Brexiteers, you may need a stiff drink – politicalbetting.com

Miklosvar said:

viewcode said:

Miklosvar said:

Carnyx said:

HYUFD said:

Fishing said:

Gardenwalker said:

Fishing said:

Phil said:

Sean_F said:

Gardenwalker said:

Sean_F said:

Phil said:

DavidL said:

Pagan2 said:

This we lost 5.5% gdp is frankly bollocks

EU GDP 2019 2020 2021 2022
15692 15370 17187 16641
% 0% -2% +11.8% -3%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/gdp#:~:text=GDP in European Union averaged,503.70 USD Billion in 1966.

uk gdp 2019 2020 2021 2022
2857 2703 3122 3070
% 0% -5.5% +15.5% -1.7%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp#:~:text=GDP in the United Kingdom,73.23 USD Billion in 1960.

Total change since 2019

EU +6%

UK +7.4%

Before spouting shit about this supposed loss of 5.5% gdp please explain why the UK should have grown by 7.4%+the mythical 5.5% when the eu didn't even manage 7.4%

The 5.5% is a made up counter factual no one can prove spouted by remainers to make them feel like they were right.

I used actual figures included the sources not a number that some shit for brains economist plucked out of thin air and remainers jumped on

So we have slightly outperformed the EU since 2019, are predicted to do so over the next 4-5 years but Brexit remains a disaster. This is so endemic and such an unequivocal fact in our media I do not find it surprising that many have been persuaded it has been a mistake. But it is really nonsense. Our successes and failures are a consequence of our own decisions good and mad. The fact that a significant percentage of the latter has still left us ahead says a lot about the EU but not much about our decision to leave it.

Personally, I think the real questions people should be asking is why both the UK & European growth rates have been so terrible since 2008, whilst the US has gone from strength to strength.

Lack of investment in infrastructure due to misguided implementation of austerity? Labour supply issues? Planning issues?

Whatever it is, either it’s Europe-wide or the same malaise has multiple different causes in different countries & that lack of growth is one of the major macro economic issues that’s driving the politics of Western Europe today.

& it’s not due to population drops either - you see the same stagnation whether you plot GDP or GDP per capita.

An entirely fair point. Much of the argument is two bald men fighting over a comb. Neither the UK, nor most EU nations, are achieving more than weak growth.

Although, a further issue with the US is why does its impressive growth rate simply not show up in the living standards of so much of its population? So many complaints one hears from the US about stagnant real wages sound very familiar.

It does, but it is inordinately soaked up by the 1%.

There may be a clue here somewhere about what happens to economies when income is concentrated in a gilded elite.

It's extraordinary how the benefits of growth have been captured by the elite.

The median standard of living in the USA is 25% higher than here. It simply should not have a life expectancy that's four years lower.

Yes, you look at a country that’s as wealthy as the US & their life expectancy & wonder what on earth is going on.

Last time I looked, IIRC a good chunk of it is people killing themselves with guns, to which they have very easy access. The legally prescribed opioid epidemic is another large chunk, again something that’s unique to the US in scale.

The rest is the consequences of US healthcare issues, which show up almost everywhere. This is why it’s also worth remembering that the US spends 20% of it’s GDP on healthcare, a vast sum compared to peer nations, when making these comparisons. Even when taking this waste into account, the US is still considerably richer on a GDP per capita basis than Western Europe though.

I've explained the difference on here before, but to repeat:

- Americans work about 12% longer on average than we do
- Americans piss away almost three times as much on healthcare as we do per head, for much worse outcomes
- the dollar is unusually strong, at the moment, maybe 20% overvalued

These three factors together explain almost all the difference. Added to that a much more skewed income distribution and you see why, when you visit the US, unless you hang out with the vastly wealthy, living standards aren't that different.

(Except in housing, where American houses are 2.5x as big as ours, but there's no way to defend our terrible record in this area, just as there's no way to defend America's gun laws or healthcare).

When you look at attempts to decompose these differences (which are real), they do not by any means explain “all” the difference.

Your maths needs work.

American GDP per head is about 70% higher than ours ($76,398 vs $45,850 in 2022), so they make $17 for each $10 we make.

If you cut their hours by twelve percent, they lose $2.04, giving them $14.96.

If you cut their remaining GDP of $14.96 by twelve percent to give them the same level of healthcare spending per capita as ours, that's another $1.80 or so.

So they are now making $13.16. Then if you cut their GDP by 20% to allow for dollar overvaluation, that's another $2.28 so they are now making $10.52, which is basically the same as us.

That's before you allow for the skewed income distribution, or the ridiculous expense of eating well there, or the extra costs necessary because the poorer public transport or the more extreme climate.

We have nothing to envy in the bastard child of the Empire.

And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price

Because of deliberate inflation by your party, with catastrophic results for the UK economy.

The greatest uptick in house prices was about 2000 - 2007, and the greatest non-financial driver in living memory was the leap in immigration over about the same period. Tories suck but I don't see how they are more blameworthy than nulab on this particular issue.

Because after prices were stable-ish from 2009/10 to 2012/13 George Osborne created Help To Buy and the whole thing took off again.

Let's try to understand the difference between "equally" and "more".

Sunil_Prasannan said:

squareroot2 said:

Brexit was a lie perpetrated by Boris.

"He was deceived by a lie, we all were."

Mexicanpete said:

squareroot2 said:

Brexit was a lie perpetrated by Boris.

No Brexit is unfortunately real.

Boris Johnson and particularly Team Farage perpetuated lies to ensure "leave" prevailed at the EURef.

maxh said:

RandallFlagg said:

-

Mexicanpete said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Mexicanpete said:

Richard_Tyndall said:

Gardenwalker said:

Brexit is estimated to have cost 5.5% of GDP so far (some think it a bit lower, some higher).

That really is a fuck-ton when you think about the state of the country’s finances and you wonder why Britain doesn’t seem to be able to afford anything anymore.

Re-entry into the Single Market, seems inevitable.

The problem is that Britain is now a significant rule-taker, and nothing short of Rejoin really fixes that.
Brexit has resulted in an astonishing loss of meaningful sovereignty.

Hahahaha.

You are deluded if you think being a member of the EU made us anything other than a rule taker anyway. That is the whole point of QMV. We don't get to choose.

I accept your Brexit. You said it might be s*** but your perceived return of sovereignty is fair enough a reason to encourage a leave vote. I don't agree, but it is a good enough justification for me.

The ones that get my goat are those lying toerags like Johnson who sold Brexit as being an economic opportunity.

What annoys me most about that is that it actually didn't (and doesn't) have to be that way. Yes there was always going to be a hit on the economy - all change is disruptive but that is not a good enough argument not to change. But May and Johnson chose the very worst forms of change whilst smiling and telling us it was all fine.

It hasn't changed my view of Brexit one iota. Funnily enough it hasn't really changed my view of Johnson or May either. I always knew they were shits and one or two extra data points confirming that view doesn't change anything.

You are one of the few Brexiteers who has acknowledged at least in the medium term there would be pain.

Johnson and his chums claimed it would be pain free, land of milk and honey stuff, and they put their b******* on the side of a bus.

Thing is, if the Leave campaign had put forward Richard's preferred version of Brexit then Remain would have won by about twenty points. To get the WWC voters in Stoke and Hartlepool to bother turning at the polling stations you needed to say we could have all the benefits of the single market without FoM.

And yet, perhaps Richard’s version of Brexit might actually

Richard_Tyndall said:

maxh said:

Leon said:

kjh said:

Leon said:

Sean_F said:

Phil said:

DavidL said:

Pagan2 said:

This we lost 5.5% gdp is frankly bollocks

EU GDP 2019 2020 2021 2022
15692 15370 17187 16641
% 0% -2% +11.8% -3%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/gdp#:~:text=GDP in European Union averaged,503.70 USD Billion in 1966.

uk gdp 2019 2020 2021 2022
2857 2703 3122 3070
% 0% -5.5% +15.5% -1.7%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp#:~:text=GDP in the United Kingdom,73.23 USD Billion in 1960.

Total change since 2019

EU +6%

UK +7.4%

Before spouting shit about this supposed loss of 5.5% gdp please explain why the UK should have grown by 7.4%+the mythical 5.5% when the eu didn't even manage 7.4%

The 5.5% is a made up counter factual no one can prove spouted by remainers to make them feel like they were right.

I used actual figures included the sources not a number that some shit for brains economist plucked out of thin air and remainers jumped on

So we have slightly outperformed the EU since 2019, are predicted to do so over the next 4-5 years but Brexit remains a disaster. This is so endemic and such an unequivocal fact in our media I do not find it surprising that many have been persuaded it has been a mistake. But it is really nonsense. Our successes and failures are a consequence of our own decisions good and mad. The fact that a significant percentage of the latter has still left us ahead says a lot about the EU but not much about our decision to leave it.

Personally, I think the real questions people should be asking is why both the UK & European growth rates have been so terrible since 2008, whilst the US has gone from strength to strength.

Lack of investment in infrastructure due to misguided implementation of austerity? Labour supply issues? Planning issues?

Whatever it is, either it’s Europe-wide or the same malaise has multiple different causes in different countries & that lack of growth is one of the major macro economic issues that’s driving the politics of Western Europe today.

& it’s not due to population drops either - you see the same stagnation whether you plot GDP or GDP per capita.

An entirely fair point. Much of the argument is two bald men fighting over a comb. Neither the UK, nor most EU nations, are achieving more than weak growth.

Although, a further issue with the US is why does its impressive growth rate simply not show up in the living standards of so much of its population? So many complaints one hears from the US about stagnant real wages sound very familiar.

It’s not just “standard of living” it’s quality of life

Yeah great you earn $120k a year but you have to drive everywhere, everyone is obese, your local downtown is a car lot, the local suburb is full of dangerous tranq addicts, you get one week holiday a year, the food is execrable, the landscapes are often dull, you have to fly ten hours to get anywhere that isn’t America and your kids have a 17% chance of being shot dead in kindergarten

I am thinking of a couple of holidays to the USA. You're not selling it to me

I’m clearly trolling. But who would choose to be born in America, now? It is no longer the shining city on the hill

The people banging on the door in Mexico now are very poor, from LatAm, Haiti, Africa. Very few East Asians, Europeans, Australians now go to America just coz it is America. They go for a top university place, or a great job offer, that’s it

So where is THE place to be born, these days? The answer is not clear at all

Norway, if you can tolerate the weather.

Very strict alcohol laws and still very socially conservative/authoritarian in some ways.

Remember (although admittedly it is now 40 years ago) Sweden advertised 'The Life of Brian' under the headline 'So funny they banned it in Norway'. And the Swedish telecoms minister nearly caused a diplomatic incident by referring to Norway as 'the last fucking communist country in the world' after a series of frustrating meetings about setting up the Scandinavian telecoms system.

Great anecdotes- I’d never heard those.

My views are coloured by spending my honeymoon there, but I couldn’t get over the fact that there were no chain stores of any real description outside Oslo, you’d turn up in a small town to find only one restaurant that served exquisite food, and wild camping was positively encouraged.

There was also a very healthy distaste of braggadocio and narcissism amongst the Norwegians I got to know.

Perhaps it’s the place that has done communism properly?

