I agree on the breach of law but who cares about another luvvie
She's a lawyer. But why the anti-"Luvvie" sentiment? Do you not enjoy any form of the dramatic arts? The dislike of actors on PB is quite striking, and seems to come entirely from right of centre posters. Only ISIS brides seem to come in for more stick. One day someone will write a dissertation on it.
I have no time for over paid celebrities and to be fair I have never had
Bit politics of envy that isn't it? Surely they are just getting the market rate for their talent?
So moaning about the capitalist system that made them rich, while advocating online for socialist policies that would make them poorer THAT HAVE NO CHANCE OF ACTUALLY HAPPENING.
Under socialism, Gary Lineker would earn the standard £356.73 a week TV presenter wage, negotiated by the TV presenter Union, and not the £1.75m a year he actually gets paid.
I’m guessing he’s quite happy with the current “market rate” system.
There is nothing intrinsic about socialism, either in theory or practice, that mandates equal "standard" pay.
"... to each according to his needs" surely gets within hailing distance?
Which is of course the answer to what rich lefties should do. They have more than their needs and hence could give away the surplus to those who do not have as much. Whether by paying taxes or giving it to a homeless shelter.
I agree on the breach of law but who cares about another luvvie
She's a lawyer. But why the anti-"Luvvie" sentiment? Do you not enjoy any form of the dramatic arts? The dislike of actors on PB is quite striking, and seems to come entirely from right of centre posters. Only ISIS brides seem to come in for more stick. One day someone will write a dissertation on it.
It’s not about any particular profession, but rather about rich hypocrites who promote left-wing ideology in public, while insulating themselves from the effects of it in private.
How should a person behave if they are rich and left wing?
+1 (asking for a friend).
- an option to pay a "lefty surcharge" tax has been mooted.
Which if you think the tax system should discourage bad behaviour such as holding leftish political views whilst not on your uppers makes a lot of sense. Could raise quite a bit too. Could perhaps even smooth the way to a tax CUT specifically for 'small state' Conservatives.
This is the best idea ever, and a chance to have one's democratically-expressed views respected even if your party doesn't win the election: those in favour of higher taxes get the fabulous opportunity to pay them, those against them pay less. Everybody's happy!
Using that theorem, jhb reckons that more than 90% of the positive cases showing up in the UK right now are false positives.
Just think about that for a moment.
Equally to the point, doesn’t that mean that the number of positives will always correlate quite closely with the number of tests, regardless of the spread (or not) of the virus?
The Cambridge Uni stats guy has it like this.
The ONS reckons that the infection rate is one in a thousand. So test a thousand people and you will get (with a test false positive rate of 0.8%).....
1 person who has corona 8 false positives
So nine in one thousand.
So that would imply that currently out of every nine positives the tests are revealing, eight are false positives. At the ONS's current estimate of the infection rate.
Destroy the economy based on that data? Insane. Insane.
🤦♂️
The issue is not the number of people coming back positive it is the changing rate of people coming back positive.
If false positives were a major issue then as cases rise they become LESS of an issue not more of one (as you have fewer false positives and more false negatives) which means that the increasing rates of positives is actually WORSE than we thought.
That is the result of your logic.
maybe but it isn;t the rise in the rate that is being cited as the reason for closing us down. Its the number of cases. And those cases right now are mostly phantoms, on the government's own data.
Its insane.
That's categorically not true. It's the rise in the rate that is being cited. If the number of cases were stable there'd be no issue.
If we set a baseline that 90% of cases were false positives then the increased rate (since it will be driven by real positives and fewer false positives) would mean that instead of a two-fold increase in real cases we have a ten-fold increase in real cases.
Using that theorem, jhb reckons that more than 90% of the positive cases showing up in the UK right now are false positives.
Just think about that for a moment.
Equally to the point, doesn’t that mean that the number of positives will always correlate quite closely with the number of tests, regardless of the spread (or not) of the virus?
The Cambridge Uni stats guy has it like this.
