another example of the fraying of cohesiveness that I have been wittering on about this morning.
I wrote my response to David's article before reading the Guardian piece but I see it makes some of the same points. Where I disagree with it is the political spin at the end. It seems to be suggesting that it was Tory policy that drove these unequal distributions. I think that there are many more complex reasons, many of them beyond any government's ability to control or even offset.
Perhaps David, but the Tories are the biggest culprits in the mix.
I think you are at a disadvantage for understanding the issues with your hatred of the Tories. I’ve always thought that even poverty has multiple causes - wages at the bottom end and demand on public services have been suppressed by mass immigration. Add in a few oligarchs moving to London and you have a rise in relative poverty. Trying to find a political answer or cause is really difficult unless you are overtly political (Labour blame Tories, Tories blame Labour, Libdems blame Tories and Nick Clegg, SNP blame Tories in England and Unionists in Scotland).
Quantitative Easing has a lot to answer for. It was always unlikely that this was a magic solution to economic troubles without any side effects.
i went to China recently to a conference and was speaking to an engineer They were telling me about their new provincial leader /gauleiter (don't recall the exact term), I said something along the lines of "but this person isn't accountable, how do you vote them out of office?"
He replied, "I don't know anything about running to province of 60 million people, why should i have a say in appointing someone to run it"
It kind of staggered me, the whole concept of democratic accountably, seem obvious to me, but it was an alien concept to them.
I do occasional seminars for Chinese groups, and had one on systems of government. I espoused the virtues of democracy and was asked by one participant, "How far does the average person in Britain feel that they in fact have any influence on how the country is governed?" Er...
The Chinese system is clearly deficient in principle in accountability as well as much more liable to corruption and misuse of power. But if it's managed competently and people feel they're much better off, they are generally inclined to go along with Governor X appointing cronies and getting rich. They may even feel he deserves it. I am not a fan of the Chinese system but I can see why we have mass revolts of various kinds (France, Brexit, Trump) and they largely don't.
i went to China recently to a conference and was speaking to an engineer They were telling me about their new provincial leader /gauleiter (don't recall the exact term), I said something along the lines of "but this person isn't accountable, how do you vote them out of office?"
He replied, "I don't know anything about running to province of 60 million people, why should i have a say in appointing someone to run it"
It kind of staggered me, the whole concept of democratic accountably, seem obvious to me, but it was an alien concept to them.
I do occasional seminars for Chinese groups, and had one on systems of government. I espoused the virtues of democracy and was asked by one participant, "How far does the average person in Britain feel that they in fact have any influence on how the country is governed?" Er...
The Chinese system is clearly deficient in principle in accountability as well as much more liable to corruption and misuse of power. But if it's managed competently and people feel they're much better off, they are generally inclined to go along with Governor X appointing cronies and getting rich. They may even feel he deserves it. I am not a fan of the Chinese system but I can see why we have mass revolts of various kinds (France, Brexit, Trump) and they largely don't.
Being a police state helps keeps revolts down, of course. There have sticks as well as carrots.
It can be easier and cheaper to travel from London to Berlin than from Brighton to Bristol.
Given how hard it is to get to Berlin by air, that's a damning statistic.
Even by train, get the boat train to Harwich, and from Holland change at Utrecht and Koln, and bingo.
I don't think somehow it takes 14 hours and €120 to get from Brighton to Bristol by train. In fact, the figures I type in say it's about 3.5 hours and £60.
In my limited experience prices are ok if you stay in your region. It costs silly amounts if I want to take a train to Middlesbrough, it costs less or the same to fly to Newcastle then get a train down from there. And it takes less time.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
Careful Charles, that sounds awfully like you are describing citizens of nowhere there. Some people find that incredibly offensive.
When the Brexit revolution comes, unfortunately Charles and his ilk will need to surrender their estates for compulsory turnip farming.
His constant references to bridesmaiding Mollie Sugden’s wedding will not avail him.
The French are revolting but that is a pretty normal state of affairs. Whether it is farmers burning livestock, air traffic controllers screwing up peoples' holidays, the banlieues of Paris becoming no go areas and exporting their violence from their slums into the centre, it is something that happens pretty much every year, several times.
We in the UK don't really do that sort of thing. We tried it in 2011 but didn't get a taste for it. Why not? I think, until recently, we had a much more cohesive society where strands of the disaffected still thought that the establishment got their problems and were trying to address them, no matter how ineffectually and incompetently. In France if you wanted attention you really had to burn something.
I fear that we may move closer to the French example for a number of reasons. Firstly, the arrogance and hypocrisy of those who want to overturn the Brexit decision simply because they know best and are so happy to conclude that the great unwashed were deceived or simply ignorant. That is a very French attitude. If millions of our fellow citizens feel that the system no longer respects their views we have a situation where they may need to try something else.
Secondly, the much slower growth since the GFC has made the inequality of distribution of that growth more stark. When the economy was burbling along at 3-4% a year some of that growth bled out to the provinces even if the majority was in London and the south east. Now, for several years, much of the country has a seemingly unending recession.
Thirdly, that perception of recession has been increased by the loss of many semi skilled jobs and better paid jobs outside of London. This has had many iniquitous effects. Local economies are depressed by lack of demand, shops close and High Streets are boarded up, the more ambitious youth head to the big smoke leaving behind the less capable, it is a vicious circle.
As my second and third points show this is a complex and difficult problem which may well be as beyond the capability of our government to fix (even if they had the will) as that of France. I believe that we risk undermining the cohesiveness of our society at our peril.
Well that's all very depressing. No way we have the will to address the issues, it's too complicated or unpopular.
If I was the EU and secretly I was prepared to renegotiate I'd still tell us I was not even prepared to discuss it until we voted on the deal they already offered us. I'd want to know how much it had been rejected by.
The best we can do for the UK then is have 500 vote against it Tuesday.....
I wrote my response to David's article before reading the Guardian piece but I see it makes some of the same points. Where I disagree with it is the political spin at the end. It seems to be suggesting that it was Tory policy that drove these unequal distributions. I think that there are many more complex reasons, many of them beyond any government's ability to control or even offset.
Perhaps David, but the Tories are the biggest culprits in the mix.
I think you are at a disadvantage for understanding the issues with your hatred of the Tories. I’ve always thought that even poverty has multiple causes - wages at the bottom end and demand on public services have been suppressed by mass immigration. Add in a few oligarchs moving to London and you have a rise in relative poverty. Trying to find a political answer or cause is really difficult unless you are overtly political (Labour blame Tories, Tories blame Labour, Libdems blame Tories and Nick Clegg, SNP blame Tories in England and Unionists in Scotland).
Quantitative Easing has a lot to answer for. It was always unlikely that this was a magic solution to economic troubles without any side effects.
There's a class of challenges actually called 'wicked problems'. I think poverty is one of them. There are a myriad reasons while poverty persists (of course, relative poverty will always be with us, bar Chairman Corbyn sending us all to the camps).
We can all pick an example. You've picked easy money. I'd point at low inflation - it's the businessperson's friend but the debtors' enemy. Most poor people I know are also heavily indebted. Boomers forget how aggressively their mortgage debt was reduced by conditions in the 80s.
There's an interesting article on Quilette about Brexit and the rise of populism, that I think misses the point.
Essentially, it makes the case that Brexit and the like are really all about how "the elites" are out of touch, and make decisions for their own benefits rather than the population as a whole, and that "national populism" is the correct response to this.