ETA: sorry for messing up blockquotes!

Stuartinromford said:

squareroot2 said:

Brexit was a lie perpetrated by Boris.

That's a gross oversimplification, but... basically yes. No Boris, No Brexit and certainly not the Brexit he manovered us into for personal ambition.

We know that for Gove, there was an element of it that was personal (his father's fish business and all that- whatever the reality, it was the story Gove seems to have told himself). Stanley Johnson was an MEP for a while; has anyone tried to link that to Johnson's euroscepticism?

And even if Boris wasn't responsible for Brexit, it's likely that he gets the blame in the history books. Much easier to blame a hasbeen when the country decides to move on, whatever form that takes. And Boris always wanted to go down in history.

Scott_xP said:

Sunil_Prasannan said:

squareroot2 said:

Brexit was a lie perpetrated by Boris.

"He was deceived by a lie, we all were."

Only 52%...

dixiedean said:

MaxPB said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

MaxPB said:

I think what I'd love for any new government to do in 2025 after the election is investigate all of the anti growth regulation and legislation the country has in place that other countries don't bother with. Stuff like ULEZ, which though I personally favour, is undoubtedly a drag on growth, a lot of the agricultural regulation is a huge drag on growth (pro-badger policies that other countries laugh at) in our farming sector, lack of competition in key sectors and a swathe of planning regulations and eliminating council control over any project that drives continual positive GDP.

Why is ULEZ a drag on growth? It encourages additional spending and transactions in the auto retail sector, and it will lead to improved health outcomes and thus higher productivity.
The biggest drags on growth right now come from inadequate government spending on health and education, which is leaving people too ill and too poorly-educated to be as productive as they could be. And too little spending on infrastructure that could unlock new housing development (eg in my neck of the woods, failure to fund the Bakerloo Line extension that could allow for loads of new housing down the Old Kent Road). At the moment it feels like the government has a deliberate policy to impoverish us.

It prevents some number of people driving in outer London and we're a net importer of vehicles so we're not going to benefit as a country from new vehicle sales outside of the sales chain, most of the value chain exists outside of the UK, especially for cars being bought in wealthy outer London suburbs.

My biggest issue, however, isn't ULEZ, which as I said I do support because I live in London and the summer air quality is atrocious. The biggest issue is local planning and local councils. They are the biggest barrier to growth in the country, they seem to exist to snuff out all enterprise in the nation a thousand paper cuts at a time.

In my experience local councils reflect the concerns of local Parties' memberships. Average age 55+.
And local Council voters. Probably not much different.
Far too many seem to think that their community should look exactly as it did when they were youthful.
And cater to the needs and desires of the over 55's.
Hence. No ball games. No youth clubs. No nightlife. No school facilities. No new housing. Moans when bank branches close. Moans when a micropub or a softplay facility tries to move in to the empty branch. Nowt for the young at all. And precious little for families with young children.

MaxPB said:

dixiedean said:

MaxPB said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

MaxPB said:

I think what I'd love for any new government to do in 2025 after the election is investigate all of the anti growth regulation and legislation the country has in place that other countries don't bother with. Stuff like ULEZ, which though I personally favour, is undoubtedly a drag on growth, a lot of the agricultural regulation is a huge drag on growth (pro-badger policies that other countries laugh at) in our farming sector, lack of competition in key sectors and a swathe of planning regulations and eliminating council control over any project that drives continual positive GDP.

Why is ULEZ a drag on growth? It encourages additional spending and transactions in the auto retail sector, and it will lead to improved health outcomes and thus higher productivity.
The biggest drags on growth right now come from inadequate government spending on health and education, which is leaving people too ill and too poorly-educated to be as productive as they could be. And too little spending on infrastructure that could unlock new housing development (eg in my neck of the woods, failure to fund the Bakerloo Line extension that could allow for loads of new housing down the Old Kent Road). At the moment it feels like the government has a deliberate policy to impoverish us.

It prevents some number of people driving in outer London and we're a net importer of vehicles so we're not going to benefit as a country from new vehicle sales outside of the sales chain, most of the value chain exists outside of the UK, especially for cars being bought in wealthy outer London suburbs.

My biggest issue, however, isn't ULEZ, which as I said I do support because I live in London and the summer air quality is atrocious. The biggest issue is local planning and local councils. They are the biggest barrier to growth in the country, they seem to exist to snuff out all enterprise in the nation a thousand paper cuts at a time.

In my experience local councils reflect the concerns of local Parties' memberships. Average age 55+.
And local Council voters. Probably not much different.
Far too many seem to think that their community should look exactly as it did when they were youthful.
And cater to the needs and desires of the over 55's.
Hence. No ball games. No youth clubs. No nightlife. No school facilities. No new housing. Moans when bank branches close. Moans when a micropub or a softplay facility tries to move in to the empty branch. Nowt for the young at all. And precious little for families with young children.

Which is why economic development decisions should be taken away from them, decisions should be made on automatic qualifying criteria and if those are met you go ahead, if not you don't.

Nimbys can get fucked.

dixiedean said:

MaxPB said:

dixiedean said:

MaxPB said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

MaxPB said:

I think what I'd love for any new government to do in 2025 after the election is investigate all of the anti growth regulation and legislation the country has in place that other countries don't bother with. Stuff like ULEZ, which though I personally favour, is undoubtedly a drag on growth, a lot of the agricultural regulation is a huge drag on growth (pro-badger policies that other countries laugh at) in our farming sector, lack of competition in key sectors and a swathe of planning regulations and eliminating council control over any project that drives continual positive GDP.

Why is ULEZ a drag on growth? It encourages additional spending and transactions in the auto retail sector, and it will lead to improved health outcomes and thus higher productivity.
The biggest drags on growth right now come from inadequate government spending on health and education, which is leaving people too ill and too poorly-educated to be as productive as they could be. And too little spending on infrastructure that could unlock new housing development (eg in my neck of the woods, failure to fund the Bakerloo Line extension that could allow for loads of new housing down the Old Kent Road). At the moment it feels like the government has a deliberate policy to impoverish us.

It prevents some number of people driving in outer London and we're a net importer of vehicles so we're not going to benefit as a country from new vehicle sales outside of the sales chain, most of the value chain exists outside of the UK, especially for cars being bought in wealthy outer London suburbs.

My biggest issue, however, isn't ULEZ, which as I said I do support because I live in London and the summer air quality is atrocious. The biggest issue is local planning and local councils. They are the biggest barrier to growth in the country, they seem to exist to snuff out all enterprise in the nation a thousand paper cuts at a time.

In my experience local councils reflect the concerns of local Parties' memberships. Average age 55+.
And local Council voters. Probably not much different.
Far too many seem to think that their community should look exactly as it did when they were youthful.
And cater to the needs and desires of the over 55's.
Hence. No ball games. No youth clubs. No nightlife. No school facilities. No new housing. Moans when bank branches close. Moans when a micropub or a softplay facility tries to move in to the empty branch. Nowt for the young at all. And precious little for families with young children.

Which is why economic development decisions should be taken away from them, decisions should be made on automatic qualifying criteria and if those are met you go ahead, if not you don't.

Nimbys can get fucked.

But. Then who decides the qualifying criteria?

MaxPB said:

dixiedean said:

MaxPB said:

dixiedean said:

MaxPB said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

MaxPB said:

I think what I'd love for any new government to do in 2025 after the election is investigate all of the anti growth regulation and legislation the country has in place that other countries don't bother with. Stuff like ULEZ, which though I personally favour, is undoubtedly a drag on growth, a lot of the agricultural regulation is a huge drag on growth (pro-badger policies that other countries laugh at) in our farming sector, lack of competition in key sectors and a swathe of planning regulations and eliminating council control over any project that drives continual positive GDP.

Why is ULEZ a drag on growth? It encourages additional spending and transactions in the auto retail sector, and it will lead to improved health outcomes and thus higher productivity.
The biggest drags on growth right now come from inadequate government spending on health and education, which is leaving people too ill and too poorly-educated to be as productive as they could be. And too little spending on infrastructure that could unlock new housing development (eg in my neck of the woods, failure to fund the Bakerloo Line extension that could allow for loads of new housing down the Old Kent Road). At the moment it feels like the government has a deliberate policy to impoverish us.

It prevents some number of people driving in outer London and we're a net importer of vehicles so we're not going to benefit as a country from new vehicle sales outside of the sales chain, most of the value chain exists outside of the UK, especially for cars being bought in wealthy outer London suburbs.

My biggest issue, however, isn't ULEZ, which as I said I do support because I live in London and the summer air quality is atrocious. The biggest issue is local planning and local councils. They are the biggest barrier to growth in the country, they seem to exist to snuff out all enterprise in the nation a thousand paper cuts at a time.

In my experience local councils reflect the concerns of local Parties' memberships. Average age 55+.
And local Council voters. Probably not much different.
Far too many seem to think that their community should look exactly as it did when they were youthful.
And cater to the needs and desires of the over 55's.
Hence. No ball games. No youth clubs. No nightlife. No school facilities. No new housing. Moans when bank branches close. Moans when a micropub or a softplay facility tries to move in to the empty branch. Nowt for the young at all. And precious little for families with young children.

Which is why economic development decisions should be taken away from them, decisions should be made on automatic qualifying criteria and if those are met you go ahead, if not you don't.

Nimbys can get fucked.

But. Then who decides the qualifying criteria?

The government, not the local council.

dixiedean said:

MaxPB said:

dixiedean said:

MaxPB said:

dixiedean said:

MaxPB said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

MaxPB said:

I think what I'd love for any new government to do in 2025 after the election is investigate all of the anti growth regulation and legislation the country has in place that other countries don't bother with. Stuff like ULEZ, which though I personally favour, is undoubtedly a drag on growth, a lot of the agricultural regulation is a huge drag on growth (pro-badger policies that other countries laugh at) in our farming sector, lack of competition in key sectors and a swathe of planning regulations and eliminating council control over any project that drives continual positive GDP.

Why is ULEZ a drag on growth? It encourages additional spending and transactions in the auto retail sector, and it will lead to improved health outcomes and thus higher productivity.
The biggest drags on growth right now come from inadequate government spending on health and education, which is leaving people too ill and too poorly-educated to be as productive as they could be. And too little spending on infrastructure that could unlock new housing development (eg in my neck of the woods, failure to fund the Bakerloo Line extension that could allow for loads of new housing down the Old Kent Road). At the moment it feels like the government has a deliberate policy to impoverish us.

It prevents some number of people driving in outer London and we're a net importer of vehicles so we're not going to benefit as a country from new vehicle sales outside of the sales chain, most of the value chain exists outside of the UK, especially for cars being bought in wealthy outer London suburbs.

My biggest issue, however, isn't ULEZ, which as I said I do support because I live in London and the summer air quality is atrocious. The biggest issue is local planning and local councils. They are the biggest barrier to growth in the country, they seem to exist to snuff out all enterprise in the nation a thousand paper cuts at a time.

In my experience local councils reflect the concerns of local Parties' memberships. Average age 55+.
And local Council voters. Probably not much different.
Far too many seem to think that their community should look exactly as it did when they were youthful.
And cater to the needs and desires of the over 55's.
Hence. No ball games. No youth clubs. No nightlife. No school facilities. No new housing. Moans when bank branches close. Moans when a micropub or a softplay facility tries to move in to the empty branch. Nowt for the young at all. And precious little for families with young children.