The ONS reckons that the infection rate is one in a thousand. So test a thousand people and you will get (with a test false positive rate of 0.8%).....
1 person who has corona 8 false positives
So nine in one thousand.
So that would imply that currently out of every nine positives the tests are revealing, eight are false positives. At the ONS's current estimate of the infection rate.
Destroy the economy based on that data? Insane. Insane.
So why are the positive numbers rising much faster than the number of tests ?
There's an issue here about how good we are getting at making sure the people who need a test are getting one. For example, how well contact-tracing is working, whether people recognise what symptoms are more COVIDy and which more flu/coldlike, and so on. I'm not saying that this on its own accounts for the rise in positive tests, just saying that the number of positive tests depends on more than "how many infected people are there" and "how many tests are being given".
The ONS random testing has the advantage of cutting a lot of those factors out, and that's definitely heading north unfortunately.
Incidentally, for all the people saying the rises in cases is just a phantasm, you still need to look at the ONS random sample numbers. Because that definitely won't be being driven by more testing, better tracing, more intelligent healthcare-seeking behaviour and all the other possibilities that apply to the daily case numbers.
The ONS figures are rising and that doesn't seem to be phantasmic. If you look down to figure 5, the age-group analysis is instructive - while numbers seem low and stable among the 70+, which presumably explains why indicators like hospital admissions don't look as alarming as headline case numbers at the moment, there have to be questions on how sustainable that is, given the numbers among the young are increasing so rapidly.
I agree on the breach of law but who cares about another luvvie
She's a lawyer. But why the anti-"Luvvie" sentiment? Do you not enjoy any form of the dramatic arts? The dislike of actors on PB is quite striking, and seems to come entirely from right of centre posters. Only ISIS brides seem to come in for more stick. One day someone will write a dissertation on it.
It’s not about any particular profession, but rather about rich hypocrites who promote left-wing ideology in public, while insulating themselves from the effects of it in private.
How should a person behave if they are rich and left wing?
Pay voluntary higher tax rates. You can send HMRC a cheque of any value and label it a voluntary tax donation.
That would be philanthropy. A left-winger would campaign for everyone to pay higher taxes, just as a right-winger would campaign for everyone to pay lower taxes.
Amazingly, some people do do it though. All of £180k from 200 people, according to the FT.
I agree on the breach of law but who cares about another luvvie
She's a lawyer. But why the anti-"Luvvie" sentiment? Do you not enjoy any form of the dramatic arts? The dislike of actors on PB is quite striking, and seems to come entirely from right of centre posters. Only ISIS brides seem to come in for more stick. One day someone will write a dissertation on it.
It’s not about any particular profession, but rather about rich hypocrites who promote left-wing ideology in public, while insulating themselves from the effects of it in private.
How should a person behave if they are rich and left wing?
Pay voluntary higher tax rates. You can send HMRC a cheque of any value and label it a voluntary tax donation.
That would be philanthropy. A left-winger would campaign for everyone to pay higher taxes, just as a right-winger would campaign for everyone to pay lower taxes.
Amazingly, some people do do it though. All of £180k from 200 people, according to the FT.
I agree on the breach of law but who cares about another luvvie
She's a lawyer. But why the anti-"Luvvie" sentiment? Do you not enjoy any form of the dramatic arts? The dislike of actors on PB is quite striking, and seems to come entirely from right of centre posters. Only ISIS brides seem to come in for more stick. One day someone will write a dissertation on it.
It’s not about any particular profession, but rather about rich hypocrites who promote left-wing ideology in public, while insulating themselves from the effects of it in private.
How should a person behave if they are rich and left wing?
Thankful to the capitalist system they pretend to want to smash up, that made them rich in the first place?
It’s really easy to say you’d be happy to pay 60% or 70% tax rates, when there’s no chance of it actually happening and millions of the woke will like you on Twitter for saying it. If Corbyn had got in you’d have seen a fair few of them ending up in Monaco or Dubai.
I’ll believe the Luvvies are serious about wanting higher taxes, when they actually start writing the cheques voluntarily.