Really, it's about distrust of experts.
But here's the thing I think it misses. You see, the most successful economies in the last two decades have actually been the ones with the technocratic and out of touch leaders: China and Singapore, being the most obvious examples.
T that discourages saving. These are long term solutions to the UK's problems. But they are not "populist". Quite the opposite.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
The problem in a globalised world is personified by Bezos and Amazon. Popular consumerism and great service, but a corporate structure that declares no profit and pays little tax. The boss is possibly the worlds most wealthy man, yet his company reles on micromanaged serfs on minimum wage, and contributes next to nothing to the social and economic infrastructure that makes his business profitable. It is a parasite and we are the host.
To what extent should we regard business as a cash cow for tax though? Their main benefits are the goods and services they provide and companies like Google and Apple have transformed our lives. We tax business because they are easier to target than the three groups of people who are actually paying the tax: owners, customers, and employees. If that is no longe true then perhaps we should go after the intended targets more directly.
In France as well as elsewhere in Europe we’re seeing the hard bigotry of unjustified high expectations. It’s reasonable to have aspirations. It’s not reasonable to expect those aspirations to be met without a strongly growing productive economy.
Governments can’t magic such economies up. They can lay the groundwork but as M. Le Président is finding out, that groundwork is itself unpopular. The public have to decide what compromises they will make to realise their aspirations - or to change their aspirations.
The French have a peculiar attitude to what they call les acquis Basically they understand the need for substantial reforms - for others, but it must not affect the privileges they have acquired. Macron presented himself as a reformer like so many others before him, but the French want the gain but will not accept the pain.
I wrote my response to David's article before reading the Guardian piece but I see it makes some of the same points. Where I disagree with it is the political spin at the end. It seems to be suggesting that it was Tory policy that drove these unequal distributions. I think that there are many more complex reasons, many of them beyond any government's ability to control or even offset.
Perhaps David, but the Tories are the biggest culprits in the mix.
I think you are at a disadvantage for understanding the issues with your hatred of the Tories. I’ve always thought that even poverty has multiple causes - wages at the bottom end and demand on public services have been suppressed by mass immigration. Add in a few oligarchs moving to London and you have a rise in relative poverty. Trying to find a political answer or cause is really difficult unless you are overtly political (Labour blame Tories, Tories blame Labour, Libdems blame Tories and Nick Clegg, SNP blame Tories in England and Unionists in Scotland).
Quantitative Easing has a lot to answer for. It was always unlikely that this was a magic solution to economic troubles without any side effects.
What I have found odd is how modest those effects have been, at least on the surface. It has caused some asset inflation and protected asset prices. It seems to have had remarkably little effect in increasing demand and none at all in increasing inflation (although it may have prevented deflation).
Medieval rulers who mucked about with the coinage generally had rapid and immediately adverse effects on the economy, typically causing rampant inflation. Printing money famously destroyed the Wiemar republic. Given the scale of QE the consequences have been remarkably modest. I fear that future politicians may well learn the wrong lesson from this.
There's an interesting article on Quilette about Brexit and the rise of populism, that I think misses the point.
Our globalisedcreating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
It's a sad reality for people like me but there is truth to what you are saying. I'm not an advocate for this but it's probably more popular than Green/Trump/Abramovich.
Over egged of course, but FWIW my brother although - in law - an “owner” regards himself as a trustee for the wider family (about 1,200). Fortunately he only has to work a 10 hour day plus entertaining 3 nights a week and gets the weekends off, so it’s a relatively relaxed lifestyle compared to his peers
He has a choice surely?
Duty not choice.
Obviously I don't know the circumstances and I'm not going to criticise.
1,200 relatives is a bloody large family though. Is your brother Prince Charles?
All descended from one gentleman in the 18th century.
We’re unusual in that the family pooled their strategic assets 10 generations ago.
Individuals have their own assets as well, of course, (some of which the core family have a RoFR on should they ever be sold) but those are small in comparison
So last thread reports were May will decide on Monday whether to hold the vote. Which probably means no. Even with all the can kicking I cannot quite believe she would be so stupid as to let all mps off the hook and silly enough to think that achieves anything.
Doesn't it need a vote in order not to have the vote?
And in any case if she goes down this path she absolutely has to have an alternative proposal.
I think the best course for her is to postpone the vote and take the case for the deal to the people. Say that it will be to accept or reject her deal. If it's the latter then it'll be for parliament to decide what happens next.
Emergency legislation for this could kick off by Christmas. I think it'd need an extension to A50.
Or you can get Labour to approve / abstain on passing her parliamentary deal, as it would be made only subject to a referendum on leave (via her deal) vs. remaining / revoking A50.
The French are revolting but that is a pretty normal state of affairs. Whether it is farmers burning livestock, air traffic controllers screwing up peoples' holidays, the banlieues of Paris becoming no go areas and exporting their violence from their slums into the centre, it is something that happens pretty much every year, several times.
We in the UK don't really do that sort of thing. We tried it in 2011 but didn't get a taste for it. Why not? I think, until recently, we had a much more cohesive society where strands of the disaffected still thought that the establishment got their problems and were trying to address them, no matter how ineffectually and incompetently. In France if you wanted attention you really had to burn something.
I fear that we may move closer to the French example for a number of reasons. Firstly, the arrogance and hypocrisy of those who want to overturn the Brexit decision simply because they know best and are so happy to conclude that the great unwashed were deceived or simply ignorant. That is a very French attitude. If millions of our fellow citizens feel that the system no longer respects their views we have a situation where they may need to try something else.
Secondly, the much slower growth since the GFC has made the inequality of distribution of that growth more stark. When the economy was burbling along at 3-4% a year some of that growth bled out to the provinces even if the majority was in London and the south east. Now, for several years, much of the country has a seemingly unending recession.
Thirdly, that perception of recession has been increased by the loss of many semi skilled jobs and better paid jobs outside of London. This has had many iniquitous effects. Local economies are depressed by lack of demand, shops close and High Streets are boarded up, the more ambitious youth head to the big smoke leaving behind the less capable, it is a vicious circle.
As my second and third points show this is a complex and difficult problem which may well be as beyond the capability of our government to fix (even if they had the will) as that of France. I believe that we risk undermining the cohesiveness of our society at our peril.
Well that's all very depressing. No way we have the will to address the issues, it's too complicated or unpopular.
Which begs the question: who are the "ordinary people" and who are the "out of touch elite?
"Bollocks to Brexit" is a great slogan, and was the cry of the mass demonstration in London in October. It is very Populist in nature, rather like the Gillet Jaune, in that it knows what it is against rather than what it is for. Ultimately that tends to be the rock on which Populism founders. The Populists voted Brexit, against something, but have no agreed plan for what happens next. Even No Dealers are split between protectionism and free traders. Populism is a discontent, not a solution.
The problem we have is that the Brexit/Remain debate is wholly irrelevant to the issues of inequality and dispossession that underpin the discontent. At least in the US a new President has the prospect of being able to champion changes to address the real issue, even if Trump turned out to be a con. In France it was always peculiar that discontent swept such an establishment figure with mainstream economic views into power, and the backlash was only a matter of time. If reforms are needed, he needed to find a way to deliver redistributive benefit to people at the same time.
The real tragedy of Mrs M's primacy is that she appeared to recognise very well the reasons for the discontent when she came into power, and committed herself to addressing them, since when precisely nothing has been achieved through a combination of lack of will, lack of ability, and lack of imagination.
