Inflation is taxation without legislation – politicalbetting.com

rcs1000 said:

Nigelb said:

rcs1000 said:

kinabalu said:

Re Alastair on cards, related but not at all the same, I have a party piece which goes as follows -

Somebody shuffles a pack of cards and gives it to me. I hold it face down and start flipping them over, one by one and quick. Before each one, I predict Red or Black, and if I’m right I score a point.

Beforehand I explain what I’m going to do and I ask people how many points they think I’ll manage to get. They say 26 or thereabouts. Why? I ask. Because it’s about a 50/50 chance each time, they say.

And I go, well I bet you I get at least 33 and maybe even close to 40.

Go for it, they say, and they crowd around excitedly (it’s a slow party).

So I do, and I always meet my mark. Much admiration ensues. Quite rightly because only a minority of people can do this.

As you know how red or black the remainder of the deck is, this doesn't sound very complicated.

I will now run a thousand python simulations, and tell you what the expected number you should get is (given you always choose whatever is the value option).

The trick is keeping count at speed, though.

Ummm. It's just a single number, and it only goes up or down by one each card. So I reckon it wouldn't be that hard.

Nigelb said:

rcs1000 said:

Nigelb said:

rcs1000 said:

kinabalu said:

Re Alastair on cards, related but not at all the same, I have a party piece which goes as follows -

Somebody shuffles a pack of cards and gives it to me. I hold it face down and start flipping them over, one by one and quick. Before each one, I predict Red or Black, and if I’m right I score a point.

Beforehand I explain what I’m going to do and I ask people how many points they think I’ll manage to get. They say 26 or thereabouts. Why? I ask. Because it’s about a 50/50 chance each time, they say.

And I go, well I bet you I get at least 33 and maybe even close to 40.

Go for it, they say, and they crowd around excitedly (it’s a slow party).

So I do, and I always meet my mark. Much admiration ensues. Quite rightly because only a minority of people can do this.

As you know how red or black the remainder of the deck is, this doesn't sound very complicated.

I will now run a thousand python simulations, and tell you what the expected number you should get is (given you always choose whatever is the value option).

The trick is keeping count at speed, though.

Ummm. It's just a single number, and it only goes up or down by one each card. So I reckon it wouldn't be that hard.

Two single numbers - you need to keep a running count of red and not red.
A bit like playing fizz/buzz.

rcs1000 said:

Nigelb said:

rcs1000 said:

kinabalu said:

Re Alastair on cards, related but not at all the same, I have a party piece which goes as follows -

Somebody shuffles a pack of cards and gives it to me. I hold it face down and start flipping them over, one by one and quick. Before each one, I predict Red or Black, and if I’m right I score a point.

Beforehand I explain what I’m going to do and I ask people how many points they think I’ll manage to get. They say 26 or thereabouts. Why? I ask. Because it’s about a 50/50 chance each time, they say.

And I go, well I bet you I get at least 33 and maybe even close to 40.

Go for it, they say, and they crowd around excitedly (it’s a slow party).

So I do, and I always meet my mark. Much admiration ensues. Quite rightly because only a minority of people can do this.

As you know how red or black the remainder of the deck is, this doesn't sound very complicated.

I will now run a thousand python simulations, and tell you what the expected number you should get is (given you always choose whatever is the value option).

The trick is keeping count at speed, though.

Ummm. It's just a single number, and it only goes up or down by one each card. So I reckon it wouldn't be that hard.

Nigelb said:

Transplanting @Cyclefree ’s rather lovely tulips FPT.

Cyclefree said:

Tulip mania is IMHO entirely understandable.

You're only saying that because you've already established a bull position. 😊

ydoethur said:

Rob Key confirmed as the new England managing director.

Now they just need a coach, a captain, a chair and a CEO who isn't batshit crazy.

DavidL said:

ydoethur said:

Rob Key confirmed as the new England managing director.

Now they just need a coach, a captain, a chair and a CEO who isn't batshit crazy.

Someone who can bowl on a flat wicket would be good too.

ydoethur said:

DavidL said:

ydoethur said:

Rob Key confirmed as the new England managing director.

Now they just need a coach, a captain, a chair and a CEO who isn't batshit crazy.

Someone who can bowl on a flat wicket would be good too.

We mustn't ask for miracles, even on Easter Day.

Carnyx said:

Nigelb said:

Transplanting @Cyclefree ’s rather lovely tulips FPT.

Cyclefree said:

Tulip mania is IMHO entirely understandable.

You're only saying that because you've already established a bull position. 😊

Someone mentioned tulips? How about cheese plants? (?)