Are you being serious? I only ask because it is such a stupid comment. I would happily pay more tax but unless all the other rich people do then it's pointless. Can you name a single person who advocated for higher taxes then avoided paying them? So far these left wing hypocrites that so enrage PB Tories seem to exist solely in their imagination.
Re "Can you name a single person who advocated for higher taxes then avoided paying them?", I don't think claimed or apparent political affiliation seemed to make much difference on those list of slebs caught up in tax schemes. Not accusing them of deliberate wrongdoing, they took their advice and as it happened the legal findings went against them, but they wouldn't have signed up in the first place if they weren't trying to minimise their tax bill (avoidance not evasion).
I'll give you Linneker, Ferguson, the Labour donor (Hollick) and I think Ant and Dec and Mel C have said they vote Labour. Otherwise that list seems like thin gruel for a Labour Luvvie Hypocrites argument. I believe it's quite common for people like pop stars and actors and footballers to get a lot of tax and financial advice because they tend to earn a lot but only for a short period of time. Not saying it's OK, but you can understand someone from a modest background who suddenly becomes rich wanting to get advice on how to manage it so it doesn't run out.
I agree on the breach of law but who cares about another luvvie
She's a lawyer. But why the anti-"Luvvie" sentiment? Do you not enjoy any form of the dramatic arts? The dislike of actors on PB is quite striking, and seems to come entirely from right of centre posters. Only ISIS brides seem to come in for more stick. One day someone will write a dissertation on it.
It’s not about any particular profession, but rather about rich hypocrites who promote left-wing ideology in public, while insulating themselves from the effects of it in private.
How should a person behave if they are rich and left wing?
Thankful to the capitalist system they pretend to want to smash up, that made them rich in the first place?
It’s really easy to say you’d be happy to pay 60% or 70% tax rates, when there’s no chance of it actually happening and millions of the woke will like you on Twitter for saying it. If Corbyn had got in you’d have seen a fair few of them ending up in Monaco or Dubai.
I’ll believe the Luvvies are serious about wanting higher taxes, when they actually start writing the cheques voluntarily.
Just because a system works for you personally does not preclude you disliking the system or wanting to change it. That's a ridiculous position to take. C'mon. Thinking cap.
Indeed. It would imply Kim Jong Un is right to support the North Korean regime instead of replacing it with something fairer.
Or that capitalism's losers must be Socialists otherwise they are plain dumb.
I agree on the breach of law but who cares about another luvvie
She's a lawyer. But why the anti-"Luvvie" sentiment? Do you not enjoy any form of the dramatic arts? The dislike of actors on PB is quite striking, and seems to come entirely from right of centre posters. Only ISIS brides seem to come in for more stick. One day someone will write a dissertation on it.
It’s not about any particular profession, but rather about rich hypocrites who promote left-wing ideology in public, while insulating themselves from the effects of it in private.
How should a person behave if they are rich and left wing?
Pay voluntary higher tax rates. You can send HMRC a cheque of any value and label it a voluntary tax donation.
That would be philanthropy. A left-winger would campaign for everyone to pay higher taxes, just as a right-winger would campaign for everyone to pay lower taxes.
Amazingly, some people do do it though. All of £180k from 200 people, according to the FT.
I agree on the breach of law but who cares about another luvvie
She's a lawyer. But why the anti-"Luvvie" sentiment? Do you not enjoy any form of the dramatic arts? The dislike of actors on PB is quite striking, and seems to come entirely from right of centre posters. Only ISIS brides seem to come in for more stick. One day someone will write a dissertation on it.
It’s not about any particular profession, but rather about rich hypocrites who promote left-wing ideology in public, while insulating themselves from the effects of it in private.
How should a person behave if they are rich and left wing?
Pay voluntary higher tax rates. You can send HMRC a cheque of any value and label it a voluntary tax donation.
That would be philanthropy. A left-winger would campaign for everyone to pay higher taxes, just as a right-winger would campaign for everyone to pay lower taxes.