Which is why economic development decisions should be taken away from them, decisions should be made on automatic qualifying criteria and if those are met you go ahead, if not you don't.

Nimbys can get fucked.

But. Then who decides the qualifying criteria?

The government, not the local council.

And who elects them?

Phil said:

HYUFD said:

Carnyx said:

Gallowgate said:

Carnyx said:

HYUFD said:

Fishing said:

Gardenwalker said:

Fishing said:

Phil said:

Sean_F said:

Gardenwalker said:

Sean_F said:

Phil said:

DavidL said:

Pagan2 said:

This we lost 5.5% gdp is frankly bollocks

EU GDP 2019 2020 2021 2022
15692 15370 17187 16641
% 0% -2% +11.8% -3%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/gdp#:~:text=GDP in European Union averaged,503.70 USD Billion in 1966.

uk gdp 2019 2020 2021 2022
2857 2703 3122 3070
% 0% -5.5% +15.5% -1.7%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp#:~:text=GDP in the United Kingdom,73.23 USD Billion in 1960.

Total change since 2019

EU +6%

UK +7.4%

Before spouting shit about this supposed loss of 5.5% gdp please explain why the UK should have grown by 7.4%+the mythical 5.5% when the eu didn't even manage 7.4%

The 5.5% is a made up counter factual no one can prove spouted by remainers to make them feel like they were right.

I used actual figures included the sources not a number that some shit for brains economist plucked out of thin air and remainers jumped on

So we have slightly outperformed the EU since 2019, are predicted to do so over the next 4-5 years but Brexit remains a disaster. This is so endemic and such an unequivocal fact in our media I do not find it surprising that many have been persuaded it has been a mistake. But it is really nonsense. Our successes and failures are a consequence of our own decisions good and mad. The fact that a significant percentage of the latter has still left us ahead says a lot about the EU but not much about our decision to leave it.

Personally, I think the real questions people should be asking is why both the UK & European growth rates have been so terrible since 2008, whilst the US has gone from strength to strength.

Lack of investment in infrastructure due to misguided implementation of austerity? Labour supply issues? Planning issues?

Whatever it is, either it’s Europe-wide or the same malaise has multiple different causes in different countries & that lack of growth is one of the major macro economic issues that’s driving the politics of Western Europe today.

& it’s not due to population drops either - you see the same stagnation whether you plot GDP or GDP per capita.

An entirely fair point. Much of the argument is two bald men fighting over a comb. Neither the UK, nor most EU nations, are achieving more than weak growth.

Although, a further issue with the US is why does its impressive growth rate simply not show up in the living standards of so much of its population? So many complaints one hears from the US about stagnant real wages sound very familiar.

It does, but it is inordinately soaked up by the 1%.

There may be a clue here somewhere about what happens to economies when income is concentrated in a gilded elite.

It's extraordinary how the benefits of growth have been captured by the elite.

The median standard of living in the USA is 25% higher than here. It simply should not have a life expectancy that's four years lower.

Yes, you look at a country that’s as wealthy as the US & their life expectancy & wonder what on earth is going on.

Last time I looked, IIRC a good chunk of it is people killing themselves with guns, to which they have very easy access. The legally prescribed opioid epidemic is another large chunk, again something that’s unique to the US in scale.

The rest is the consequences of US healthcare issues, which show up almost everywhere. This is why it’s also worth remembering that the US spends 20% of it’s GDP on healthcare, a vast sum compared to peer nations, when making these comparisons. Even when taking this waste into account, the US is still considerably richer on a GDP per capita basis than Western Europe though.

I've explained the difference on here before, but to repeat:

- Americans work about 12% longer on average than we do
- Americans piss away almost three times as much on healthcare as we do per head, for much worse outcomes
- the dollar is unusually strong, at the moment, maybe 20% overvalued

These three factors together explain almost all the difference. Added to that a much more skewed income distribution and you see why, when you visit the US, unless you hang out with the vastly wealthy, living standards aren't that different.

(Except in housing, where American houses are 2.5x as big as ours, but there's no way to defend our terrible record in this area, just as there's no way to defend America's gun laws or healthcare).

When you look at attempts to decompose these differences (which are real), they do not by any means explain “all” the difference.

Your maths needs work.

American GDP per head is about 70% higher than ours ($76,398 vs $45,850 in 2022), so they make $17 for each $10 we make.

If you cut their hours by twelve percent, they lose $2.04, giving them $14.96.

If you cut their remaining GDP of $14.96 by twelve percent to give them the same level of healthcare spending per capita as ours, that's another $1.80 or so.

So they are now making $13.16. Then if you cut their GDP by 20% to allow for dollar overvaluation, that's another $2.28 so they are now making $10.52, which is basically the same as us.

That's before you allow for the skewed income distribution, or the ridiculous expense of eating well there, or the extra costs necessary because the poorer public transport or the more extreme climate.

We have nothing to envy in the bastard child of the Empire.

And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price

Because of deliberate inflation by your party, with catastrophic results for the UK economy.

Who cares about the UK economy if Tory voters are rich?

It's also bizarre that HYUFD compares extreme values in the UK (Surrey or London) with the average US house price. Like comparing NYC house prices with the average UK price. One might think he's trying to persuade us of something.

PS Just for the record, this is what he said, before he edits it: "And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price"

The average UK house price is now £372,812, still higher than the average US house price of $384,500 at the current rate of
£1= $1.3.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/news/house-price-index/
https://www.noradarealestate.com/blog/housing-prices/

This is not a good thing, given that the average US buyer gets a whole lot more square footage for their $.

In the UK the older property owning generation is holding the next hostage & forcing them to pay through the nose for shelter in order to line their own pockets to pay for their expensive cruises.

Economically this is not productive & it’s far from obvious why a fortunate subset of the population deserve this unearned income.

dixiedean said:

MaxPB said:

dixiedean said:

MaxPB said:

dixiedean said:

MaxPB said:

OnlyLivingBoy said:

MaxPB said:

I think what I'd love for any new government to do in 2025 after the election is investigate all of the anti growth regulation and legislation the country has in place that other countries don't bother with. Stuff like ULEZ, which though I personally favour, is undoubtedly a drag on growth, a lot of the agricultural regulation is a huge drag on growth (pro-badger policies that other countries laugh at) in our farming sector, lack of competition in key sectors and a swathe of planning regulations and eliminating council control over any project that drives continual positive GDP.

Why is ULEZ a drag on growth? It encourages additional spending and transactions in the auto retail sector, and it will lead to improved health outcomes and thus higher productivity.
The biggest drags on growth right now come from inadequate government spending on health and education, which is leaving people too ill and too poorly-educated to be as productive as they could be. And too little spending on infrastructure that could unlock new housing development (eg in my neck of the woods, failure to fund the Bakerloo Line extension that could allow for loads of new housing down the Old Kent Road). At the moment it feels like the government has a deliberate policy to impoverish us.

It prevents some number of people driving in outer London and we're a net importer of vehicles so we're not going to benefit as a country from new vehicle sales outside of the sales chain, most of the value chain exists outside of the UK, especially for cars being bought in wealthy outer London suburbs.

My biggest issue, however, isn't ULEZ, which as I said I do support because I live in London and the summer air quality is atrocious. The biggest issue is local planning and local councils. They are the biggest barrier to growth in the country, they seem to exist to snuff out all enterprise in the nation a thousand paper cuts at a time.

In my experience local councils reflect the concerns of local Parties' memberships. Average age 55+.
And local Council voters. Probably not much different.
Far too many seem to think that their community should look exactly as it did when they were youthful.
And cater to the needs and desires of the over 55's.
Hence. No ball games. No youth clubs. No nightlife. No school facilities. No new housing. Moans when bank branches close. Moans when a micropub or a softplay facility tries to move in to the empty branch. Nowt for the young at all. And precious little for families with young children.

Which is why economic development decisions should be taken away from them, decisions should be made on automatic qualifying criteria and if those are met you go ahead, if not you don't.

Nimbys can get fucked.

But. Then who decides the qualifying criteria?

The government, not the local council.

And who elects them?
Don't get me wrong, I am in agreement with your aims.
But, until we have a society which doesn't fear the young we won't get far.

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

Phil said:

HYUFD said:

Carnyx said:

Gallowgate said:

Carnyx said:

HYUFD said:

Fishing said:

Gardenwalker said:

Fishing said:

Phil said:

Sean_F said:

Gardenwalker said:

Sean_F said:

Phil said:

DavidL said:

Pagan2 said:

This we lost 5.5% gdp is frankly bollocks

EU GDP 2019 2020 2021 2022
15692 15370 17187 16641
% 0% -2% +11.8% -3%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/gdp#:~:text=GDP in European Union averaged,503.70 USD Billion in 1966.

uk gdp 2019 2020 2021 2022
2857 2703 3122 3070
% 0% -5.5% +15.5% -1.7%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp#:~:text=GDP in the United Kingdom,73.23 USD Billion in 1960.

Total change since 2019

EU +6%

UK +7.4%

Before spouting shit about this supposed loss of 5.5% gdp please explain why the UK should have grown by 7.4%+the mythical 5.5% when the eu didn't even manage 7.4%

The 5.5% is a made up counter factual no one can prove spouted by remainers to make them feel like they were right.

I used actual figures included the sources not a number that some shit for brains economist plucked out of thin air and remainers jumped on

So we have slightly outperformed the EU since 2019, are predicted to do so over the next 4-5 years but Brexit remains a disaster. This is so endemic and such an unequivocal fact in our media I do not find it surprising that many have been persuaded it has been a mistake. But it is really nonsense. Our successes and failures are a consequence of our own decisions good and mad. The fact that a significant percentage of the latter has still left us ahead says a lot about the EU but not much about our decision to leave it.

Personally, I think the real questions people should be asking is why both the UK & European growth rates have been so terrible since 2008, whilst the US has gone from strength to strength.

Lack of investment in infrastructure due to misguided implementation of austerity? Labour supply issues? Planning issues?

Whatever it is, either it’s Europe-wide or the same malaise has multiple different causes in different countries & that lack of growth is one of the major macro economic issues that’s driving the politics of Western Europe today.

& it’s not due to population drops either - you see the same stagnation whether you plot GDP or GDP per capita.

An entirely fair point. Much of the argument is two bald men fighting over a comb. Neither the UK, nor most EU nations, are achieving more than weak growth.

Although, a further issue with the US is why does its impressive growth rate simply not show up in the living standards of so much of its population? So many complaints one hears from the US about stagnant real wages sound very familiar.

It does, but it is inordinately soaked up by the 1%.

There may be a clue here somewhere about what happens to economies when income is concentrated in a gilded elite.

It's extraordinary how the benefits of growth have been captured by the elite.

The median standard of living in the USA is 25% higher than here. It simply should not have a life expectancy that's four years lower.

Yes, you look at a country that’s as wealthy as the US & their life expectancy & wonder what on earth is going on.

Last time I looked, IIRC a good chunk of it is people killing themselves with guns, to which they have very easy access. The legally prescribed opioid epidemic is another large chunk, again something that’s unique to the US in scale.