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2022/apr/17/gold-leaves-meet-the-30000-pound-houseplants-sparking-a-new-green-crimewave

rcs1000 said:

Nigelb said:

rcs1000 said:

Nigelb said:

rcs1000 said:

kinabalu said:

Re Alastair on cards, related but not at all the same, I have a party piece which goes as follows -

Somebody shuffles a pack of cards and gives it to me. I hold it face down and start flipping them over, one by one and quick. Before each one, I predict Red or Black, and if I’m right I score a point.

Beforehand I explain what I’m going to do and I ask people how many points they think I’ll manage to get. They say 26 or thereabouts. Why? I ask. Because it’s about a 50/50 chance each time, they say.

And I go, well I bet you I get at least 33 and maybe even close to 40.

Go for it, they say, and they crowd around excitedly (it’s a slow party).

So I do, and I always meet my mark. Much admiration ensues. Quite rightly because only a minority of people can do this.

As you know how red or black the remainder of the deck is, this doesn't sound very complicated.

I will now run a thousand python simulations, and tell you what the expected number you should get is (given you always choose whatever is the value option).

The trick is keeping count at speed, though.

Ummm. It's just a single number, and it only goes up or down by one each card. So I reckon it wouldn't be that hard.

Two single numbers - you need to keep a running count of red and not red.
A bit like playing fizz/buzz.

You start off at zero, and add one if it's red, and take one away if it's black. If the number is greater than zero, choose black. If it's less than zero choose red.

If it's zero, just guess.

Nigelb said:

Transplanting @Cyclefree ’s rather lovely tulips FPT.

Cyclefree said:

Tulip mania is IMHO entirely understandable.

You're only saying that because you've already established a bull position. 😊

Cyclefree said:

Nigelb said:

Transplanting @Cyclefree ’s rather lovely tulips FPT.

Cyclefree said:

Tulip mania is IMHO entirely understandable.

You're only saying that because you've already established a bull position. 😊

If only. What that garden costs me in ready cash, not to mention hard physical labour .... well. Bending down and planting 000's of spring bulbs is not the work of a moment, I can tell you. I may not be able to run a marathon but my flexibility is that of a Chinese gymnast.

I am so pleased with how it has turned out, not least because here there have been no squirrels to dig them all up. It was a running battle every year in London trying to outwit the local squirrels who seemed to view my garden as their local food bank.

StuartDickson said:

topherdawson said:

If someone else has raised this, apologies, but does it not look likely that Johnson or his camp have leaked Sunak's green card, wife's tax affairs and so on? It seems to have been a very effective way to banjax Sunak's chances of being PM. Is banjax a word used outside Scotland by the way? It seems to have an unknown, perhaps Irish etymology.

Yes, that was my first thought. Unprovable, but a sound working hypothesis.

Ought to be “outwith Scotland”

On the etymology: no idea. All I can say is that it is a word I am familiar with. Often Scots have no idea that our vocabulary is specific to us, until someone points it out.

ping said:

The main problem with the current bout of inflation is that is isn’t wage/price driven.

If it was it would be easy - if a little painful - to fix.

We have the worst of all possible inflations. It’s external and we have no tools to deal with it.

rcs1000 said:

IshmaelZ said:

BlancheLivermore said:

IshmaelZ said:

BlancheLivermore said:

YBarddCwsc said:

NickPalmer said:

The latest from Alastair Meeks, formerly of this parish. The first half is not quite up to his usual standard, being a fairly obvious statement of the risk of assuming that events are completely random. But he then leads on to Covid and Ukraine. Anyway, it's an renjoyable read, as his pieces always are.

https://alastair-meeks.medium.com/adventures-in-card-play-mistakes-with-maths-and-how-to-avoid-them-when-thinking-about-covid-19-and-126b356b921a

It is an extremely poor article in which Meeks pontificates on a subject (Bayes Theorem) about which he characteristically knows nothing.

I once tried to explain what a Fisher matrix was to Meeks ... I was told law is more important than mathematics.

I had to stop reading when he said “I understand the maths, I really do”; I couldn’t risk tossing my phone at the Pyrenees due to his ignorance of the subject.

Well, hang on. Take the R & C Are Dead situation where you are tossing a coin and telling me the outcome. When you get to the 90th heads in a row I am coming to conclusions about your honesty and/or the fairness of the coin. Surely what I am doing is updating my priors, which is exactly what Mr Meeks is correctly on about?

Entirely different. A coin is far easier to rig than a shuffle. Meeks is talking about card games; the cards are already shuffled by the game. For anyone to rig them for exactly the same deal with another shuffle is beyond even belief.