Amazingly, some people do do it though. All of £180k from 200 people, according to the FT.
Many of us also pay voluntary NI contributions, which helps the government’s current numbers even though we don’t live there and consume any services.
Because the return when you get to state pension age makes it a cracking investment for you; for the government, not so much?
The government are torn between raising revenue today and the need to provide a minimum standard of living for future British pensioners.
If I didn’t pay anything now I’d still be British, and therefore still able to claim benefits in the U.K. as a retiree in 30 years’ time.
Do you really believe that? Someone in the treasury sitting there saying we are really struggling to raise enough revenue this year.....thank god for overseas NI voluntary contributions - they will make all the difference to our £1tn spending! We are saved!
I agree on the breach of law but who cares about another luvvie
She's a lawyer. But why the anti-"Luvvie" sentiment? Do you not enjoy any form of the dramatic arts? The dislike of actors on PB is quite striking, and seems to come entirely from right of centre posters. Only ISIS brides seem to come in for more stick. One day someone will write a dissertation on it.
It’s not about any particular profession, but rather about rich hypocrites who promote left-wing ideology in public, while insulating themselves from the effects of it in private.
How should a person behave if they are rich and left wing?
Pay voluntary higher tax rates. You can send HMRC a cheque of any value and label it a voluntary tax donation.
That would be philanthropy. A left-winger would campaign for everyone to pay higher taxes, just as a right-winger would campaign for everyone to pay lower taxes.
Amazingly, some people do do it though. All of £180k from 200 people, according to the FT.
I agree on the breach of law but who cares about another luvvie
She's a lawyer. But why the anti-"Luvvie" sentiment? Do you not enjoy any form of the dramatic arts? The dislike of actors on PB is quite striking, and seems to come entirely from right of centre posters. Only ISIS brides seem to come in for more stick. One day someone will write a dissertation on it.
It’s not about any particular profession, but rather about rich hypocrites who promote left-wing ideology in public, while insulating themselves from the effects of it in private.
How should a person behave if they are rich and left wing?
Pay voluntary higher tax rates. You can send HMRC a cheque of any value and label it a voluntary tax donation.
That would be philanthropy. A left-winger would campaign for everyone to pay higher taxes, just as a right-winger would campaign for everyone to pay lower taxes.
Amazingly, some people do do it though. All of £180k from 200 people, according to the FT.
Many of us also pay voluntary NI contributions, which helps the government’s current numbers even though we don’t live there and consume any services.
Because the return when you get to state pension age makes it a cracking investment for you; for the government, not so much?
The government are torn between raising revenue today and the need to provide a minimum standard of living for future British pensioners.
If I didn’t pay anything now I’d still be British, and therefore still able to claim benefits in the U.K. as a retiree in 30 years’ time.
Do you really believe that? Someone in the treasury sitting there saying we are really struggling to raise enough revenue this year.....thank god for overseas NI voluntary contributions - they will make all the difference to our £1tn spending! We are saved!
Well, I can choose to pay it or not. The difference in what the government would have to pay me out in retirement benefits is very marginal, when one also thinks about housing benefit and pensioner tax credits.
By paying NICs voluntarily I’m giving the government money today, which they’re grateful for
I agree on the breach of law but who cares about another luvvie
She's a lawyer. But why the anti-"Luvvie" sentiment? Do you not enjoy any form of the dramatic arts? The dislike of actors on PB is quite striking, and seems to come entirely from right of centre posters. Only ISIS brides seem to come in for more stick. One day someone will write a dissertation on it.
It’s not about any particular profession, but rather about rich hypocrites who promote left-wing ideology in public, while insulating themselves from the effects of it in private.
How should a person behave if they are rich and left wing?
Thankful to the capitalist system they pretend to want to smash up, that made them rich in the first place?
It’s really easy to say you’d be happy to pay 60% or 70% tax rates, when there’s no chance of it actually happening and millions of the woke will like you on Twitter for saying it. If Corbyn had got in you’d have seen a fair few of them ending up in Monaco or Dubai.