Think you're being a little harsh. She’s been spending quite a lot of time on Brexit when I’m sure she’d prefer to be doing other stuff
The rest of the government machine has hardly been stripped of all staff in order to deliver Brexit, and it hasn't taken up much parliamentary time until recently. If there was a will genuinely to address the concerns of the JAMs, or whatever they are called nowadays, we should have seen it by now.
It’s absorbed political capital. There is stuff going on in Defra or mental health but May can’t drive her agenda
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
Careful Charles, that sounds awfully like you are describing citizens of nowhere there. Some people find that incredibly offensive.
I thought about including the phrase but decided the grievance mongers would focus on that and miss the actual serious point!
In all seriousness, the phrase as originally used was designed to focus on exactly what you describe. People who consider themselves above society and independent of it so that they do not feel a part of it or have the right to opt out when it suits them. People who put rather more emphasis on their talents as a source of their success and less on the society that created the opportunities to use those talents. It is another example of the fraying of cohesiveness that I have been wittering on about this morning.
I agree. But offence takers destroyed the argument by misrepresenting it
i went to China recently to a conference and was speaking to an engineer They were telling me about their new provincial leader /gauleiter (don't recall the exact term), I said something along the lines of "but this person isn't accountable, how do you vote them out of office?"
He replied, "I don't know anything about running to province of 60 million people, why should i have a say in appointing someone to run it"
It kind of staggered me, the whole concept of democratic accountably, seem obvious to me, but it was an alien concept to them.
I do occasional seminars for Chinese groups, and had one on systems of government. I espoused the virtues of democracy and was asked by one participant, "How far does the average person in Britain feel that they in fact have any influence on how the country is governed?" Er...
The Chinese system is clearly deficient in principle in accountability as well as much more liable to corruption and misuse of power. But if it's managed competently and people feel they're much better off, they are generally inclined to go along with Governor X appointing cronies and getting rich. They may even feel he deserves it. I am not a fan of the Chinese system but I can see why we have mass revolts of various kinds (France, Brexit, Trump) and they largely don't.
There's a strong argument that a benign (which includes capable) dictatorship is the best form of government; if only there were some way of keeping them benign and/or getting rid of them when they cease to be so, that didn't run the risk of putting bunch of idiots in instead.
I heard about the Bloodhound project. Such a shame.
The EJ200 never seemed like the optimum engine but I guess they had to take what they could scrounge. The Typhoon platform is optimised for BVRAAM and in the BVRAAM game you want to be as fast as possible as high as possible so that's where the EJ200 works best. An EJ200 at M1.0+ at sea level was going to need fiendishly clever intake design.
A Mk.104 RB199 out of a Tornado F3 might have been better. Those things were as fast as fuck on the deck.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
Careful Charles, that sounds awfully like you are describing citizens of nowhere there. Some people find that incredibly offensive.
When the Brexit revolution comes, unfortunately Charles and his ilk will need to surrender their estates for compulsory turnip farming.
His constant references to bridesmaiding Mollie Sugden’s wedding will not avail him.
I wrote my response to David's article before reading the Guardian piece but I see it makes some of the same points. Where I disagree with it is the political spin at the end. It seems to be suggesting that it was Tory policy that drove these unequal distributions. I think that there are many more complex reasons, many of them beyond any government's ability to control or even offset.
Perhaps David, but the Tories are the biggest culprits in the mix.
I think you are at a disadvantage for understanding the issues with your hatred of the Tories. I’ve always thought that even poverty has multiple causes - wages at the bottom end and demand on public services have been suppressed by mass immigration. Add in a few oligarchs moving to London and you have a rise in relative poverty. Trying to find a political answer or cause is really difficult unless you are overtly political (Labour blame Tories, Tories blame Labour, Libdems blame Tories and Nick Clegg, SNP blame Tories in England and Unionists in Scotland).
Quantitative Easing has a lot to answer for. It was always unlikely that this was a magic solution to economic troubles without any side effects.
It’s easy to blame Brown overspending but that Labour Government did invest into capital projects in the public sector and it was needed, certainly to begin with. Unfortunately the Labour answer that they always need to spend more than the Tories, and the Tories think we need to spend less or more effectively
i went to China recently to a conference and was speaking to an engineer They were telling me about their new provincial leader /gauleiter (don't recall the exact term), I said something along the lines of "but this person isn't accountable, how do you vote them out of office?"
He replied, "I don't know anything about running to province of 60 million people, why should i have a say in appointing someone to run it"
It kind of staggered me, the whole concept of democratic accountably, seem obvious to me, but it was an alien concept to them.
I do occasional seminars for Chinese groups, and had one on systems of government. I espoused the virtues of democracy and was asked by one participant, "How far does the average person in Britain feel that they in fact have any influence on how the country is governed?" Er...
The Chinese system is clearly deficient in principle in accountability as well as much more liable to corruption and misuse of power. But if it's managed competently and people feel they're much better off, they are generally inclined to go along with Governor X appointing cronies and getting rich. They may even feel he deserves it. I am not a fan of the Chinese system but I can see why we have mass revolts of various kinds (France, Brexit, Trump) and they largely don't.
There's a strong argument that a benign (which includes capable) dictatorship is the best form of government; if only there were some way of keeping them benign and/or getting rid of them when they cease to be so, that didn't run the risk of putting bunch of idiots in instead.
Indeed, they inevitably spiral away from the benign. Except in high fantasy stories (yes bad ones happen but the solution is always more benign dictatorship)
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
Careful Charles, that sounds awfully like you are describing citizens of nowhere there. Some people find that incredibly offensive.
No he's not, and the suggestion that he is is offensive.
You can, and many people do, live globally nomadic lives without some deep allegiance to a legacy nation state and still pay their fare share of taxes to wherever they are. Whereas a lot of the biggest tax evaders seem to be strong adherents of a particular national identity. The Russian oligarchs would be, and several of our biggest Brexit supporters seem to be keen to avoid British taxes. They're citizens of somewhere, and they're sometimes even tax residents of that somewhere. But their assets are somewhere else.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
Careful Charles, that sounds awfully like you are describing citizens of nowhere there. Some people find that incredibly offensive.
No he's not, and the suggestion that he is is offensive.
You can, and many people do, live globally nomadic lives without some deep allegiance to a legacy nation state and still pay their fare share of taxes to wherever they are. Whereas a lot of the biggest tax evaders seem to be strong adherents of a particular national identity. The Russian oligarchs would be, and several of our biggest Brexit supporters seem to be keen to avoid British taxes. They're citizens of somewhere, and they're sometimes even tax residents of that somewhere. But their assets are somewhere else.
I think there’s a difference between legal, political and moral citizenship
Everyone is legally a citizen of somewhere
But if they don’t make a contribution to society then morally they are not
i went to China recently to a conference and was speaking to an engineer They were telling me about their new provincial leader /gauleiter (don't recall the exact term), I said something along the lines of "but this person isn't accountable, how do you vote them out of office?"
He replied, "I don't know anything about running to province of 60 million people, why should i have a say in appointing someone to run it"
It kind of staggered me, the whole concept of democratic accountably, seem obvious to me, but it was an alien concept to them.
I do occasional seminars for Chinese groups, and had one on systems of government. I espoused the virtues of democracy and was asked by one participant, "How far does the average person in Britain feel that they in fact have any influence on how the country is governed?" Er...