The rest is the consequences of US healthcare issues, which show up almost everywhere. This is why it’s also worth remembering that the US spends 20% of it’s GDP on healthcare, a vast sum compared to peer nations, when making these comparisons. Even when taking this waste into account, the US is still considerably richer on a GDP per capita basis than Western Europe though.

I've explained the difference on here before, but to repeat:

- Americans work about 12% longer on average than we do
- Americans piss away almost three times as much on healthcare as we do per head, for much worse outcomes
- the dollar is unusually strong, at the moment, maybe 20% overvalued

These three factors together explain almost all the difference. Added to that a much more skewed income distribution and you see why, when you visit the US, unless you hang out with the vastly wealthy, living standards aren't that different.

(Except in housing, where American houses are 2.5x as big as ours, but there's no way to defend our terrible record in this area, just as there's no way to defend America's gun laws or healthcare).

When you look at attempts to decompose these differences (which are real), they do not by any means explain “all” the difference.

Your maths needs work.

American GDP per head is about 70% higher than ours ($76,398 vs $45,850 in 2022), so they make $17 for each $10 we make.

If you cut their hours by twelve percent, they lose $2.04, giving them $14.96.

If you cut their remaining GDP of $14.96 by twelve percent to give them the same level of healthcare spending per capita as ours, that's another $1.80 or so.

So they are now making $13.16. Then if you cut their GDP by 20% to allow for dollar overvaluation, that's another $2.28 so they are now making $10.52, which is basically the same as us.

That's before you allow for the skewed income distribution, or the ridiculous expense of eating well there, or the extra costs necessary because the poorer public transport or the more extreme climate.

We have nothing to envy in the bastard child of the Empire.

And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price

Because of deliberate inflation by your party, with catastrophic results for the UK economy.

Who cares about the UK economy if Tory voters are rich?

It's also bizarre that HYUFD compares extreme values in the UK (Surrey or London) with the average US house price. Like comparing NYC house prices with the average UK price. One might think he's trying to persuade us of something.

PS Just for the record, this is what he said, before he edits it: "And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price"

The average UK house price is now £372,812, still higher than the average US house price of $384,500 at the current rate of
£1= $1.3.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/news/house-price-index/
https://www.noradarealestate.com/blog/housing-prices/

This is not a good thing, given that the average US buyer gets a whole lot more square footage for their $.

In the UK the older property owning generation is holding the next hostage & forcing them to pay through the nose for shelter in order to line their own pockets to pay for their expensive cruises.

Economically this is not productive & it’s far from obvious why a fortunate subset of the population deserve this unearned income.

The younger generation in the UK, especially in the South are and will inherit more than any generation before them

We've been through this before. The younger generation don't inherit anything. Their much older parents do.

Stuartinromford said:

squareroot2 said:

Brexit was a lie perpetrated by Boris.

That's a gross oversimplification, but... basically yes. No Boris, No Brexit and certainly not the Brexit he manovered us into for personal ambition.

We know that for Gove, there was an element of it that was personal (his father's fish business and all that- whatever the reality, it was the story Gove seems to have told himself). Stanley Johnson was an MEP for a while; has anyone tried to link that to Johnson's euroscepticism?

And even if Boris wasn't responsible for Brexit, it's likely that he gets the blame in the history books. Much easier to blame a hasbeen when the country decides to move on, whatever form that takes. And Boris always wanted to go down in history.

kjh said:

rcs1000 said:

On the subject of travel and countries... I've just arrived in Berlin, and it's absolutely heaving at 11pm on Sunday.

Paris was the same a few weeks ago. It was quite impressive.

RobD said:

Gardenwalker said:

RobD said:

Gardenwalker said:

StillWaters said:

RobD said:

Gardenwalker said:

In my anecdote of one, my New York based company appears to get *more*, not *fewer* holidays than I did in Britain.

But there’s a different pattern.
And overall, I can well believe that Americans work 16% longer overall.

I think that's highly atypical. Americans get a raw deal when it comes to bank holidays and annual leave.

Not so much these days

New Years Day
Presidents Day
MLK
Easter
Memorial Day
Juneteenth
Independence Day
Labor Day
Veterans Day
Thanksgiving
Christmas

Wiki has 11 vs UK of 8-10

Thanks for doing this comparison.
Not only this, but some holidays do not fall on a Monday and so there is a culture of “making the bridge” as well, whereas a majority of British bank holidays are statutorily designed to keep on a Monday.

Americans are less likely to take long holidays (2 weeks is slightly decadent) but between the above, and a general tendency to take the entire summer slowly, I’m convinced Americans have *more* time off than Brits.

I’m exchange, they work longer/harder on the days they’re supposed to be at work.

Again, anecdote of 1.

While that list may be accurate for federal employees, is it true for everyone else?

It’s true in my company.

As I said earlier, atypical.

kle4 said:

Gardenwalker said:

Councils have too little power, or perhaps too little of the power we want (placemaking), and too much of the power we don’t want (pettifogging).

The result is a lowest common denominator disaster zone.

When pettifrogging is pretty much all you have, naturally it gets overdone. What's weird is Westminster and Whitehall have the actual power and yet also overemphasise pettifrogging.

Gardenwalker said:

Councils have too little power, or perhaps too little of the power we want (placemaking), and too much of the power we don’t want (pettifogging).

The result is a lowest common denominator disaster zone.

MaxPB said:

Anabobazina said:

I live in outer London and only occasionally hear people even mention the Ulez-x. The vast majority of the whining I encounter is from the bumpkins on PB.

Most people I know are in favour.

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

Phil said:

HYUFD said:

Carnyx said:

Gallowgate said:

Carnyx said:

HYUFD said:

Fishing said:

Gardenwalker said:

Fishing said:

Phil said:

Sean_F said:

Gardenwalker said:

Sean_F said:

Phil said:

DavidL said:

Pagan2 said:

This we lost 5.5% gdp is frankly bollocks

EU GDP 2019 2020 2021 2022
15692 15370 17187 16641
% 0% -2% +11.8% -3%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/gdp#:~:text=GDP in European Union averaged,503.70 USD Billion in 1966.

uk gdp 2019 2020 2021 2022
2857 2703 3122 3070
% 0% -5.5% +15.5% -1.7%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp#:~:text=GDP in the United Kingdom,73.23 USD Billion in 1960.

Total change since 2019

EU +6%

UK +7.4%

Before spouting shit about this supposed loss of 5.5% gdp please explain why the UK should have grown by 7.4%+the mythical 5.5% when the eu didn't even manage 7.4%

The 5.5% is a made up counter factual no one can prove spouted by remainers to make them feel like they were right.

I used actual figures included the sources not a number that some shit for brains economist plucked out of thin air and remainers jumped on

So we have slightly outperformed the EU since 2019, are predicted to do so over the next 4-5 years but Brexit remains a disaster. This is so endemic and such an unequivocal fact in our media I do not find it surprising that many have been persuaded it has been a mistake. But it is really nonsense. Our successes and failures are a consequence of our own decisions good and mad. The fact that a significant percentage of the latter has still left us ahead says a lot about the EU but not much about our decision to leave it.

Personally, I think the real questions people should be asking is why both the UK & European growth rates have been so terrible since 2008, whilst the US has gone from strength to strength.

Lack of investment in infrastructure due to misguided implementation of austerity? Labour supply issues? Planning issues?

Whatever it is, either it’s Europe-wide or the same malaise has multiple different causes in different countries & that lack of growth is one of the major macro economic issues that’s driving the politics of Western Europe today.

& it’s not due to population drops either - you see the same stagnation whether you plot GDP or GDP per capita.

An entirely fair point. Much of the argument is two bald men fighting over a comb. Neither the UK, nor most EU nations, are achieving more than weak growth.

Although, a further issue with the US is why does its impressive growth rate simply not show up in the living standards of so much of its population? So many complaints one hears from the US about stagnant real wages sound very familiar.

It does, but it is inordinately soaked up by the 1%.

There may be a clue here somewhere about what happens to economies when income is concentrated in a gilded elite.

It's extraordinary how the benefits of growth have been captured by the elite.

The median standard of living in the USA is 25% higher than here. It simply should not have a life expectancy that's four years lower.

Yes, you look at a country that’s as wealthy as the US & their life expectancy & wonder what on earth is going on.

Last time I looked, IIRC a good chunk of it is people killing themselves with guns, to which they have very easy access. The legally prescribed opioid epidemic is another large chunk, again something that’s unique to the US in scale.

The rest is the consequences of US healthcare issues, which show up almost everywhere. This is why it’s also worth remembering that the US spends 20% of it’s GDP on healthcare, a vast sum compared to peer nations, when making these comparisons. Even when taking this waste into account, the US is still considerably richer on a GDP per capita basis than Western Europe though.

I've explained the difference on here before, but to repeat:

- Americans work about 12% longer on average than we do
- Americans piss away almost three times as much on healthcare as we do per head, for much worse outcomes
- the dollar is unusually strong, at the moment, maybe 20% overvalued

These three factors together explain almost all the difference. Added to that a much more skewed income distribution and you see why, when you visit the US, unless you hang out with the vastly wealthy, living standards aren't that different.

(Except in housing, where American houses are 2.5x as big as ours, but there's no way to defend our terrible record in this area, just as there's no way to defend America's gun laws or healthcare).

When you look at attempts to decompose these differences (which are real), they do not by any means explain “all” the difference.

Your maths needs work.

American GDP per head is about 70% higher than ours ($76,398 vs $45,850 in 2022), so they make $17 for each $10 we make.

If you cut their hours by twelve percent, they lose $2.04, giving them $14.96.

If you cut their remaining GDP of $14.96 by twelve percent to give them the same level of healthcare spending per capita as ours, that's another $1.80 or so.

So they are now making $13.16. Then if you cut their GDP by 20% to allow for dollar overvaluation, that's another $2.28 so they are now making $10.52, which is basically the same as us.

That's before you allow for the skewed income distribution, or the ridiculous expense of eating well there, or the extra costs necessary because the poorer public transport or the more extreme climate.

We have nothing to envy in the bastard child of the Empire.

And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price

Because of deliberate inflation by your party, with catastrophic results for the UK economy.

Who cares about the UK economy if Tory voters are rich?

It's also bizarre that HYUFD compares extreme values in the UK (Surrey or London) with the average US house price. Like comparing NYC house prices with the average UK price. One might think he's trying to persuade us of something.

PS Just for the record, this is what he said, before he edits it: "And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price"

The average UK house price is now £372,812, still higher than the average US house price of $384,500 at the current rate of
£1= $1.3.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/news/house-price-index/
https://www.noradarealestate.com/blog/housing-prices/

This is not a good thing, given that the average US buyer gets a whole lot more square footage for their $.

In the UK the older property owning generation is holding the next hostage & forcing them to pay through the nose for shelter in order to line their own pockets to pay for their expensive cruises.

Economically this is not productive & it’s far from obvious why a fortunate subset of the population deserve this unearned income.

The younger generation in the UK, especially in the South are and will inherit more than any generation before them

We've been through this before. The younger generation don't inherit anything. Their much older parents do.

Some will via gifts for deposits from grandparents or from their parents

And those (the vast majority) who don't?