I’ll believe the Luvvies are serious about wanting higher taxes, when they actually start writing the cheques voluntarily.
Are you being serious? I only ask because it is such a stupid comment. I would happily pay more tax but unless all the other rich people do then it's pointless. Can you name a single person who advocated for higher taxes then avoided paying them? So far these left wing hypocrites that so enrage PB Tories seem to exist solely in their imagination.
Didn't quite a few left wing people go out of their way to avoid inheritance taxes? The Benns spring to mind
I agree on the breach of law but who cares about another luvvie
She's a lawyer. But why the anti-"Luvvie" sentiment? Do you not enjoy any form of the dramatic arts? The dislike of actors on PB is quite striking, and seems to come entirely from right of centre posters. Only ISIS brides seem to come in for more stick. One day someone will write a dissertation on it.
It’s not about any particular profession, but rather about rich hypocrites who promote left-wing ideology in public, while insulating themselves from the effects of it in private.
How should a person behave if they are rich and left wing?
Thankful to the capitalist system they pretend to want to smash up, that made them rich in the first place?
It’s really easy to say you’d be happy to pay 60% or 70% tax rates, when there’s no chance of it actually happening and millions of the woke will like you on Twitter for saying it. If Corbyn had got in you’d have seen a fair few of them ending up in Monaco or Dubai.
I’ll believe the Luvvies are serious about wanting higher taxes, when they actually start writing the cheques voluntarily.
Are you being serious? I only ask because it is such a stupid comment. I would happily pay more tax but unless all the other rich people do then it's pointless. Can you name a single person who advocated for higher taxes then avoided paying them? So far these left wing hypocrites that so enrage PB Tories seem to exist solely in their imagination.
Re "Can you name a single person who advocated for higher taxes then avoided paying them?", I don't think claimed or apparent political affiliation seemed to make much difference on those list of slebs caught up in tax schemes. Not accusing them of deliberate wrongdoing, they took their advice and as it happened the legal findings went against them, but they wouldn't have signed up in the first place if they weren't trying to minimise their tax bill (avoidance not evasion).
I'll give you Linneker, Ferguson, the Labour donor (Hollick) and I think Ant and Dec and Mel C have said they vote Labour. Otherwise that list seems like thin gruel for a Labour Luvvie Hypocrites argument. I believe it's quite common for people like pop stars and actors and footballers to get a lot of tax and financial advice because they tend to earn a lot but only for a short period of time. Not saying it's OK, but you can understand someone from a modest background who suddenly becomes rich wanting to get advice on how to manage it so it doesn't run out.
It's not a list that contains a massive preponderance of screaming righties either. I think it's mostly people with pretty private or even (gasp!) completely uninterested opinions... I think there was a similar scheme in the news a few years back that had been marketed very hard at comedians and similar entertainers, so might have been easier to pick some obvious opinions out from there, rather than a list that's mainly sportspeople.
Tax and financial planning gets so complex once you get past a certain point - and slebs are likely to hit that point before most of us - that very few wouldn't seek at least some advice. The ethics of such an aggressive scheme are a matter of personal conscience, and whether we agree or disagree with them says rather more about us than the sleb involved, which is why I always find the rights and wrongs of it - even the discussion of whether it's "hypocrisy" - a rather dull argument. Your basic point that it's not inherently contradictory to be left-wing but not wish to pay "voluntary" taxes until the law changes is clearly (in my view) correct. Your contention that wealthy people with left-wing views will reach extremely happily for their cheque-book as soon as tax hikes come in, rather than book an extra appointment with their tax adviser, just struck me as founded in a false idealism about human nature. Just because someone splurts out some opinions on twitter, or is willing to front up a Labour political broadast or whatever, doesn't mean they're a fundamentally ideologically-driven person, or that we should expect them to act as such. Particularly unreasonable not to expect them to think about their own future interests, their family, etc.
'The latest survey of 1,008 Scots, conducted between September 10 and 12, found that if the pound is replaced with a new Scottish currency, then 42% would be less likely to vote for independence, with 16% more likely, while there would be no difference for 35%.