The Chinese system is clearly deficient in principle in accountability as well as much more liable to corruption and misuse of power. But if it's managed competently and people feel they're much better off, they are generally inclined to go along with Governor X appointing cronies and getting rich. They may even feel he deserves it. I am not a fan of the Chinese system but I can see why we have mass revolts of various kinds (France, Brexit, Trump) and they largely don't.
In Indonesia in the 1990s Suharto’s implicit deal was “shut up and your standard of living will keep improving” - when the Asian Financial Crisis put paid to that Suharto was gone within the year. As the Chinese will know “He who rides a tiger is afraid to dismount'.
I wrote my response to David's article before reading the Guardian piece but I see it makes some of the same points. Where I disagree with it is the political spin at the end. It seems to be suggesting that it was Tory policy that drove these unequal distributions. I think that there are many more complex reasons, many of them beyond any government's ability to control or even offset.
Perhaps David, but the Tories are the biggest culprits in the mix.
I think you are at a disadvantage for understanding the issues with your hatred of the Tories. I’ve always thought that even poverty has multiple causes - wages at the bottom end and demand on public services have been suppressed by mass immigration. Add in a few oligarchs moving to London and you have a rise in relative poverty. Trying to find a political answer or cause is really difficult unless you are overtly political (Labour blame Tories, Tories blame Labour, Libdems blame Tories and Nick Clegg, SNP blame Tories in England and Unionists in Scotland).
Quantitative Easing has a lot to answer for. It was always unlikely that this was a magic solution to economic troubles without any side effects.
It’s easy to blame Brown overspending but that Labour Government did invest into capital projects in the public sector and it was needed, certainly to begin with. Unfortunately the Labour answer that they always need to spend more than the Tories, and the Tories think we need to spend less or more effectively
And the Tories are generally correct. Brown's lunacy has cost 10 yrs of hardship for all of us.
I wrote my response to David's article before reading the Guardian piece but I see it makes some of the same points. Where I disagree with it is the political spin at the end. It seems to be suggesting that it was Tory policy that drove these unequal distributions. I think that there are many more complex reasons, many of them beyond any government's ability to control or even offset.
Perhaps David, but the Tories are the biggest culprits in the mix.
I think its a real dilemma for governments of all stripes. To take a simple example the money invested in Crossrail makes the transport budget for the rest of the country look a joke. We argue about the extent of subsidy for rural bus services in Scotland or Yorkshire when tens of billions are being invested to help those rich Londoners get even richer. And yet from an economic perspective there is no question Crossrail will be a very good investment generating further investment, jobs and growth. Bus services, not so much.
Clearly there has to be a balance here or a recognition that the social value of keeping rural areas vibrant has worth even if it cannot be measured in pounds and pence. This government, especially since May took over, has not always got that right. Do you invest in success or do you invest to prevent failure or further decline? Both is not really an option.
HS2 is another one. Another staggeringly expensive project essentially benefiting the already well looked after metropolitan elites talked about down thread. Useful semi-rural rail re-openings such as Skipton- Colne, Uckfield - Lewes, Ashington-Blyth-Newcastle, in parts of Wales, Devon and elsewhere never seem to get off the ground. Only in Scotland has there been some progress.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
I’m not sure it’s forced distribution via that tax system that matters (although clearly a progressive tax system works)
It’s more that the last 20 years has seen the rise of a footloose global group that believe they have no obligations to any but themselves
This includes the Russian oligarchs, the Indian steel magnates, our very own Philip Green and others like him, as well as the tax obsessed tech companies
Fundamentally the wealthy have forgotten that their success isn’t just down to their own brilliance but they have an obligation to the communities that fostered them.
People resent the flashy, greedy, rub-your-noses-in-it wealth. I don’t think they mind so much the discreet wealth that makes a contribution. For example: people dislike Philip Green, but how many get that worked up about Hugh Grosvenor?
Careful Charles, that sounds awfully like you are describing citizens of nowhere there. Some people find that incredibly offensive.
No he's not, and the suggestion that he is is offensive.
You can, and many people do, live globally nomadic lives without some deep allegiance to a legacy nation state and still pay their fare share of taxes to wherever they are. Whereas a lot of the biggest tax evaders seem to be strong adherents of a particular national identity. The Russian oligarchs would be, and several of our biggest Brexit supporters seem to be keen to avoid British taxes. They're citizens of somewhere, and they're sometimes even tax residents of that somewhere. But their assets are somewhere else.
Well Edmond, it appears that Charles himself agrees with me on this occasion. Not that I disagree with your general point. Many, probably most, people thankfully recognise the need to contribute to the society where they earn their living. Those that don't (Amazon comes to mind) are indeed parasites as someone suggested well down thread.
Mr. P, people have already seen the original 'Project Fear' prophecies of doom proved false. You'd be better off blaming those who claimed immediate catastrophe with overblown predictions, which were (correctly) disbelieved, than the electorate for not believing them then or believing forecasts of the Apocalypse now.
You encapsulate the Remain problem. "They refuse to listen to reason, or facts." Exactly. There are people who don't share your views, so they are obviously wrong. Populism is something popular with which you disagree. But you only disagree because you know better.
It must be awful to live among such ignorant people. You have my sympathies.
Oh dear. This is exactly the point.
Before the vote there were predictions that we would suffer economically as a result. Which is what happened. That is objective fact.
Because the scale of the hit does not match the most apocalyptic predictions, Leave voters dismiss ALL the predictions, even the ones that were objectively correct.
Now we are facing disruption in medical supplies. The Government is buying fridges like it's Black Friday. That is objective fact.
But leavers insist there is no risk to medical supplies. Not that the scale of the risk is exaggerated, that there is zero risk, that any risk is Fake News.
That is not true, and those sort of lies are dangerous.
Until we actually experience flights grounded and medication stranded in Calais Brexiteers have every right to claim 'fake news' and 'project fear'. Anything other than full blown cliff edge Brexit too can be excused by the Brexiteers as a sell out or a dilution of the dream.
The Brexiteers may well be right and the reality of no deal really is no big deal. However if it does turn out that the fake news or project fear were in fact true, Johnson and Mogg, Davis and Raab will have some explaining to do.
Johnson and friends will either all be shown up as the political geniuses and saviours of the nation they claim or more likely as scoundrels and charlatans.
That's the infuriating though, if No Deal is a disaster its advocates will simply shrug their shoulders and say it wasn't their fault as it wasn't planned properly. Unfortunately nothing will ever "prove" that Brexit was a mistake because there will always be an excuse.
I wrote my response to David's article before reading the Guardian piece but I see it makes some of the same points. Where I disagree with it is the political spin at the end. It seems to be suggesting that it was Tory policy that drove these unequal distributions. I think that there are many more complex reasons, many of them beyond any government's ability to control or even offset.
Perhaps David, but the Tories are the biggest culprits in the mix.
I think its a real dilemma for governments of all stripes. To take a simple example the money invested in Crossrail makes the transport budget for the rest of the country look a joke. We argue about the extent of subsidy for rural bus services in Scotland or Yorkshire when tens of billions are being invested to help those rich Londoners get even richer. And yet from an economic perspective there is no question Crossrail will be a very good investment generating further investment, jobs and growth. Bus services, not so much.
Clearly there has to be a balance here or a recognition that the social value of keeping rural areas vibrant has worth even if it cannot be measured in pounds and pence. This government, especially since May took over, has not always got that right. Do you invest in success or do you invest to prevent failure or further decline? Both is not really an option.