MaxPB said:

Gardenwalker said:

Councils have too little power, or perhaps too little of the power we want (placemaking), and too much of the power we don’t want (pettifogging).

The result is a lowest common denominator disaster zone.

No, councils have too much power. It's time to smash planning committees to pieces and just get rid of all of them.

kle4 said:

MaxPB said:

Gardenwalker said:

Councils have too little power, or perhaps too little of the power we want (placemaking), and too much of the power we don’t want (pettifogging).

The result is a lowest common denominator disaster zone.

No, councils have too much power. It's time to smash planning committees to pieces and just get rid of all of them.

Planning committees can only do what government permits them to do (when they go beyond that, as they frequently do, their decisions get overturned). The local planning policies their councils pass have to be signed off as sound under national rules.

Also, something like 90+% of applications don't get near a planning committee.

Fundamentally the problem with planning committees is that local councils want the planning system to be a way of saying No to things, whereas central government (historically) wants the planning system to be a way of saying Yes to things.

It's a balance which was already leaning too far toward No, and since Boris's failed attempt at reform and the current government's retreat to pleasing its absolute core, has now been smashed as the government no longer even wants it to say Yes anymore.

Fairliered said:

HYUFD said:

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

Phil said:

HYUFD said:

Carnyx said:

Gallowgate said:

Carnyx said:

HYUFD said:

Fishing said:

Gardenwalker said:

Fishing said:

Phil said:

Sean_F said:

Gardenwalker said:

Sean_F said:

Phil said:

DavidL said:

Pagan2 said:

This we lost 5.5% gdp is frankly bollocks

EU GDP 2019 2020 2021 2022
15692 15370 17187 16641
% 0% -2% +11.8% -3%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/gdp#:~:text=GDP in European Union averaged,503.70 USD Billion in 1966.

uk gdp 2019 2020 2021 2022
2857 2703 3122 3070
% 0% -5.5% +15.5% -1.7%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp#:~:text=GDP in the United Kingdom,73.23 USD Billion in 1960.

Total change since 2019

EU +6%

UK +7.4%

Before spouting shit about this supposed loss of 5.5% gdp please explain why the UK should have grown by 7.4%+the mythical 5.5% when the eu didn't even manage 7.4%

The 5.5% is a made up counter factual no one can prove spouted by remainers to make them feel like they were right.

I used actual figures included the sources not a number that some shit for brains economist plucked out of thin air and remainers jumped on

So we have slightly outperformed the EU since 2019, are predicted to do so over the next 4-5 years but Brexit remains a disaster. This is so endemic and such an unequivocal fact in our media I do not find it surprising that many have been persuaded it has been a mistake. But it is really nonsense. Our successes and failures are a consequence of our own decisions good and mad. The fact that a significant percentage of the latter has still left us ahead says a lot about the EU but not much about our decision to leave it.

Personally, I think the real questions people should be asking is why both the UK & European growth rates have been so terrible since 2008, whilst the US has gone from strength to strength.

Lack of investment in infrastructure due to misguided implementation of austerity? Labour supply issues? Planning issues?

Whatever it is, either it’s Europe-wide or the same malaise has multiple different causes in different countries & that lack of growth is one of the major macro economic issues that’s driving the politics of Western Europe today.

& it’s not due to population drops either - you see the same stagnation whether you plot GDP or GDP per capita.

An entirely fair point. Much of the argument is two bald men fighting over a comb. Neither the UK, nor most EU nations, are achieving more than weak growth.

Although, a further issue with the US is why does its impressive growth rate simply not show up in the living standards of so much of its population? So many complaints one hears from the US about stagnant real wages sound very familiar.

It does, but it is inordinately soaked up by the 1%.

There may be a clue here somewhere about what happens to economies when income is concentrated in a gilded elite.

It's extraordinary how the benefits of growth have been captured by the elite.

The median standard of living in the USA is 25% higher than here. It simply should not have a life expectancy that's four years lower.

Yes, you look at a country that’s as wealthy as the US & their life expectancy & wonder what on earth is going on.

Last time I looked, IIRC a good chunk of it is people killing themselves with guns, to which they have very easy access. The legally prescribed opioid epidemic is another large chunk, again something that’s unique to the US in scale.

The rest is the consequences of US healthcare issues, which show up almost everywhere. This is why it’s also worth remembering that the US spends 20% of it’s GDP on healthcare, a vast sum compared to peer nations, when making these comparisons. Even when taking this waste into account, the US is still considerably richer on a GDP per capita basis than Western Europe though.

I've explained the difference on here before, but to repeat:

- Americans work about 12% longer on average than we do
- Americans piss away almost three times as much on healthcare as we do per head, for much worse outcomes
- the dollar is unusually strong, at the moment, maybe 20% overvalued

These three factors together explain almost all the difference. Added to that a much more skewed income distribution and you see why, when you visit the US, unless you hang out with the vastly wealthy, living standards aren't that different.

(Except in housing, where American houses are 2.5x as big as ours, but there's no way to defend our terrible record in this area, just as there's no way to defend America's gun laws or healthcare).

When you look at attempts to decompose these differences (which are real), they do not by any means explain “all” the difference.

Your maths needs work.

American GDP per head is about 70% higher than ours ($76,398 vs $45,850 in 2022), so they make $17 for each $10 we make.

If you cut their hours by twelve percent, they lose $2.04, giving them $14.96.

If you cut their remaining GDP of $14.96 by twelve percent to give them the same level of healthcare spending per capita as ours, that's another $1.80 or so.

So they are now making $13.16. Then if you cut their GDP by 20% to allow for dollar overvaluation, that's another $2.28 so they are now making $10.52, which is basically the same as us.

That's before you allow for the skewed income distribution, or the ridiculous expense of eating well there, or the extra costs necessary because the poorer public transport or the more extreme climate.

We have nothing to envy in the bastard child of the Empire.

And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price

Because of deliberate inflation by your party, with catastrophic results for the UK economy.

Who cares about the UK economy if Tory voters are rich?

It's also bizarre that HYUFD compares extreme values in the UK (Surrey or London) with the average US house price. Like comparing NYC house prices with the average UK price. One might think he's trying to persuade us of something.

PS Just for the record, this is what he said, before he edits it: "And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price"

The average UK house price is now £372,812, still higher than the average US house price of $384,500 at the current rate of
£1= $1.3.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/news/house-price-index/
https://www.noradarealestate.com/blog/housing-prices/

This is not a good thing, given that the average US buyer gets a whole lot more square footage for their $.

In the UK the older property owning generation is holding the next hostage & forcing them to pay through the nose for shelter in order to line their own pockets to pay for their expensive cruises.

Economically this is not productive & it’s far from obvious why a fortunate subset of the population deserve this unearned income.

The younger generation in the UK, especially in the South are and will inherit more than any generation before them

We've been through this before. The younger generation don't inherit anything. Their much older parents do.

Some will via gifts for deposits from grandparents or from their parents

And those (the vast majority) who don't?

The majority do now 'Nearly two-thirds of parents have helped their children with a deposit for a new home, forking out an average of £32,440'
https://www.zoopla.co.uk/discover/property-news/revealed-how-much-the-bank-of-mum-and-dad-gives-children-for-deposits/

It’s a shame that so many children can only get on the housing ladder with help from their parents. It would be so much better if house prices were lower and they could afford to buy a home with their own savings and income.

HYUFD said:

kle4 said:

MaxPB said:

Gardenwalker said:

Councils have too little power, or perhaps too little of the power we want (placemaking), and too much of the power we don’t want (pettifogging).

The result is a lowest common denominator disaster zone.

No, councils have too much power. It's time to smash planning committees to pieces and just get rid of all of them.

Planning committees can only do what government permits them to do (when they go beyond that, as they frequently do, their decisions get overturned). The local planning policies their councils pass have to be signed off as sound under national rules.

Also, something like 90+% of applications don't get near a planning committee.

Fundamentally the problem with planning committees is that local councils want the planning system to be a way of saying No to things, whereas central government (historically) wants the planning system to be a way of saying Yes to things.

It's a balance which was already leaning too far toward No, and since Boris's failed attempt at reform and the current government's retreat to pleasing its absolute core, has now been smashed as the government no longer even wants it to say Yes anymore.

59% of UK voters oppose allowing more housing to be built on the green belt. Planning cttees only reflect what their voters think. Gove has now reflected those views at central government level too

https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/survey-results/daily/2023/05/17/d5ba5/1

HYUFD said:

Phil said:

HYUFD said:

Carnyx said:

Gallowgate said:

Carnyx said:

HYUFD said:

Fishing said:

Gardenwalker said:

Fishing said:

Phil said:

Sean_F said:

Gardenwalker said:

Sean_F said:

Phil said:

DavidL said:

Pagan2 said:

This we lost 5.5% gdp is frankly bollocks

EU GDP 2019 2020 2021 2022
15692 15370 17187 16641
% 0% -2% +11.8% -3%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/gdp#:~:text=GDP in European Union averaged,503.70 USD Billion in 1966.

uk gdp 2019 2020 2021 2022
2857 2703 3122 3070
% 0% -5.5% +15.5% -1.7%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp#:~:text=GDP in the United Kingdom,73.23 USD Billion in 1960.

Total change since 2019

EU +6%

UK +7.4%

Before spouting shit about this supposed loss of 5.5% gdp please explain why the UK should have grown by 7.4%+the mythical 5.5% when the eu didn't even manage 7.4%

The 5.5% is a made up counter factual no one can prove spouted by remainers to make them feel like they were right.

I used actual figures included the sources not a number that some shit for brains economist plucked out of thin air and remainers jumped on

So we have slightly outperformed the EU since 2019, are predicted to do so over the next 4-5 years but Brexit remains a disaster. This is so endemic and such an unequivocal fact in our media I do not find it surprising that many have been persuaded it has been a mistake. But it is really nonsense. Our successes and failures are a consequence of our own decisions good and mad. The fact that a significant percentage of the latter has still left us ahead says a lot about the EU but not much about our decision to leave it.

Personally, I think the real questions people should be asking is why both the UK & European growth rates have been so terrible since 2008, whilst the US has gone from strength to strength.

Lack of investment in infrastructure due to misguided implementation of austerity? Labour supply issues? Planning issues?

Whatever it is, either it’s Europe-wide or the same malaise has multiple different causes in different countries & that lack of growth is one of the major macro economic issues that’s driving the politics of Western Europe today.

& it’s not due to population drops either - you see the same stagnation whether you plot GDP or GDP per capita.

An entirely fair point. Much of the argument is two bald men fighting over a comb. Neither the UK, nor most EU nations, are achieving more than weak growth.

Although, a further issue with the US is why does its impressive growth rate simply not show up in the living standards of so much of its population? So many complaints one hears from the US about stagnant real wages sound very familiar.

It does, but it is inordinately soaked up by the 1%.

There may be a clue here somewhere about what happens to economies when income is concentrated in a gilded elite.

It's extraordinary how the benefits of growth have been captured by the elite.

The median standard of living in the USA is 25% higher than here. It simply should not have a life expectancy that's four years lower.

Yes, you look at a country that’s as wealthy as the US & their life expectancy & wonder what on earth is going on.