If a hard border is introduced between Scotland and England, then 43% would be less likely to vote for independence, with 18% more likely, while there would be no difference for 31%.
The prospect of an independent Scotland being outside both the UK and the EU for several years would see 42% of Scots become less likely to back independence, while 15% would be more likely and it would make no difference for third (33%).
Respondents were then asked how they would vote in a referendum with the question ‘Should Scotland remain in the United Kingdom or leave the United Kingdom?’
After considering the issues put, 56% said they would vote to remain in the UK and 44% would vote to leave, when undecided voters were excluded.
With all respondents included, 47 per cent would vote to remain in the UK and 37 per cent would vote to leave.'
Christ, there is push polling and then, err, this.
Famously the Con 2015 internal polling was in a form most people on here would consider push polling - asking a bunch of "consider issue X" before the voting intention question. It proved to be far more accurate than the national pollsters.
It's not asked about in the above, but Sturgeon should probably have a chat with the EU about Euro membership. So long as there's a stable currency in prospect for an independent Scotland it would allay fears I think.
We know that the SNP sees the Euro as the end point, but the difficulty is the intermediate stage, where the Euro entry rules first requires a floating Scottish currency that would get smashed to bits on day 1.
This all rather assumes that the Scottish dollar would have any further to drop from the dustbin in which sterling is going to find itself before too much longer. The forthcoming socio-economic collapse may very well leave those seeking to get as far away from the sinking British state as possible with nothing left to lose.
No matter how far in the bin Sterling happens to be at the time, a newly-launched Scottish currency would depreciate against it, because of the fiscal transfers that currently take place between the U.K. and Scotland.
Just as Sterling depreciated post Brexit. So what?
It's a correction it doesn't matter, especially since we don't have any inflation. If Scotland were to launch a McPound and transition from that into the Euro then a devalued McPound joining the Euro could give the Scots a major boost.
The countries that entered the Euro with a devalued currency (like a post unification Germany) coped better than those that were overvalued (like the Lira).
All correct, but UK banks are not going to redenominate loans made in Sterling into McGroats.
The exchange rate depends on the Scottish government’s ability to run a balanced budget and not issue debt, which would require significant tax increases in Scotland on their Independence Day.
The issue is that getting from Sterling to the Euro requires an intermediate step, and the SNP can’t agree a direct rate between Sterling and the Euro, because Sterling isn’t their currency.
If the SNP want to carry on using the Pound but with no say in monetary policy (which is against Euro entry criteria), the pound would likely appreciate when shorn of the subsidy currently paid from the U.K. to Scotland - a worse position for Scotland trying to join the Euro.
Yes it would be far worse without those sensible enough to wear them, pity the other idiots didn’t.
You are banging your head against a brick wall Nichomar. I don't come on here much these days as I really cannot stomach the non-stop stream of drivel and misinformation from the likes of Nerys.
Instead I have decided to sit back and watch with growing amusement as this "Government of all the Brexit Talents" lurches from one cock up to the next. As entertaining as it was predicable.
'The latest survey of 1,008 Scots, conducted between September 10 and 12, found that if the pound is replaced with a new Scottish currency, then 42% would be less likely to vote for independence, with 16% more likely, while there would be no difference for 35%.
If a hard border is introduced between Scotland and England, then 43% would be less likely to vote for independence, with 18% more likely, while there would be no difference for 31%.
The prospect of an independent Scotland being outside both the UK and the EU for several years would see 42% of Scots become less likely to back independence, while 15% would be more likely and it would make no difference for third (33%).
Respondents were then asked how they would vote in a referendum with the question ‘Should Scotland remain in the United Kingdom or leave the United Kingdom?’
After considering the issues put, 56% said they would vote to remain in the UK and 44% would vote to leave, when undecided voters were excluded.
With all respondents included, 47 per cent would vote to remain in the UK and 37 per cent would vote to leave.'