Unless we’re playing against “God”.

But:

https://aperiodical.com/2011/12/four-perfect-hands-an-event-never-seen-before-right/

9 reports of "perfect" bridge deals. The assumption is not rigging, it's randomness on top of imperfect shuffling

You need to update your priors

ETA and the game *unshuffles* the cards. If you collect in hands at the end of a game of bridge they are partly sorted by suit.

It is worth remembering that there aren't anywhere near as many hands of bridge as there are of different shuffles of the deck.

Because each card is assigned to one of four hands, and the order they enter the hand is irrelevant.

I can't be bothered to do the math, but I'd reckon that cuts the number of deals by at least ten orders of magnitude.

ydoethur said:

BlancheLivermore said:

So I got to Ripoll and decided I wasn’t going to stay there. Nothing I could see wrong with the place, but it seemed too early to stop the day’s journey and I wanted to get closer to the volcano park. I looked at my map and picked out a town called Olot, much closer to where I was headed and only just under twenty miles away. But, being a Sunday, the public transport options didn’t look great. I’d have to catch either three buses covering about sixty miles, with some too close to call transfer times, or two buses in the evening and not arrive until after eight this evening.

I decided, for the first time in about quarter of a century, to hitchhike. I set out on the ‘walk’ to Olot (that my phone said would take over six hours) with my thumb out. After about twenty minutes, and several cars speeding past, a minibus pulled in next to me. The window opened and the lady driving it asked where I was going (in English once we’d established my limited language skills) and I told her. She said “You are going the wrong way for me right now”, I tilted my head a little and tried to look confused. She said “I have to drive to xxx village first, then back to Ripoll, then to Olot. I won’t get there until three o’clock. Is that okay?”. I affirmed that it was more than okay and jumped in.

I was the only passenger until we got back to Ripoll and we had a really lovely chat up to then. She’s Dutch and drives her route between the two places, stopping in lots of out of the way villages, six times a day. She wanted me to tell her everything
about my holiday so far, and what my remaining vague plans were (and she loved the fact that they were so vague!).

So I’m now in Olot. I’m sitting in a park square in the middle of town, drinking the last beer I bought this morning, and with half a mile to walk to the hotel I booked in the minibus. I’ve still got Olot of drinking time, Olot of restaurants to choose from, and Olot of fun to be had!

I'm just loving these holiday updates. Sounds like you're having a truly amazing time.

ydoethur said:

BlancheLivermore said:

ydoethur said:

BlancheLivermore said:

So I got to Ripoll and decided I wasn’t going to stay there. Nothing I could see wrong with the place, but it seemed too early to stop the day’s journey and I wanted to get closer to the volcano park. I looked at my map and picked out a town called Olot, much closer to where I was headed and only just under twenty miles away. But, being a Sunday, the public transport options didn’t look great. I’d have to catch either three buses covering about sixty miles, with some too close to call transfer times, or two buses in the evening and not arrive until after eight this evening.

I decided, for the first time in about quarter of a century, to hitchhike. I set out on the ‘walk’ to Olot (that my phone said would take over six hours) with my thumb out. After about twenty minutes, and several cars speeding past, a minibus pulled in next to me. The window opened and the lady driving it asked where I was going (in English once we’d established my limited language skills) and I told her. She said “You are going the wrong way for me right now”, I tilted my head a little and tried to look confused. She said “I have to drive to xxx village first, then back to Ripoll, then to Olot. I won’t get there until three o’clock. Is that okay?”. I affirmed that it was more than okay and jumped in.

I was the only passenger until we got back to Ripoll and we had a really lovely chat up to then. She’s Dutch and drives her route between the two places, stopping in lots of out of the way villages, six times a day. She wanted me to tell her everything
about my holiday so far, and what my remaining vague plans were (and she loved the fact that they were so vague!).

So I’m now in Olot. I’m sitting in a park square in the middle of town, drinking the last beer I bought this morning, and with half a mile to walk to the hotel I booked in the minibus. I’ve still got Olot of drinking time, Olot of restaurants to choose from, and Olot of fun to be had!

I'm just loving these holiday updates. Sounds like you're having a truly amazing time.

Thanks Robert! It’s the best holiday I’ve ever had, and I’m really enjoying sharing with you all as well.

The only issue with that comment is that my name's not Robert...

kinabalu said:

rcs1000 said:

So I did the red/black thing in Python 10,000 times, and got mean and median of 30 correct guesses, with a max of 42(!) and a min of 26.

Taking all the romance out of it.