HS2 is another one. Another staggeringly expensive project essentially benefiting the already well looked after metropolitan elites talked about down thread. Useful semi-rural rail re-openings such as Skipton- Colne, Uckfield - Lewes, Ashington-Blyth-Newcastle, in parts of Wales, Devon and elsewhere never seem to get off the ground. Only in Scotland has there been some progress.
In France as well as elsewhere in Europe we’re seeing the hard bigotry of unjustified high expectations. It’s reasonable to have aspirations. It’s not reasonable to expect those aspirations to be met without a strongly growing productive economy.
Governments can’t magic such economies up. They can lay the groundwork but as M. Le Président is finding out, that groundwork is itself unpopular. The public have to decide what compromises they will make to realise their aspirations - or to change their aspirations.
The French have a peculiar attitude to what they call les acquis Basically they understand the need for substantial reforms - for others, but it must not affect the privileges they have acquired. Macron presented himself as a reformer like so many others before him, but the French want the gain but will not accept the pain.
Retired people and their understanding of the need to trim back the welfare state.... remember the Granny Tax which was litttle more than equalising up workers tax free allowance to pensioner tax free allowance. You would have thought the world had fallen in. Had people refusing to sign nomination for,s who had signed them throughout them 90s etc.
The French are revolting but that is a pretty normal state of affairs. Whether it is farmers burning livestock, air traffic controllers screwing up peoples' holidays, the banlieues of Paris becoming no go areas and exporting their violence from their slums into the centre, it is something that happens pretty much every year, several times.
We in the UK don't really do that sort of thing. We tried it in 2011 but didn't get a taste for it. Why not? I think, until recently, we had a much more cohesive society where strands of the disaffected still thought that the establishment got their problems and were trying to address them, no matter how ineffectually and incompetently. In France if you wanted attention you really had to burn something.
I fear that we may move closer to the French example for a number of reasons. Firstly, the arrogance and hypocrisy of those who want to overturn the Brexit decision simply because they know best and are so happy to conclude that the great unwashed were deceived or simply ignorant. That is a very French attitude. If millions of our fellow citizens feel that the system no longer respects their views we have a situation where they may need to try something else.
Secondly, the much slower growth since the GFC has made the inequality of distribution of that growth more stark. When the economy was burbling along at 3-4% a year some of that growth bled out to the provinces even if the majority was in London and the south east. Now, for several years, much of the country has a seemingly unending recession.
Thirdly, that perception of recession has been increased by the loss of many semi skilled jobs and better paid jobs outside of London. This has had many iniquitous effects. Local economies are depressed by lack of demand, shops close and High Streets are boarded up, the more ambitious youth head to the big smoke leaving behind the less capable, it is a vicious circle.
As my second and third points show this is a complex and difficult problem which may well be as beyond the capability of our government to fix (even if they had the will) as that of France. I believe that we risk undermining the cohesiveness of our society at our peril.
You have made a very good case for Scottish independence. If the Brexiteers wishes are being ignored by a London and South East elite at least they can comfort themselves that the vote was close. In Scotland they are having something foised on them against the wishes of 76% of their population. If anyone's likely to take to the streets it'll be the gilet tartans.
The most worrying news for Macron is after these protests he now has a lower approval rating than Le Pen, still his main rival for 2022. While he would still probably beat Le Pen in the runoff even if she beat him in the first round given the far left as well as the far right has been a driving force behind these protests if Melenshon beat him in round one too Macron could be knocked out altogether and like Fillon in 2017 fail to make the runoff at all
It can be easier and cheaper to travel from London to Berlin than from Brighton to Bristol.
Given how hard it is to get to Berlin by air, that's a damning statistic.
Even by train, get the boat train to Harwich, and from Holland change at Utrecht and Koln, and bingo.
I don't think somehow it takes 14 hours and €120 to get from Brighton to Bristol by train. In fact, the figures I type in say it's about 3.5 hours and £60.
In my limited experience prices are ok if you stay in your region. It costs silly amounts if I want to take a train to Middlesbrough, it costs less or the same to fly to Newcastle then get a train down from there. And it takes less time.
If you want stupid pricing - I can give you this as an example from earlier this week. I'm looking at a contract in Bristol (2 days on site, 3 from home). To fly it will cost me £100 including parking at the airport. To go by train £300+. Even the cheapest train return is twice the airfare with parking.
Mr. P, people have already seen the original 'Project Fear' prophecies of doom proved false. You'd be better off blaming those who claimed immediate catastrophe with overblown predictions, which were (correctly) disbelieved, than the electorate for not believing them then or believing forecasts of the Apocalypse now.
You encapsulate the Remain problem. "They refuse to listen to reason, or facts." Exactly. There are people who don't share your views, so they are obviously wrong. Populism is something popular with which you disagree. But you only disagree because you know better.
It must be awful to live among such ignorant people. You have my sympathies.
Oh dear. This is exactly the point.
Before the vote there were predictions that we would suffer economically as a result. Which is what happened. That is objective fact.
Because the scale of the hit does not match the most apocalyptic predictions, Leave voters dismiss ALL the predictions, even the ones that were objectively correct.
Now we are facing disruption in medical supplies. The Government is buying fridges like it's Black Friday. That is objective fact.
But leavers insist there is no risk to medical supplies. Not that the scale of the risk is exaggerated, that there is zero risk, that any risk is Fake News.
That is not true, and those sort of lies are dangerous.
Until we actually experience flights grounded and medication stranded in Calais Brexiteers have every right to claim 'fake news' and 'project fear'. Anything other than full blown cliff edge Brexit too can be excused by the Brexiteers as a sell out or a dilution of the dream.
The Brexiteers may well be right and the reality of no deal really is no big deal. However if it does turn out that the fake news or project fear were in fact true, Johnson and Mogg, Davis and Raab will have some explaining to do.
Johnson and friends will either all be shown up as the political geniuses and saviours of the nation they claim or more likely as scoundrels and charlatans.
That's the infuriating though, if No Deal is a disaster its advocates will simply shrug their shoulders and say it wasn't their fault as it wasn't planned properly. Unfortunately nothing will ever "prove" that Brexit was a mistake because there will always be an excuse.
In any case given voters prefer Deal to No Deal by 62% to 38% with Yougov, No Deal is still the least likely Brexit. If the Deal fails and we do not get EUref2 and Remain the Norway+ model involving single market and customs union Amber Rudd is advocating as a reserve option this morning is more likely as it has significantly more MPs in favour of it than No Deal
i went to China recently to a conference and was speaking to an engineer They were telling me about their new provincial leader /gauleiter (don't recall the exact term), I said something along the lines of "but this person isn't accountable, how do you vote them out of office?"
He replied, "I don't know anything about running to province of 60 million people, why should i have a say in appointing someone to run it"
It kind of staggered me, the whole concept of democratic accountably, seem obvious to me, but it was an alien concept to them.
I do occasional seminars for Chinese groups, and had one on systems of government. I espoused the virtues of democracy and was asked by one participant, "How far does the average person in Britain feel that they in fact have any influence on how the country is governed?" Er...
The Chinese system is clearly deficient in principle in accountability as well as much more liable to corruption and misuse of power. But if it's managed competently and people feel they're much better off, they are generally inclined to go along with Governor X appointing cronies and getting rich. They may even feel he deserves it. I am not a fan of the Chinese system but I can see why we have mass revolts of various kinds (France, Brexit, Trump) and they largely don't.