Last time I looked, IIRC a good chunk of it is people killing themselves with guns, to which they have very easy access. The legally prescribed opioid epidemic is another large chunk, again something that’s unique to the US in scale.

The rest is the consequences of US healthcare issues, which show up almost everywhere. This is why it’s also worth remembering that the US spends 20% of it’s GDP on healthcare, a vast sum compared to peer nations, when making these comparisons. Even when taking this waste into account, the US is still considerably richer on a GDP per capita basis than Western Europe though.

I've explained the difference on here before, but to repeat:

- Americans work about 12% longer on average than we do
- Americans piss away almost three times as much on healthcare as we do per head, for much worse outcomes
- the dollar is unusually strong, at the moment, maybe 20% overvalued

These three factors together explain almost all the difference. Added to that a much more skewed income distribution and you see why, when you visit the US, unless you hang out with the vastly wealthy, living standards aren't that different.

(Except in housing, where American houses are 2.5x as big as ours, but there's no way to defend our terrible record in this area, just as there's no way to defend America's gun laws or healthcare).

When you look at attempts to decompose these differences (which are real), they do not by any means explain “all” the difference.

Your maths needs work.

American GDP per head is about 70% higher than ours ($76,398 vs $45,850 in 2022), so they make $17 for each $10 we make.

If you cut their hours by twelve percent, they lose $2.04, giving them $14.96.

If you cut their remaining GDP of $14.96 by twelve percent to give them the same level of healthcare spending per capita as ours, that's another $1.80 or so.

So they are now making $13.16. Then if you cut their GDP by 20% to allow for dollar overvaluation, that's another $2.28 so they are now making $10.52, which is basically the same as us.

That's before you allow for the skewed income distribution, or the ridiculous expense of eating well there, or the extra costs necessary because the poorer public transport or the more extreme climate.

We have nothing to envy in the bastard child of the Empire.

And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price

Because of deliberate inflation by your party, with catastrophic results for the UK economy.

Who cares about the UK economy if Tory voters are rich?

It's also bizarre that HYUFD compares extreme values in the UK (Surrey or London) with the average US house price. Like comparing NYC house prices with the average UK price. One might think he's trying to persuade us of something.

PS Just for the record, this is what he said, before he edits it: "And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price"

The average UK house price is now £372,812, still higher than the average US house price of $384,500 at the current rate of
£1= $1.3.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/news/house-price-index/
https://www.noradarealestate.com/blog/housing-prices/

This is not a good thing, given that the average US buyer gets a whole lot more square footage for their $.

In the UK the older property owning generation is holding the next hostage & forcing them to pay through the nose for shelter in order to line their own pockets to pay for their expensive cruises.

Economically this is not productive & it’s far from obvious why a fortunate subset of the population deserve this unearned income.

The younger generation in the UK, especially in the South are and will inherit more than any generation before them

rcs1000 said:

carnforth said:

Pagan2 said:

This we lost 5.5% gdp is frankly bollocks

EU GDP 2019 2020 2021 2022
15692 15370 17187 16641
% 0% -2% +11.8% -3%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/gdp#:~:text=GDP in European Union averaged,503.70 USD Billion in 1966.

uk gdp 2019 2020 2021 2022
2857 2703 3122 3070
% 0% -5.5% +15.5% -1.7%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp#:~:text=GDP in the United Kingdom,73.23 USD Billion in 1960.

Total change since 2019

EU +6%

UK +7.4%

Before spouting shit about this supposed loss of 5.5% gdp please explain why the UK should have grown by 7.4%+the mythical 5.5% when the eu didn't even manage 7.4%

The 5.5% is a made up counter factual no one can prove spouted by remainers to make them feel like they were right.

I used actual figures included the sources not a number that some shit for brains economist plucked out of thin air and remainers jumped on

I assume GardenWalker's 5.5% is the doppelganger nonsense, but he doesn't actually specify. The doppelganger model which is built upon the UK's economy being most like the US's, and not much like Europe's. Followed by a huge American boom. Bingo, Britain "falls behind".

As you point out it's rather unlikely that, had we not left the EU, we would have grown markedly faster than any other major western european nation.

The IMF predict we will grow faster than all european G7 members in the next few years anyway:

The biggest component of the IMF's forecast is working age population.

HYUFD said:

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

Phil said:

HYUFD said:

Carnyx said:

Gallowgate said:

Carnyx said:

HYUFD said:

Fishing said:

Gardenwalker said:

Fishing said:

Phil said:

Sean_F said:

Gardenwalker said:

Sean_F said:

Phil said:

DavidL said:

Pagan2 said:

This we lost 5.5% gdp is frankly bollocks

EU GDP 2019 2020 2021 2022
15692 15370 17187 16641
% 0% -2% +11.8% -3%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/gdp#:~:text=GDP in European Union averaged,503.70 USD Billion in 1966.

uk gdp 2019 2020 2021 2022
2857 2703 3122 3070
% 0% -5.5% +15.5% -1.7%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp#:~:text=GDP in the United Kingdom,73.23 USD Billion in 1960.

Total change since 2019

EU +6%

UK +7.4%

Before spouting shit about this supposed loss of 5.5% gdp please explain why the UK should have grown by 7.4%+the mythical 5.5% when the eu didn't even manage 7.4%

The 5.5% is a made up counter factual no one can prove spouted by remainers to make them feel like they were right.

I used actual figures included the sources not a number that some shit for brains economist plucked out of thin air and remainers jumped on

So we have slightly outperformed the EU since 2019, are predicted to do so over the next 4-5 years but Brexit remains a disaster. This is so endemic and such an unequivocal fact in our media I do not find it surprising that many have been persuaded it has been a mistake. But it is really nonsense. Our successes and failures are a consequence of our own decisions good and mad. The fact that a significant percentage of the latter has still left us ahead says a lot about the EU but not much about our decision to leave it.

Personally, I think the real questions people should be asking is why both the UK & European growth rates have been so terrible since 2008, whilst the US has gone from strength to strength.

Lack of investment in infrastructure due to misguided implementation of austerity? Labour supply issues? Planning issues?

Whatever it is, either it’s Europe-wide or the same malaise has multiple different causes in different countries & that lack of growth is one of the major macro economic issues that’s driving the politics of Western Europe today.

& it’s not due to population drops either - you see the same stagnation whether you plot GDP or GDP per capita.

An entirely fair point. Much of the argument is two bald men fighting over a comb. Neither the UK, nor most EU nations, are achieving more than weak growth.

Although, a further issue with the US is why does its impressive growth rate simply not show up in the living standards of so much of its population? So many complaints one hears from the US about stagnant real wages sound very familiar.

It does, but it is inordinately soaked up by the 1%.

There may be a clue here somewhere about what happens to economies when income is concentrated in a gilded elite.

It's extraordinary how the benefits of growth have been captured by the elite.

The median standard of living in the USA is 25% higher than here. It simply should not have a life expectancy that's four years lower.

Yes, you look at a country that’s as wealthy as the US & their life expectancy & wonder what on earth is going on.

Last time I looked, IIRC a good chunk of it is people killing themselves with guns, to which they have very easy access. The legally prescribed opioid epidemic is another large chunk, again something that’s unique to the US in scale.

The rest is the consequences of US healthcare issues, which show up almost everywhere. This is why it’s also worth remembering that the US spends 20% of it’s GDP on healthcare, a vast sum compared to peer nations, when making these comparisons. Even when taking this waste into account, the US is still considerably richer on a GDP per capita basis than Western Europe though.

I've explained the difference on here before, but to repeat:

- Americans work about 12% longer on average than we do
- Americans piss away almost three times as much on healthcare as we do per head, for much worse outcomes
- the dollar is unusually strong, at the moment, maybe 20% overvalued

These three factors together explain almost all the difference. Added to that a much more skewed income distribution and you see why, when you visit the US, unless you hang out with the vastly wealthy, living standards aren't that different.

(Except in housing, where American houses are 2.5x as big as ours, but there's no way to defend our terrible record in this area, just as there's no way to defend America's gun laws or healthcare).

When you look at attempts to decompose these differences (which are real), they do not by any means explain “all” the difference.

Your maths needs work.

American GDP per head is about 70% higher than ours ($76,398 vs $45,850 in 2022), so they make $17 for each $10 we make.

If you cut their hours by twelve percent, they lose $2.04, giving them $14.96.

If you cut their remaining GDP of $14.96 by twelve percent to give them the same level of healthcare spending per capita as ours, that's another $1.80 or so.

So they are now making $13.16. Then if you cut their GDP by 20% to allow for dollar overvaluation, that's another $2.28 so they are now making $10.52, which is basically the same as us.

That's before you allow for the skewed income distribution, or the ridiculous expense of eating well there, or the extra costs necessary because the poorer public transport or the more extreme climate.

We have nothing to envy in the bastard child of the Empire.

And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price

Because of deliberate inflation by your party, with catastrophic results for the UK economy.

Who cares about the UK economy if Tory voters are rich?

It's also bizarre that HYUFD compares extreme values in the UK (Surrey or London) with the average US house price. Like comparing NYC house prices with the average UK price. One might think he's trying to persuade us of something.

PS Just for the record, this is what he said, before he edits it: "And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price"

The average UK house price is now £372,812, still higher than the average US house price of $384,500 at the current rate of
£1= $1.3.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/news/house-price-index/
https://www.noradarealestate.com/blog/housing-prices/

This is not a good thing, given that the average US buyer gets a whole lot more square footage for their $.

In the UK the older property owning generation is holding the next hostage & forcing them to pay through the nose for shelter in order to line their own pockets to pay for their expensive cruises.

Economically this is not productive & it’s far from obvious why a fortunate subset of the population deserve this unearned income.

The younger generation in the UK, especially in the South are and will inherit more than any generation before them

We've been through this before. The younger generation don't inherit anything. Their much older parents do.

Some will via gifts for deposits from grandparents or from their parents

And those (the vast majority) who don't?

The majority do now 'Nearly two-thirds of parents have helped their children with a deposit for a new home, forking out an average of £32,440'
https://www.zoopla.co.uk/discover/property-news/revealed-how-much-the-bank-of-mum-and-dad-gives-children-for-deposits/

HYUFD said:

Fairliered said:

HYUFD said:

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

Phil said:

HYUFD said:

Carnyx said:

Gallowgate said:

Carnyx said:

HYUFD said:

Fishing said:

Gardenwalker said:

Fishing said:

Phil said:

Sean_F said:

Gardenwalker said:

Sean_F said:

Phil said:

DavidL said:

Pagan2 said:

This we lost 5.5% gdp is frankly bollocks

EU GDP 2019 2020 2021 2022
15692 15370 17187 16641
% 0% -2% +11.8% -3%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/gdp#:~:text=GDP in European Union averaged,503.70 USD Billion in 1966.

uk gdp 2019 2020 2021 2022
2857 2703 3122 3070
% 0% -5.5% +15.5% -1.7%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp#:~:text=GDP in the United Kingdom,73.23 USD Billion in 1960.

Total change since 2019

EU +6%

UK +7.4%

Before spouting shit about this supposed loss of 5.5% gdp please explain why the UK should have grown by 7.4%+the mythical 5.5% when the eu didn't even manage 7.4%

The 5.5% is a made up counter factual no one can prove spouted by remainers to make them feel like they were right.