Interesting though - I'd have guessed a bit higher than 30 as an average with that method.

import random
import statistics

deck = []

for i in range(0,26):
    deck.append('r')
    deck.append('b')

outcomes = []

def DoDeck():
    random.shuffle(deck)

    count = 0

    correct = 0

    for card in deck:
        if count > 0:
            pick = 'r'
        elif count < 0:
            pick = 'b'
        else:
            pick = random.choice(['r', 'b'])

        if pick == card:
            correct += 1

        if card == 'r':
            count -= 1
        else:
            count += 1

    return correct

for i in range(0, 10000):
    outcomes.append(DoDeck())

print("Mean: ", statistics.mean(outcomes))
print("Median: ", statistics.median(outcomes))
print("Min: ", min(outcomes))
print("Max: ", max(outcomes))

BlancheLivermore said:

So I got to Ripoll and decided I wasn’t going to stay there. Nothing I could see wrong with the place, but it seemed too early to stop the day’s journey and I wanted to get closer to the volcano park. I looked at my map and picked out a town called Olot, much closer to where I was headed and only just under twenty miles away. But, being a Sunday, the public transport options didn’t look great. I’d have to catch either three buses covering about sixty miles, with some too close to call transfer times, or two buses in the evening and not arrive until after eight this evening.

I decided, for the first time in about quarter of a century, to hitchhike. I set out on the ‘walk’ to Olot (that my phone said would take over six hours) with my thumb out. After about twenty minutes, and several cars speeding past, a minibus pulled in next to me. The window opened and the lady driving it asked where I was going (in English once we’d established my limited language skills) and I told her. She said “You are going the wrong way for me right now”, I tilted my head a little and tried to look confused. She said “I have to drive to xxx village first, then back to Ripoll, then to Olot. I won’t get there until three o’clock. Is that okay?”. I affirmed that it was more than okay and jumped in.

I was the only passenger until we got back to Ripoll and we had a really lovely chat up to then. She’s Dutch and drives her route between the two places, stopping in lots of out of the way villages, six times a day. She wanted me to tell her everything
about my holiday so far, and what my remaining vague plans were (and she loved the fact that they were so vague!).

So I’m now in Olot. I’m sitting in a park square in the middle of town, drinking the last beer I bought this morning, and with half a mile to walk to the hotel I booked in the minibus. I’ve still got Olot of drinking time, Olot of restaurants to choose from, and Olot of fun to be had!

CorrectHorseBattery said:

GE2024 is going to be a repeat of GE2010 except in reverse

rcs1000 said:

kinabalu said:

rcs1000 said:

So I did the red/black thing in Python 10,000 times, and got mean and median of 30 correct guesses, with a max of 42(!) and a min of 26.

Taking all the romance out of it.

Interesting though - I'd have guessed a bit higher than 30 as an average with that method.

My coding could be a bit wonky mind.

import random
import statistics

deck = []

for i in range(0,26):
    deck.append('r')
    deck.append('b')

outcomes = []

def DoDeck():
    random.shuffle(deck)

    count = 0

    correct = 0

    for card in deck:
        if count > 0:
            pick = 'r'
        elif count < 0:
            pick = 'b'
        else:
            pick = random.choice(['r', 'b'])

        if pick == card:
            correct += 1

        if card == 'r':
            count -= 1
        else:
            count += 1

    return correct

for i in range(0, 10000):
    outcomes.append(DoDeck())

print("Mean: ", statistics.mean(outcomes))
print("Median: ", statistics.median(outcomes))
print("Min: ", min(outcomes))
print("Max: ", max(outcomes))

tlg86 said:

This is good...

https://oec.world/en/tradle/

FrancisUrquhart said:

Inflation is the absolutely worst thing for any government, as there isn't very much they can do about it without massive other negative knock-on effects. While at the same time, it is visible every day to everybody, food, fuel, etc, rather than for instance the use of fiscal drag in their taxes where most people don't realise a bit more tax has been taken each year in real terms.

Foxy said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

Inflation is the absolutely worst thing for any government, as there isn't very much they can do about it without massive other negative knock-on effects. While at the same time, it is visible every day to everybody, food, fuel, etc, rather than for instance the use of fiscal drag in their taxes where most people don't realise a bit more tax has been taken each year in real terms.

Fiscal drag only affects those getting pay rises. I think many are going to be getting sub-inflationary ones.

ping said:

StuartDickson said:

‘Prince Andrew ‘unlikely’ to move out of Queen Mother's £30m mansion despite money woes
- The Duke of York is said to be set on staying at the Royal Lodge in Windsor, a 30-room property with an indoor pool which he moved into following the death of the Queen Mother in 2002’

This story ain’t going away. If HMQ doesn’t kick him out, her successor will. She’d be wise to grab the nettle herself.