Christ, there is push polling and then, err, this.
Famously the Con 2015 internal polling was in a form most people on here would consider push polling - asking a bunch of "consider issue X" before the voting intention question. It proved to be far more accurate than the national pollsters.
Have you and David just switched sides of the argument in a mutual festival of devil's advocacy?
Oh, the Scotland in Union poll is trash. But the idea of asking questions before the "headline" question shouldn't be totally dismissed out of hand.
Indeed, this should be a huge warning shot to the SNP that the currency issue isn't resolved and will once again prove decisive in a referendum. The UK would never have voted to leave the EU had we joined the Euro, the threat to people's savings would have been too large and there would be too many questions about debt denominations. It's actually a good poll in a sense that it points out exactly the areas the SNP needs to address before asking for a referendum.
How on Earth did all those new countries in ex-USSR and ex-Yugoslavia come into being without their currency issues being addressed?
A civil war in the former Yugoslavia in which 140,000 died and after which most of the new nations of the former Yugoslavia and the USSR are still amongst the poorest in Europe?
Answer the question , do they have a currency, does any country in the world have an issue in having its own currency. Especially any that are totally debt free.
Yes, lots of small, open economies (Montenegro, Luxembourg pre-euro, various Latin American and French West African countries, etc.) have an issue with having their own currencies. The ones that can't tend to fall into one or more of three categories:
a) they have no fiscal track record so the markets assign them poor credit ratings b) their trade is dominated by one much larger neighbour c) they have a very large financial services sector relative to the rest of their economy.
Good thing none of those are true of Scotland, isn't it?
Yes not even a million miles from Scottish position , when even an arsehole like you realises that.
Comments
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/18/liam-fox-reaches-last-five-in-race-to-head-wto
If we set a baseline that 90% of cases were false positives then the increased rate (since it will be driven by real positives and fewer false positives) would mean that instead of a two-fold increase in real cases we have a ten-fold increase in real cases.
Is that what you're trying to argue?
The ONS figures are rising and that doesn't seem to be phantasmic. If you look down to figure 5, the age-group analysis is instructive - while numbers seem low and stable among the 70+, which presumably explains why indicators like hospital admissions don't look as alarming as headline case numbers at the moment, there have to be questions on how sustainable that is, given the numbers among the young are increasing so rapidly.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/conditionsanddiseases/bulletins/coronaviruscovid19infectionsurveypilot/englandandwales18september2020#age-analysis-of-the-number-of-people-in-england-who-had-covid-19
Amongst GOP it was 50.5/49.5 Female/Male
Amongst Dem it was 60/40 Female/Male
If I didn’t pay anything now I’d still be British, and therefore still able to claim benefits in the U.K. as a retiree in 30 years’ time.
https://twitter.com/richardhorton1/status/1306936692226613252?s=19
Actually ...
By paying NICs voluntarily I’m giving the government money today, which they’re grateful for
Tax and financial planning gets so complex once you get past a certain point - and slebs are likely to hit that point before most of us - that very few wouldn't seek at least some advice. The ethics of such an aggressive scheme are a matter of personal conscience, and whether we agree or disagree with them says rather more about us than the sleb involved, which is why I always find the rights and wrongs of it - even the discussion of whether it's "hypocrisy" - a rather dull argument. Your basic point that it's not inherently contradictory to be left-wing but not wish to pay "voluntary" taxes until the law changes is clearly (in my view) correct. Your contention that wealthy people with left-wing views will reach extremely happily for their cheque-book as soon as tax hikes come in, rather than book an extra appointment with their tax adviser, just struck me as founded in a false idealism about human nature. Just because someone splurts out some opinions on twitter, or is willing to front up a Labour political broadast or whatever, doesn't mean they're a fundamentally ideologically-driven person, or that we should expect them to act as such. Particularly unreasonable not to expect them to think about their own future interests, their family, etc.
Instead I have decided to sit back and watch with growing amusement as this "Government of all the Brexit Talents" lurches from one cock up to the next. As entertaining as it was predicable.