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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » COVID-19: With Boris back some of this afternoon’s development

Boris Johnson promises austerity won't be part of coronavirus economic recovery planhttps://t.co/tzHRLqmxpq pic.twitter.com/U6sYyoMlyw
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Yet again.
Now where's my pizza and my tin of pineapple.
But the pizza will be from the freezer.
The stuff I struggle for at present is limes and lemons. I've just finished the stock from an overdone purchase for a cocktail party 18 months ago, and I can't find any more.
I spit* on your supermarket pizza!
(*Not literally obvs - that would get me arrested.)
Here's a question: which travels further and faster in the atmosphere, yeast spores or coronavirus?
And sae let the Lord be Thankit!
Pizza night tomorrow in the Pointer household... probably topped with fresh asparagus from the garden *smug face*
I bagsy the designer ones.
(Why does the time paramenter not work?). Try 2:37.
https://youtu.be/7vk5K-4PGYQ?t=157
A month ago we weren't finding many cases because we weren't testing. Now we are testing more it is only logical that we are finding more.
Edit: if we're shifting focus from "people who probably have it" to a mixture of "people who probably have it" and "people who probably don't have it but let's check anyway to make sure and also because we have an arbitrary target to hit" then you would also expect the % +ve figure to drop, to some extent.
Get with the programme.
That is the inevitable consequence of a TFR below 2, and rising life expectancies.
There is nothing any government can do about it, well nothing much, and it therefore means that either spending on other services is cut, or taxpayers need to reach into their pockets and pay more in taxes.
That is - however you cut it - austerity.
Forshame.
What is unsustainable is the deficit which causes debt to increase compoundedly and interest can't be paid.
Debt is relevant but insignificant. What is significant is our structural deficit, which is why our bond yields now are so much cheaper than they were a decade ago.
*
Which illustrates my point. At some stage on the torrid journey of UK plc from debt of 85% towards debt of 3000% - and almost certainly well before such a level is reached - it will become untenable. Budget surpluses would hardly be relevant unless we are postulating coming down to 3000% from an even higher level. Which is not possible since if 3000% is unsustainable, anything higher would already have been unsustainable and thus never reached.
Botton line - both debt and deficit are relevant and significant. Pretend it's not me telling you if it helps. Pretend it's Sunak.
Scrap remaining defined benefit pensions paid by the public purse.
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/04/30/uk/britain-coronavirus-missteps-boris-johnson-analysis-gbr-intl/index.html
But it's also unbelievably unpopular. And labour participation rates drop off as people get older even with a rising retirement age.
You can offer no more defined benefit plans in future, but you can't change the ones that we already owe (and have not saved for).
I wrote a report a couple of years ago, showing the rising spend on healthcare and pensions in the UK. It's really scary, because you can't make the number go backwards easily.
The second: unless you plan to effectively steal from millions of current public sector workers and retirees, it will have precisely zero effect for several decades, since most of the schemes that matter are unfunded.
These schemes need frozen ASAP.
https://healthmedia.blog.gov.uk/2020/04/30/a-testing-target-why-does-the-100k-target-matter/
If we had borrowing at 10% GDP but had a structural 33% of GDP budget deficit per annum then how sustainable or unsustainable would that be?
Because CV-19 - if left unchecked to wipe out the oldies - would be a massive economic boon, reducing pension payments, freeing up housing, and improving the dependency ratio.
We're possibly seeing some effects of a backlog in testing demand though? Other high-testing countries may be predominately testing unlikelies by now, having had spare capacity for a while.
In the US, there are a large number of municipalities that are on the verge of bankruptcy due to pension obligations. There it's worse, because you have a negative feedback loop. Pension costs cause local income taxes to rise. Workers leave because other places have lower taxes. Proportion of municipality's spending on pensions rises. They cut the education, police and parks budget. More workers leave. It's a really horrible negative feedback loop that we need to avoid.
Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee: Stella Creasy, Angela Eagle, Darren Jones
Committee of Standards: Chris Bryant
Nominations close on Monday
(1) Totally fucked it up. Overloaded healthcare system. High death rates. Lockdown too late. Lombardy and New York City are the key standouts here.
(2) Locked down a little later than they should have done, but broadly did "OK". These countries - like France and the UK and much of the US - are mostly looking now to how they ease restrictions.
(3) Did really well, and have contained the virus. Which is a very small number of countries, like South Korea and some of China.
The UK is comfortably in the second group. We've done OK. We could have done better. But we've done OK.
Liverpool fans will now calling for EPL to not resume matches.
We know Liverpool deserve the League but they also deserve to smash past 100 points.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/52484530
*paraphrased
But they missed out a couple of things - substituting a second bacg of frozen beans for frozen broccoli. And not packing any carrots even though I ordered two bags. On the other hand when I checked our order online prior to delivery, they said we were going to be without pasta, but the delivery DID include pasta!
He really is special.
For ten years he complained about Tory austerity screwing over Liverpool council but in 2018 he managed to find £280 million to loan to Everton for their new stadium.
https://what3words.com
Update on London "clapping for carers": we have progressed to honking car horns, alongside the banging of saucepans. If it wasn't summer, we probably would have broken out the fireworks by now.
Will he win, almost certainly not, but in these uncertain times, maybe, just maybe.
I will be chearing him on and wish him all the best, for what little that is worth.
Will it change the dynamics of the election, probably not a lot, but perhaps more than last time, after a legal battle, its more likely that he will be in at least one of the TV Debates.
any thoughts?
We have found another supplier with an a la carte menu for fresh produce, but with a 3 week delay between order and delivery.
Collective bargaining prevents the best public sector workers getting paid more.
Has anybody seen the rises in Bitcoin price? up about 18% in 48 hours or so.
Gland I heald on for the long hall.
Is the weather miserable where you are too?
To make up for it I'll do a Google image search for nurses...
The problem is that it won't make any difference until at least 2065. The private sector defined benefit industry has been effectively dead for years already, but it'll keep running around like the proverbial headless chicken for decades to come.