I used actual figures included the sources not a number that some shit for brains economist plucked out of thin air and remainers jumped on

So we have slightly outperformed the EU since 2019, are predicted to do so over the next 4-5 years but Brexit remains a disaster. This is so endemic and such an unequivocal fact in our media I do not find it surprising that many have been persuaded it has been a mistake. But it is really nonsense. Our successes and failures are a consequence of our own decisions good and mad. The fact that a significant percentage of the latter has still left us ahead says a lot about the EU but not much about our decision to leave it.

Personally, I think the real questions people should be asking is why both the UK & European growth rates have been so terrible since 2008, whilst the US has gone from strength to strength.

Lack of investment in infrastructure due to misguided implementation of austerity? Labour supply issues? Planning issues?

Whatever it is, either it’s Europe-wide or the same malaise has multiple different causes in different countries & that lack of growth is one of the major macro economic issues that’s driving the politics of Western Europe today.

& it’s not due to population drops either - you see the same stagnation whether you plot GDP or GDP per capita.

An entirely fair point. Much of the argument is two bald men fighting over a comb. Neither the UK, nor most EU nations, are achieving more than weak growth.

Although, a further issue with the US is why does its impressive growth rate simply not show up in the living standards of so much of its population? So many complaints one hears from the US about stagnant real wages sound very familiar.

It does, but it is inordinately soaked up by the 1%.

There may be a clue here somewhere about what happens to economies when income is concentrated in a gilded elite.

It's extraordinary how the benefits of growth have been captured by the elite.

The median standard of living in the USA is 25% higher than here. It simply should not have a life expectancy that's four years lower.

Yes, you look at a country that’s as wealthy as the US & their life expectancy & wonder what on earth is going on.

Last time I looked, IIRC a good chunk of it is people killing themselves with guns, to which they have very easy access. The legally prescribed opioid epidemic is another large chunk, again something that’s unique to the US in scale.

The rest is the consequences of US healthcare issues, which show up almost everywhere. This is why it’s also worth remembering that the US spends 20% of it’s GDP on healthcare, a vast sum compared to peer nations, when making these comparisons. Even when taking this waste into account, the US is still considerably richer on a GDP per capita basis than Western Europe though.

I've explained the difference on here before, but to repeat:

- Americans work about 12% longer on average than we do
- Americans piss away almost three times as much on healthcare as we do per head, for much worse outcomes
- the dollar is unusually strong, at the moment, maybe 20% overvalued

These three factors together explain almost all the difference. Added to that a much more skewed income distribution and you see why, when you visit the US, unless you hang out with the vastly wealthy, living standards aren't that different.

(Except in housing, where American houses are 2.5x as big as ours, but there's no way to defend our terrible record in this area, just as there's no way to defend America's gun laws or healthcare).

When you look at attempts to decompose these differences (which are real), they do not by any means explain “all” the difference.

Your maths needs work.

American GDP per head is about 70% higher than ours ($76,398 vs $45,850 in 2022), so they make $17 for each $10 we make.

If you cut their hours by twelve percent, they lose $2.04, giving them $14.96.

If you cut their remaining GDP of $14.96 by twelve percent to give them the same level of healthcare spending per capita as ours, that's another $1.80 or so.

So they are now making $13.16. Then if you cut their GDP by 20% to allow for dollar overvaluation, that's another $2.28 so they are now making $10.52, which is basically the same as us.

That's before you allow for the skewed income distribution, or the ridiculous expense of eating well there, or the extra costs necessary because the poorer public transport or the more extreme climate.

We have nothing to envy in the bastard child of the Empire.

And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price

Because of deliberate inflation by your party, with catastrophic results for the UK economy.

Who cares about the UK economy if Tory voters are rich?

It's also bizarre that HYUFD compares extreme values in the UK (Surrey or London) with the average US house price. Like comparing NYC house prices with the average UK price. One might think he's trying to persuade us of something.

PS Just for the record, this is what he said, before he edits it: "And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price"

The average UK house price is now £372,812, still higher than the average US house price of $384,500 at the current rate of
£1= $1.3.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/news/house-price-index/
https://www.noradarealestate.com/blog/housing-prices/

This is not a good thing, given that the average US buyer gets a whole lot more square footage for their $.

In the UK the older property owning generation is holding the next hostage & forcing them to pay through the nose for shelter in order to line their own pockets to pay for their expensive cruises.

Economically this is not productive & it’s far from obvious why a fortunate subset of the population deserve this unearned income.

The younger generation in the UK, especially in the South are and will inherit more than any generation before them

We've been through this before. The younger generation don't inherit anything. Their much older parents do.

Some will via gifts for deposits from grandparents or from their parents

And those (the vast majority) who don't?

The majority do now 'Nearly two-thirds of parents have helped their children with a deposit for a new home, forking out an average of £32,440'
https://www.zoopla.co.uk/discover/property-news/revealed-how-much-the-bank-of-mum-and-dad-gives-children-for-deposits/

It’s a shame that so many children can only get on the housing ladder with help from their parents. It would be so much better if house prices were lower and they could afford to buy a home with their own savings and income.

North of Watford gap many can but I am in favour of inherited wealth and the family so have no problem with parental assistance for their childrens' deposits

rcs1000 said:

HYUFD said:

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

Phil said:

HYUFD said:

Carnyx said:

Gallowgate said:

Carnyx said:

HYUFD said:

Fishing said:

Gardenwalker said:

Fishing said:

Phil said:

Sean_F said:

Gardenwalker said:

Sean_F said:

Phil said:

DavidL said:

Pagan2 said:

This we lost 5.5% gdp is frankly bollocks

EU GDP 2019 2020 2021 2022
15692 15370 17187 16641
% 0% -2% +11.8% -3%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/gdp#:~:text=GDP in European Union averaged,503.70 USD Billion in 1966.

uk gdp 2019 2020 2021 2022
2857 2703 3122 3070
% 0% -5.5% +15.5% -1.7%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp#:~:text=GDP in the United Kingdom,73.23 USD Billion in 1960.

Total change since 2019

EU +6%

UK +7.4%

Before spouting shit about this supposed loss of 5.5% gdp please explain why the UK should have grown by 7.4%+the mythical 5.5% when the eu didn't even manage 7.4%

The 5.5% is a made up counter factual no one can prove spouted by remainers to make them feel like they were right.

I used actual figures included the sources not a number that some shit for brains economist plucked out of thin air and remainers jumped on

So we have slightly outperformed the EU since 2019, are predicted to do so over the next 4-5 years but Brexit remains a disaster. This is so endemic and such an unequivocal fact in our media I do not find it surprising that many have been persuaded it has been a mistake. But it is really nonsense. Our successes and failures are a consequence of our own decisions good and mad. The fact that a significant percentage of the latter has still left us ahead says a lot about the EU but not much about our decision to leave it.

Personally, I think the real questions people should be asking is why both the UK & European growth rates have been so terrible since 2008, whilst the US has gone from strength to strength.

Lack of investment in infrastructure due to misguided implementation of austerity? Labour supply issues? Planning issues?

Whatever it is, either it’s Europe-wide or the same malaise has multiple different causes in different countries & that lack of growth is one of the major macro economic issues that’s driving the politics of Western Europe today.

& it’s not due to population drops either - you see the same stagnation whether you plot GDP or GDP per capita.

An entirely fair point. Much of the argument is two bald men fighting over a comb. Neither the UK, nor most EU nations, are achieving more than weak growth.

Although, a further issue with the US is why does its impressive growth rate simply not show up in the living standards of so much of its population? So many complaints one hears from the US about stagnant real wages sound very familiar.

It does, but it is inordinately soaked up by the 1%.

There may be a clue here somewhere about what happens to economies when income is concentrated in a gilded elite.

It's extraordinary how the benefits of growth have been captured by the elite.

The median standard of living in the USA is 25% higher than here. It simply should not have a life expectancy that's four years lower.

Yes, you look at a country that’s as wealthy as the US & their life expectancy & wonder what on earth is going on.

Last time I looked, IIRC a good chunk of it is people killing themselves with guns, to which they have very easy access. The legally prescribed opioid epidemic is another large chunk, again something that’s unique to the US in scale.

The rest is the consequences of US healthcare issues, which show up almost everywhere. This is why it’s also worth remembering that the US spends 20% of it’s GDP on healthcare, a vast sum compared to peer nations, when making these comparisons. Even when taking this waste into account, the US is still considerably richer on a GDP per capita basis than Western Europe though.

I've explained the difference on here before, but to repeat:

- Americans work about 12% longer on average than we do
- Americans piss away almost three times as much on healthcare as we do per head, for much worse outcomes
- the dollar is unusually strong, at the moment, maybe 20% overvalued

These three factors together explain almost all the difference. Added to that a much more skewed income distribution and you see why, when you visit the US, unless you hang out with the vastly wealthy, living standards aren't that different.

(Except in housing, where American houses are 2.5x as big as ours, but there's no way to defend our terrible record in this area, just as there's no way to defend America's gun laws or healthcare).

When you look at attempts to decompose these differences (which are real), they do not by any means explain “all” the difference.

Your maths needs work.

American GDP per head is about 70% higher than ours ($76,398 vs $45,850 in 2022), so they make $17 for each $10 we make.

If you cut their hours by twelve percent, they lose $2.04, giving them $14.96.

If you cut their remaining GDP of $14.96 by twelve percent to give them the same level of healthcare spending per capita as ours, that's another $1.80 or so.

So they are now making $13.16. Then if you cut their GDP by 20% to allow for dollar overvaluation, that's another $2.28 so they are now making $10.52, which is basically the same as us.

That's before you allow for the skewed income distribution, or the ridiculous expense of eating well there, or the extra costs necessary because the poorer public transport or the more extreme climate.

We have nothing to envy in the bastard child of the Empire.

And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price

Because of deliberate inflation by your party, with catastrophic results for the UK economy.

Who cares about the UK economy if Tory voters are rich?

It's also bizarre that HYUFD compares extreme values in the UK (Surrey or London) with the average US house price. Like comparing NYC house prices with the average UK price. One might think he's trying to persuade us of something.

PS Just for the record, this is what he said, before he edits it: "And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price"

The average UK house price is now £372,812, still higher than the average US house price of $384,500 at the current rate of
£1= $1.3.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/news/house-price-index/
https://www.noradarealestate.com/blog/housing-prices/

This is not a good thing, given that the average US buyer gets a whole lot more square footage for their $.

In the UK the older property owning generation is holding the next hostage & forcing them to pay through the nose for shelter in order to line their own pockets to pay for their expensive cruises.

Economically this is not productive & it’s far from obvious why a fortunate subset of the population deserve this unearned income.

The younger generation in the UK, especially in the South are and will inherit more than any generation before them

We've been through this before. The younger generation don't inherit anything. Their much older parents do.

Some will via gifts for deposits from grandparents or from their parents

And those (the vast majority) who don't?

The majority do now 'Nearly two-thirds of parents have helped their children with a deposit for a new home, forking out an average of £32,440'
https://www.zoopla.co.uk/discover/property-news/revealed-how-much-the-bank-of-mum-and-dad-gives-children-for-deposits/

That's a misleading quote. If you read the article, it says:

"A staggering 64% of parents whose grown-up children own a home have given them money to help them onto the property ladder."