Tiananmen Square? The overthrow of the Chinese monarchy and the Chinese Nationalist government bybthe Communists were themselves revolts
You have made a very good case for Scottish independence. If the Brexiteers wishes are being ignored by a London and South East elite at least they can comfort themselves that the vote was close. In Scotland they are having something foised on them against the wishes of 76% of their population. If anyone's likely to take to the streets it'll be the gilet tartans.
It would only be a good case for Scottish independence if a successful Scottish economy was within our grasp. I am not sure it is but as I have said before the Scottish government has been given a range of powers including taxation powers which gives them an opportunity to prove me wrong. The road to independence is economic success.So far, the evidence is mixed at best with much more emphasis on economic populism and "free" stuff.
The French are revolting but that is a pretty normal state of affairs. Whether it is farmers burning livestock, air traffic controllers screwing up peoples' holidays, the banlieues of Paris becoming no go areas and exporting their violence from their slums into the centre, it is something that happens pretty much every year, several times.
We in the UK don't really do that sort of thing. We tried it in 2011 but didn't get a taste for it. Why not? I think, until recently, we had a much more cohesive society where strands of the disaffected still thought that the establishment got their problems and were trying to address them, no matter how ineffectually and incompetently. In France if you wanted attention you really had to burn something.
I fear that we may move closer to the French example for a number of reasons. Firstly, the arrogance and hypocrisy of those who want to overturn the Brexit decision simply because they know best and are so happy to conclude that the great unwashed were deceived or simply ignorant. That is a very French attitude. If millions of our fellow citizens feel that the system no longer respects their views we have a situation where they may need to try something else.
Secondly, the much slower growth since the GFC has made the inequality of distribution of that growth more stark. When the economy was burbling along at 3-4% a year some of that growth bled out to the provinces even if the majority was in London and the south east. Now, for several years, much of the country has a seemingly unending recession.
Thirdly, that perception of recession has been increased by the loss of many semi skilled jobs and better paid jobs outside of London. This has had many iniquitous effects. Local economies are depressed by lack of demand, shops close and High Streets are boarded up, the more ambitious youth head to the big smoke leaving behind the less capable, it is a vicious circle.
As my second and third points show this is a complex and difficult problem which may well be as beyond the capability of our government to fix (even if they had the will) as that of France. I believe that we risk undermining the cohesiveness of our society at our peril.
The French revolting is normal. So is the Conservative response when they see their permanent hold on power threatened in any way.
For example when Blair had his large majority , the blockade of refineries by farmers , lorry drivers , etc egged on by many in the Conservative Party.This brought the country to a near stand still. The Police took no action in direct contrast to the miners strike twenty years earlier.
The same type of action , will happen if Corbyn ever gains power.
I wrote my response to David's article before reading the Guardian piece but I see it makes some of the same points. Where I disagree with it is the political spin at the end. It seems to be suggesting that it was Tory policy that drove these unequal distributions. I think that there are many more complex reasons, many of them beyond any government's ability to control or even offset.
Perhaps David, but the Tories are the biggest culprits in the mix.
I think its a real dilemma for governments of all stripes. To take a simple example the money invested in Crossrail makes the transport budget for the rest of the country look a joke. We argue about the extent of subsidy for rural bus services in Scotland or Yorkshire when tens of billions are being invested to help those rich Londoners get even richer. And yet from an economic perspective there is no question Crossrail will be a very good investment generating further investment, jobs and growth. Bus services, not so much.
Clearly there has to be a balance here or a recognition that the social value of keeping rural areas vibrant has worth even if it cannot be measured in pounds and pence. This government, especially since May took over, has not always got that right. Do you invest in success or do you invest to prevent failure or further decline? Both is not really an option.
HS2 is another one. Another staggeringly expensive project essentially benefiting the already well looked after metropolitan elites talked about down thread. Useful semi-rural rail re-openings such as Skipton- Colne, Uckfield - Lewes, Ashington-Blyth-Newcastle, in parts of Wales, Devon and elsewhere never seem to get off the ground. Only in Scotland has there been some progress.
I think that we have to recognise that the success of large conglomerations around the world is the modern equivalent of economies of scale. Until you generate a critical mass of skills, opportunities and interactivity in a place lift off just doesn't happen. It's weird. The internet was supposed to mean that distance did not matter but it does.
The French are revolting but that is a pretty normal state of affairs. Whether it is farmers burning livestock, air traffic controllers screwing up peoples' holidays, the banlieues of Paris becoming no go areas and exporting their violence from their slums into the centre, it is something that happens pretty much every year, several times.
We in the UK don't really do that sort of thing. We tried it in 2011 but didn't get a taste for it
I fear that we may move closer to the French example for a number of reasons. Firstly, the arrogance and hypocrisy of those who want to overturn the Brexit decision simply because they know best and are so happy to conclude that the great unwashed were deceived or simply ignorant. That is a very French attitude. If millions of our fellow citizens .
Secondly, the much slower growth since the GFC has made the inequality of distribution of that growth more stark. When the economy was burbling along at 3-4% a year some of that growth bled out to the provinces even if the majority was in London and the south east. Now, for several years, much of the country has a seemingly unending recession.
Thirdly, that perception of recession has been increased by the loss of many semi skilled jobs and better paid jobs outside of London. This has had many iniquitous effects. Local economies are depressed by lack of demand, shops close and High Streets are boarded up, the more ambitious youth head to the big smoke leaving behind the less capable, it is a vicious circle.
As my second and third points show this is a complex and difficult problem which may well be as beyond the capability of our government to fix (even if they had the will) as that of France. I believe that we risk undermining the cohesiveness of our society at our peril.
The French revolting is normal. So is the Conservative response when they see their permanent hold on power threatened in any way.
For example when Blair had his large majority , the blockade of refineries by farmers , lorry drivers , etc egged on by many in the Conservative Party.This brought the country to a near stand still. The Police took no action in direct contrast to the miners strike twenty years earlier.
The same type of action , will happen if Corbyn ever gains power.
Hilarious. You quote the one single piece of direct action over the last thirty years that wasn’t sanctioned by labour as some kind of sign the the tories expect to be in permanent power. Utterly bizarre. The police took no order because the people blockading the refineries weren’t throwing down blocks of concrete on passing tankers, and neither had they had a habit of doing it over and over for decades. They did it once. The government changed the law, the chief police officers got told next time not to go softly, and the next time it just petered out.
Mr. Norm, there was a wonderfully patronising bloke on the BBC News a few nights ago talking about HS2. It'll extend 'as far north as Leeds', he said, speaking as if Leeds were the Edge of the Earth and marked with Here There Be Dragons on maps.
Goodness knows that the imbecile would make of Newcastle. Or Scotland.
The French are revolting but that is a pretty normal state of affairs. Whether it is farmers burning livestock, air traffic controllers screwing up peoples' holidays, the banlieues of Paris becoming no go areas and exporting their violence from their slums into the centre, it is something that happens pretty much every year, several times.
We in the UK don't really do that sort of thing. We tried it in 2011 but didn't get a taste for it. Why not? I think, until recently, we had a much more cohesive society where strands of the disaffected still thought that the establishment got their problems and were trying to address them, no matter how ineffectually and incompetently. In France if you wanted attention you really had to burn something.
I fear that we may move closer to the French example for a number of reasons. Firstly, the arrogance and hypocrisy of those who want to overturn the Brexit decision simply because they know best and are so happy to conclude that the great unwashed were deceived or simply ignorant. That is a very French attitude. If millions of our fellow citizens feel that the system no longer respects their views we have a situation where they may need to try something else.