While I generally have no problem in kicking prince Andrew when he’s down…

I’m not sure what else the queen is supposed to do with her properties? She can’t really rent them out privately and from what I can tell, none of the extended family have enough private income to pay a market rent.

If he shouldn’t live there, who should?

MrEd said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

Inflation is the absolutely worst thing for any government, as there isn't very much they can do about it without massive other negative knock-on effects. While at the same time, it is visible every day to everybody, food, fuel, etc, rather than for instance the use of fiscal drag in their taxes where most people don't realise a bit more tax has been taken each year in real terms.

Not necessarily.

Go back to the 70s and look at the elections in those inflationary years. It wasn’t inflation per se that determined the result but views on Government competence.

Callaghan’s Government probably would have won an election called in late 1978 even given inflation rates were high. What killed its chances was that the Winter of Discontent showed a Government that had lost control of how to run the country. The same goes for Heath in February 1974.

This also isn’t a 1070s style inflation situation - it’s actually more akin to the 50s US situation, which also saw inflation post WW2/the Korea war but which still managed to post healthy growth and not yet things spiral.

MrEd said:

Foxy said:

MrEd said:

FrancisUrquhart said:

Inflation is the absolutely worst thing for any government, as there isn't very much they can do about it without massive other negative knock-on effects. While at the same time, it is visible every day to everybody, food, fuel, etc, rather than for instance the use of fiscal drag in their taxes where most people don't realise a bit more tax has been taken each year in real terms.

Not necessarily.

Go back to the 70s and look at the elections in those inflationary years. It wasn’t inflation per se that determined the result but views on Government competence.

Callaghan’s Government probably would have won an election called in late 1978 even given inflation rates were high. What killed its chances was that the Winter of Discontent showed a Government that had lost control of how to run the country. The same goes for Heath in February 1974.

This also isn’t a 1070s style inflation situation - it’s actually more akin to the 50s US situation, which also saw inflation post WW2/the Korea war but which still managed to post healthy growth and not yet things spiral.

I was quite young in the Seventies, but the Callaghan government had brought inflation down to 10% from a high when Labour took office of near 27%, so in the context of the times was under control.

It was the collapse of his 5% policy after the Ford workers got 17% that led to the Winter of Discontent.

Which goes back to the point - Callaghan was popular when he was deemed to be in control. It is the loss of competence that dooms Governments.

(I’d argue the same with Major in the 1990s - it was his perceived incompetence, than sleaze, that doomed him).

EPG said:

ping said:

The main problem with the current bout of inflation is that is isn’t wage/price driven.

If it was it would be easy - if a little painful - to fix.

We have the worst of all possible inflations. It’s external and we have no tools to deal with it.

I'd agree. I'd guess most people are unhappy about energy prices, and there's nothing anyone in the UK can do, government, Bank of England, whoever.

TheScreamingEagles said:

Most pressing though is deciding on Root’s successor. The first Test of the summer begins at Lord’s on June 2 and it is unlikely a permanent head coach will be in place by then so it will be for Key to make that big call. Ben Stokes is the most obvious candidate although Key will consider other options including Stuart Broad, Sam Billings, Rory Burns, Moeen Ali and Jos Buttler.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/rob-key-ecb-confirm-former-england-batsman-is-new-manager-director-of-mens-cricket-vkzklqh77

MrEd said:

Re @TSE’s thought processes (and thanks for the article), a few things:

1. On inflation, it’s entirely possible that inflation levels fall next year simply because the comparables become a lot tougher. The inflation figure is a growth figure year on year. Even if prices remain high, if they don’t grow, the inflation rate will come down. That’s why - and I’d have to check the latest figures - energy inflation rates for most European countries in 2023 were deemed to be zero to low growth because the price reset had happened in 2022;

2. Given the volatility over the past 12 months on the opinion polls, it would be a fool for someone now to be able to predict the next GE results, especially given an opposition leader who doesn’t seem particularly loved nor whom anyone has much of a clue what he stands for. The polls are still determined by what the Government does; the Opposition is not setting the agenda in any form whatsoever;

3. Inflation is a tax in one way but it’s a plus in another. In a country with high consumer debt levels, and particularly with many people holding mortgages (as is the U.K.), inflation can be a big plus given if deflates the value of the debt. Much is said about the 70s but what is often forgotten is many homeowners made their fortunes as inflation wiped out the cost of their mortgages.

Farooq said:

Shocking misuse of apostrophe in the article TSE. I've come to expect better from you