Secondly, the much slower growth since the GFC has made the inequality of distribution of that growth more stark. When the economy was burbling along at 3-4% a year some of that growth bled out to the provinces even if the majority was in London and the south east. Now, for several years, much of the country has a seemingly unending recession.
Thirdly, that perception of recession has been increased by the loss of many semi skilled jobs and better paid jobs outside of London. This has had many iniquitous effects. Local economies are depressed by lack of demand, shops close and High Streets are boarded up, the more ambitious youth head to the big smoke leaving behind the less capable, it is a vicious circle.
As my second and third points show this is a complex and difficult problem which may well be as beyond the capability of our government to fix (even if they had the will) as that of France. I believe that we risk undermining the cohesiveness of our society at our peril.
You have made a very good case for Scottish independence. If the Brexiteers wishes are being ignored by a London and South East elite at least they can comfort themselves that the vote was close. In Scotland they are having something foised on them against the wishes of 76% of their population. If anyone's likely to take to the streets it'll be the gilet tartans.
Well Edmond, it appears that Charles himself agrees with me on this occasion. Not that I disagree with your general point. Many, probably most, people thankfully recognise the need to contribute to the society where they earn their living. Those that don't (Amazon comes to mind) are indeed parasites as someone suggested well down thread.
I don't mean it's offensive to Charles to make that connection, I mean it's offensive to citizens of everywhere, who have no connection with the tax-evading scumbags he's talking about, who (admittedly anecdotally) seem to be the biggest nationalistic tub-thumpers out there.
Our globalised economy is very good at creating wealth. The issue is how it is distributed, not just in monetary terms, but also in terms of opportunities, health outcomes, the environment and so on. If you’re well-off and you’re not a social democrat you’re a fool. Either you accept redistribution (ie, paying more tax) within the framework of a managed, wealth-creating, capitalist economy, or you end up losing everything when it’s all swept away. Your choice, my friends!!
Catching up with the thread, and saw this, which I 100% agree with. When globalisation swept away most trade barriers, I thought at the time that the global inequalities were going to prove unsustainable and some painful adjustments in the West were coming as jobs migrated to the developing world (or people from the developing world would come to us and accept low pay). What I'd not foreseen is how differently the effect was on different classes - the highly-educated and the financial experts float effortlessly on the tide, while everyone vulnerable to competition from the developing world at best stagnates. Redistributing from the very wealthy to the viuctims of the process is simply a sensible precaution, as Southam observes.
As a globe, the process has had more winners than losers, and for all the problems of dictatorship and inequality, what's happened in China - which in living memory had famines and intense suffering right across the country - is in human terms rather magnificent. But for us here in Britain the position is rather different, and Brexit is mostly a distraction from our real issues.
As someone of a liberal tendency, I think my lot have much to answer for by presenting globalisation as an unalloyed good. There are losers as well as winners. It's especially important to support those left behind in times of change.
I would say Brexit is worse than a distraction. It's the wrong response to the real problem and makes it much harder to solve the problem.
I wrote my response to David's article before reading the Guardian piece but I see it makes some of the same points. Where I disagree with it is the political spin at the end. It seems to be suggesting that it was Tory policy that drove these unequal distributions. I think that there are many more complex reasons, many of them beyond any government's ability to control or even offset.
Perhaps David, but the Tories are the biggest culprits in the mix.
I think its a real dilemma for governments of all stripes. To take a simple example the money invested in Crossrail makes the transport budget for the rest of the country look a joke. We argue about the extent of subsidy for rural bus services in Scotland or Yorkshire when tens of billions are being invested to help those rich Londoners get even richer. And yet from an economic perspective there is no question Crossrail will be a very good investment generating further investment, jobs and growth. Bus services, not so much.
Clearly there has to be a balance here or a recognition that the social value of keeping rural areas vibrant has worth even if it cannot be measured in pounds and pence. This government, especially since May took over, has not always got that right. Do you invest in success or do you invest to prevent failure or further decline? Both is not really an option.
HS2 is another one. Another staggeringly expensive project essentially benefiting the already well looked after metropolitan elites talked about down thread. Useful semi-rural rail re-openings such as Skipton- Colne, Uckfield - Lewes, Ashington-Blyth-Newcastle, in parts of Wales, Devon and elsewhere never seem to get off the ground. Only in Scotland has there been some progress.
I think that we have to recognise that the success of large conglomerations around the world is the modern equivalent of economies of scale. Until you generate a critical mass of skills, opportunities and interactivity in a place lift off just doesn't happen. It's weird. The internet was supposed to mean that distance did not matter but it does.
The area I live struggles, just a small urban area under 100,000 that lacks the critical mass. Has the infrastructure of a larger area such as hospital, factories, university, motorway, railways even an airport. But it just struggles to offer something to keep its young talent, and to bring highly skilled people to the area. Medical staff across all grades are difficult to get and retain. Local nhs services keep having to be restructured, not because of finances, but unsafe numbers of staff due to vacancies.
The area I live struggles, just a small urban area under 100,000 that lacks the critical mass. Has the infrastructure of a larger area such as hospital, factories, university, motorway, railways even an airport. But it just struggles to offer something to keep its young talent, and to bring highly skilled people to the area. Medical staff across all grades are difficult to get and retain. Local nhs services keep having to be restructured, not because of finances, but unsafe numbers of staff due to vacancies.
Sounds not ridiculously unlike Cannock, except we don't have a University or an airport. But of course these things are relative. Sandwiched between Stoke, Telford, Birmingham and Nottingham the likes of Cannock, Burton, Lichfield, Tamworth and even Stafford itself are never going to be major regional service centres. But smaller places in say the Scottish or Welsh Highlands, or the North West, are because of the absence of major nearby rivals.
Incidentally today was a rather grim red letter day. I went for a walk through Cannock market and for the first time it had more empty stalls than full ones - including the disappearance of some quite decent businesses where you could get goods of a fair quality at a reasonable price. I used to buy my belts, for example, at a stall that's just vanished.
Sad. It was never exactly thriving in my time here but it was still a place to go for some pleasant browsing and even a half decent meal. I don't see it lasting much longer though.
The British state is grossly over centralised. The real Brexit should be to free the regions from the dead man’s grip of Treasury. Such investment as there is is concentrated in London.
Second tier cities perform appallingly against European and US counterparts. Birmingham may be unique in that rather than promote productivity (as metros are supposed to), the city is LESS productive than the surrounding countryside.
However, having lived in the U.K. for twenty years, I know no one really gives a shit, and many actively deny the facts above.
It can be easier and cheaper to travel from London to Berlin than from Brighton to Bristol.
Given how hard it is to get to Berlin by air, that's a damning statistic.
Even by train, get the boat train to Harwich, and from Holland change at Utrecht and Koln, and bingo.
I don't think somehow it takes 14 hours and €120 to get from Brighton to Bristol by train. In fact, the figures I type in say it's about 3.5 hours and £60.
In my limited experience prices are ok if you stay in your region. It costs silly amounts if I want to take a train to Middlesbrough, it costs less or the same to fly to Newcastle then get a train down from there. And it takes less time.
If you want stupid pricing - I can give you this as an example from earlier this week. I'm looking at a contract in Bristol (2 days on site, 3 from home). To fly it will cost me £100 including parking at the airport. To go by train £300+. Even the cheapest train return is twice the airfare with parking.
My beloved and I thought a train journey to Yorkshire to see my family was a splendid idea. First class anytime return was just shy of £1300. Of course, you can do better, but just seeing the price made me wonder a bit about their pricing algorithms.
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TM is more likely to face a vnoc or a vnoc in her government
Johnson is a lost cause anyway
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LXmaHCfBKxE
Yeah but this time they really mean it! You are right about climate hysteria. They’ve cried wolf so many times, that if the wolf really is present, it’s barely more than a random event that this time they’ve managed to get it right.
What was it they said about vince cable predicting eight of the last two recessions?
If you predict the end of the world enough, you might end up being right once.
https://twitter.com/GrandPrixDiary/status/1071315394680508416
Waymo's autonomous cars might not be quite as ready for autonomous driving as they'd been claiming:
https://arstechnica.com/cars/2018/12/waymos-lame-public-driverless-launch-not-driverless-and-barely-public/
The Fake News merchants, those who have "had enough of experts" insist that it is always zero.
That lie is dangerous, and we will pay a price for allowing that to become the norm.
Automated cars seem nuts to me. It's more difficult to sit there doing nothing, whilst being 100% alert to grab the wheel at split second notice if the automated system suddenly goes wonky, than it is to just drive in the first place.
The issue is not that some predictions are bad, the Fake News merchants claim that all predictions in any scenario are worthless.
That is a dangerous lie.
Except for Tesla, who massively over-sell their 'autopilot' system to a ridiculous and (IMO) dangerous level.
I heard about the Bloodhound project. Such a shame.
Governments can’t magic such economies up. They can lay the groundwork but as M. Le Président is finding out, that groundwork is itself unpopular. The public have to decide what compromises they will make to realise their aspirations - or to change their aspirations.
I could google, but I suspect someone here has already done that.
The Brexiteers may well be right and the reality of no deal really is no big deal. However if it does turn out that the fake news or project fear were in fact true, Johnson and Mogg, Davis and Raab will have some explaining to do.
Johnson and friends will either all be shown up as the political geniuses and saviours of the nation they claim or more likely as scoundrels and charlatans.
(Illustrative figures)
Government says “we will invest 1bn per year” doesn’t get many headlines.
Government says “we will invest £50bn*
* over 50 years
gets a lot more attention
But hyperbole in one direction encourages hyperbole on the other
Basically we should disembowel all PR agents
A heuristic people often then use is just to take the various conflicting claims they hear from different sides and assume the truth must be somewhere in the middle, but recently people - Trump especially, but not just Trump - have learned to game this by telling ever more audacious lies. This works particularly well with social media because you no longer have the anchoring effect you had with conflicting media, where they all had at least some interest in being taken seriously, and they had recognizable biases that you could triangulate from.
I don't really know the solution to this, but I reckon at least part of it is in things like prediction markets and betting challenges that create a cost to pushing bullshit.
http://navya.tech/en/
I can't seem to find any in use though. Maybe on a few private sites, perhaps?
As a globe, the process has had more winners than losers, and for all the problems of dictatorship and inequality, what's happened in China - which in living memory had famines and intense suffering right across the country - is in human terms rather magnificent. But for us here in Britain the position is rather different, and Brexit is mostly a distraction from our real issues.
If she loses, nobody knows what happens next. Literally chaos.
Every MP must dip their hand in the blood. I would position the Chief Whip outside the NO lobby asking every MP passing "Do you feel lucky? Well, do ya punk?"
And in any case if she goes down this path she absolutely has to have an alternative proposal.
Clearly there has to be a balance here or a recognition that the social value of keeping rural areas vibrant has worth even if it cannot be measured in pounds and pence. This government, especially since May took over, has not always got that right. Do you invest in success or do you invest to prevent failure or further decline? Both is not really an option.
1,200 relatives is a bloody large family though. Is your brother Prince Charles?
Emergency legislation for this could kick off by Christmas. I think it'd need an extension to A50.
The Chinese system is clearly deficient in principle in accountability as well as much more liable to corruption and misuse of power. But if it's managed competently and people feel they're much better off, they are generally inclined to go along with Governor X appointing cronies and getting rich. They may even feel he deserves it. I am not a fan of the Chinese system but I can see why we have mass revolts of various kinds (France, Brexit, Trump) and they largely don't.
His constant references to bridesmaiding Mollie Sugden’s wedding will not avail him.
Not a great time to be a Whip.
We can all pick an example. You've picked easy money. I'd point at low inflation - it's the businessperson's friend but the debtors' enemy. Most poor people I know are also heavily indebted. Boomers forget how aggressively their mortgage debt was reduced by conditions in the 80s.
We tax business because they are easier to target than the three groups of people who are actually paying the tax: owners, customers, and employees. If that is no longe true then perhaps we should go after the intended targets more directly.
Medieval rulers who mucked about with the coinage generally had rapid and immediately adverse effects on the economy, typically causing rampant inflation. Printing money famously destroyed the Wiemar republic. Given the scale of QE the consequences have been remarkably modest. I fear that future politicians may well learn the wrong lesson from this.
We’re unusual in that the family pooled their strategic assets 10 generations ago.
Individuals have their own assets as well, of course, (some of which the core family have a RoFR on should they ever be sold) but those are small in comparison
A Mk.104 RB199 out of a Tornado F3 might have been better. Those things were as fast as fuck on the deck.
You can, and many people do, live globally nomadic lives without some deep allegiance to a legacy nation state and still pay their fare share of taxes to wherever they are. Whereas a lot of the biggest tax evaders seem to be strong adherents of a particular national identity. The Russian oligarchs would be, and several of our biggest Brexit supporters seem to be keen to avoid British taxes. They're citizens of somewhere, and they're sometimes even tax residents of that somewhere. But their assets are somewhere else.
Everyone is legally a citizen of somewhere
But if they don’t make a contribution to society then morally they are not
Retired people and their understanding of the need to trim back the welfare state.... remember the Granny Tax which was litttle more than equalising up workers tax free allowance to pensioner tax free allowance. You would have thought the world had fallen in. Had people refusing to sign nomination for,s who had signed them throughout them 90s etc.
These are dark times.
So is the Conservative response when they see their permanent hold on power threatened in any way.
For example when Blair had his large majority , the blockade of refineries by farmers , lorry drivers , etc egged on by many in the Conservative Party.This brought the country to a near stand still.
The Police took no action in direct contrast to the miners strike twenty years earlier.
The same type of action , will happen if Corbyn ever gains power.
The police took no order because the people blockading the refineries weren’t throwing down blocks of concrete on passing tankers, and neither had they had a habit of doing it over and over for decades. They did it once. The government changed the law, the chief police officers got told next time not to go softly, and the next time it just petered out.
Goodness knows that the imbecile would make of Newcastle. Or Scotland.
I would say Brexit is worse than a distraction. It's the wrong response to the real problem and makes it much harder to solve the problem.
https://twitter.com/BFMTV/status/1070998485015674880
Sad. It was never exactly thriving in my time here but it was still a place to go for some pleasant browsing and even a half decent meal. I don't see it lasting much longer though.
Such investment as there is is concentrated in London.
Second tier cities perform appallingly against European and US counterparts. Birmingham may be unique in that rather than promote productivity (as metros are supposed to), the city is LESS productive than the surrounding countryside.
However, having lived in the U.K. for twenty years, I know no one really gives a shit, and many actively deny the facts above.