In other words, it's almost impossible for people to get onto the property ladder without the help of mum and dad. And most parents can't afford to gift little Johnny £32k.

rcs1000 said:

HYUFD said:

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

Phil said:

HYUFD said:

Carnyx said:

Gallowgate said:

Carnyx said:

HYUFD said:

Fishing said:

Gardenwalker said:

Fishing said:

Phil said:

Sean_F said:

Gardenwalker said:

Sean_F said:

Phil said:

DavidL said:

Pagan2 said:

This we lost 5.5% gdp is frankly bollocks

EU GDP 2019 2020 2021 2022
15692 15370 17187 16641
% 0% -2% +11.8% -3%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/gdp#:~:text=GDP in European Union averaged,503.70 USD Billion in 1966.

uk gdp 2019 2020 2021 2022
2857 2703 3122 3070
% 0% -5.5% +15.5% -1.7%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp#:~:text=GDP in the United Kingdom,73.23 USD Billion in 1960.

Total change since 2019

EU +6%

UK +7.4%

Before spouting shit about this supposed loss of 5.5% gdp please explain why the UK should have grown by 7.4%+the mythical 5.5% when the eu didn't even manage 7.4%

The 5.5% is a made up counter factual no one can prove spouted by remainers to make them feel like they were right.

I used actual figures included the sources not a number that some shit for brains economist plucked out of thin air and remainers jumped on

So we have slightly outperformed the EU since 2019, are predicted to do so over the next 4-5 years but Brexit remains a disaster. This is so endemic and such an unequivocal fact in our media I do not find it surprising that many have been persuaded it has been a mistake. But it is really nonsense. Our successes and failures are a consequence of our own decisions good and mad. The fact that a significant percentage of the latter has still left us ahead says a lot about the EU but not much about our decision to leave it.

Personally, I think the real questions people should be asking is why both the UK & European growth rates have been so terrible since 2008, whilst the US has gone from strength to strength.

Lack of investment in infrastructure due to misguided implementation of austerity? Labour supply issues? Planning issues?

Whatever it is, either it’s Europe-wide or the same malaise has multiple different causes in different countries & that lack of growth is one of the major macro economic issues that’s driving the politics of Western Europe today.

& it’s not due to population drops either - you see the same stagnation whether you plot GDP or GDP per capita.

An entirely fair point. Much of the argument is two bald men fighting over a comb. Neither the UK, nor most EU nations, are achieving more than weak growth.

Although, a further issue with the US is why does its impressive growth rate simply not show up in the living standards of so much of its population? So many complaints one hears from the US about stagnant real wages sound very familiar.

It does, but it is inordinately soaked up by the 1%.

There may be a clue here somewhere about what happens to economies when income is concentrated in a gilded elite.

It's extraordinary how the benefits of growth have been captured by the elite.

The median standard of living in the USA is 25% higher than here. It simply should not have a life expectancy that's four years lower.

Yes, you look at a country that’s as wealthy as the US & their life expectancy & wonder what on earth is going on.

Last time I looked, IIRC a good chunk of it is people killing themselves with guns, to which they have very easy access. The legally prescribed opioid epidemic is another large chunk, again something that’s unique to the US in scale.

The rest is the consequences of US healthcare issues, which show up almost everywhere. This is why it’s also worth remembering that the US spends 20% of it’s GDP on healthcare, a vast sum compared to peer nations, when making these comparisons. Even when taking this waste into account, the US is still considerably richer on a GDP per capita basis than Western Europe though.

I've explained the difference on here before, but to repeat:

- Americans work about 12% longer on average than we do
- Americans piss away almost three times as much on healthcare as we do per head, for much worse outcomes
- the dollar is unusually strong, at the moment, maybe 20% overvalued

These three factors together explain almost all the difference. Added to that a much more skewed income distribution and you see why, when you visit the US, unless you hang out with the vastly wealthy, living standards aren't that different.

(Except in housing, where American houses are 2.5x as big as ours, but there's no way to defend our terrible record in this area, just as there's no way to defend America's gun laws or healthcare).

When you look at attempts to decompose these differences (which are real), they do not by any means explain “all” the difference.

Your maths needs work.

American GDP per head is about 70% higher than ours ($76,398 vs $45,850 in 2022), so they make $17 for each $10 we make.

If you cut their hours by twelve percent, they lose $2.04, giving them $14.96.

If you cut their remaining GDP of $14.96 by twelve percent to give them the same level of healthcare spending per capita as ours, that's another $1.80 or so.

So they are now making $13.16. Then if you cut their GDP by 20% to allow for dollar overvaluation, that's another $2.28 so they are now making $10.52, which is basically the same as us.

That's before you allow for the skewed income distribution, or the ridiculous expense of eating well there, or the extra costs necessary because the poorer public transport or the more extreme climate.

We have nothing to envy in the bastard child of the Empire.

And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price

Because of deliberate inflation by your party, with catastrophic results for the UK economy.

Who cares about the UK economy if Tory voters are rich?

It's also bizarre that HYUFD compares extreme values in the UK (Surrey or London) with the average US house price. Like comparing NYC house prices with the average UK price. One might think he's trying to persuade us of something.

PS Just for the record, this is what he said, before he edits it: "And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price"

The average UK house price is now £372,812, still higher than the average US house price of $384,500 at the current rate of
£1= $1.3.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/news/house-price-index/
https://www.noradarealestate.com/blog/housing-prices/

This is not a good thing, given that the average US buyer gets a whole lot more square footage for their $.

In the UK the older property owning generation is holding the next hostage & forcing them to pay through the nose for shelter in order to line their own pockets to pay for their expensive cruises.

Economically this is not productive & it’s far from obvious why a fortunate subset of the population deserve this unearned income.

The younger generation in the UK, especially in the South are and will inherit more than any generation before them

We've been through this before. The younger generation don't inherit anything. Their much older parents do.

Some will via gifts for deposits from grandparents or from their parents

And those (the vast majority) who don't?

The majority do now 'Nearly two-thirds of parents have helped their children with a deposit for a new home, forking out an average of £32,440'
https://www.zoopla.co.uk/discover/property-news/revealed-how-much-the-bank-of-mum-and-dad-gives-children-for-deposits/

That's a misleading quote. If you read the article, it says:

"A staggering 64% of parents whose grown-up children own a home have given them money to help them onto the property ladder."

In other words, it's almost impossible for people to get onto the property ladder without the help of mum and dad. And most parents can't afford to gift little Johnny £32k.

ohnotnow said:

HYUFD said:

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

dixiedean said:

HYUFD said:

Phil said:

HYUFD said:

Carnyx said:

Gallowgate said:

Carnyx said:

HYUFD said:

Fishing said:

Gardenwalker said:

Fishing said:

Phil said:

Sean_F said:

Gardenwalker said:

Sean_F said:

Phil said:

DavidL said:

Pagan2 said:

This we lost 5.5% gdp is frankly bollocks

EU GDP 2019 2020 2021 2022
15692 15370 17187 16641
% 0% -2% +11.8% -3%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/european-union/gdp#:~:text=GDP in European Union averaged,503.70 USD Billion in 1966.

uk gdp 2019 2020 2021 2022
2857 2703 3122 3070
% 0% -5.5% +15.5% -1.7%

source https://tradingeconomics.com/united-kingdom/gdp#:~:text=GDP in the United Kingdom,73.23 USD Billion in 1960.

Total change since 2019

EU +6%

UK +7.4%

Before spouting shit about this supposed loss of 5.5% gdp please explain why the UK should have grown by 7.4%+the mythical 5.5% when the eu didn't even manage 7.4%

The 5.5% is a made up counter factual no one can prove spouted by remainers to make them feel like they were right.

I used actual figures included the sources not a number that some shit for brains economist plucked out of thin air and remainers jumped on

So we have slightly outperformed the EU since 2019, are predicted to do so over the next 4-5 years but Brexit remains a disaster. This is so endemic and such an unequivocal fact in our media I do not find it surprising that many have been persuaded it has been a mistake. But it is really nonsense. Our successes and failures are a consequence of our own decisions good and mad. The fact that a significant percentage of the latter has still left us ahead says a lot about the EU but not much about our decision to leave it.

Personally, I think the real questions people should be asking is why both the UK & European growth rates have been so terrible since 2008, whilst the US has gone from strength to strength.

Lack of investment in infrastructure due to misguided implementation of austerity? Labour supply issues? Planning issues?

Whatever it is, either it’s Europe-wide or the same malaise has multiple different causes in different countries & that lack of growth is one of the major macro economic issues that’s driving the politics of Western Europe today.

& it’s not due to population drops either - you see the same stagnation whether you plot GDP or GDP per capita.

An entirely fair point. Much of the argument is two bald men fighting over a comb. Neither the UK, nor most EU nations, are achieving more than weak growth.

Although, a further issue with the US is why does its impressive growth rate simply not show up in the living standards of so much of its population? So many complaints one hears from the US about stagnant real wages sound very familiar.

It does, but it is inordinately soaked up by the 1%.

There may be a clue here somewhere about what happens to economies when income is concentrated in a gilded elite.

It's extraordinary how the benefits of growth have been captured by the elite.

The median standard of living in the USA is 25% higher than here. It simply should not have a life expectancy that's four years lower.

Yes, you look at a country that’s as wealthy as the US & their life expectancy & wonder what on earth is going on.

Last time I looked, IIRC a good chunk of it is people killing themselves with guns, to which they have very easy access. The legally prescribed opioid epidemic is another large chunk, again something that’s unique to the US in scale.

The rest is the consequences of US healthcare issues, which show up almost everywhere. This is why it’s also worth remembering that the US spends 20% of it’s GDP on healthcare, a vast sum compared to peer nations, when making these comparisons. Even when taking this waste into account, the US is still considerably richer on a GDP per capita basis than Western Europe though.

I've explained the difference on here before, but to repeat:

- Americans work about 12% longer on average than we do
- Americans piss away almost three times as much on healthcare as we do per head, for much worse outcomes
- the dollar is unusually strong, at the moment, maybe 20% overvalued

These three factors together explain almost all the difference. Added to that a much more skewed income distribution and you see why, when you visit the US, unless you hang out with the vastly wealthy, living standards aren't that different.

(Except in housing, where American houses are 2.5x as big as ours, but there's no way to defend our terrible record in this area, just as there's no way to defend America's gun laws or healthcare).

When you look at attempts to decompose these differences (which are real), they do not by any means explain “all” the difference.

Your maths needs work.

American GDP per head is about 70% higher than ours ($76,398 vs $45,850 in 2022), so they make $17 for each $10 we make.

If you cut their hours by twelve percent, they lose $2.04, giving them $14.96.

If you cut their remaining GDP of $14.96 by twelve percent to give them the same level of healthcare spending per capita as ours, that's another $1.80 or so.

So they are now making $13.16. Then if you cut their GDP by 20% to allow for dollar overvaluation, that's another $2.28 so they are now making $10.52, which is basically the same as us.

That's before you allow for the skewed income distribution, or the ridiculous expense of eating well there, or the extra costs necessary because the poorer public transport or the more extreme climate.

We have nothing to envy in the bastard child of the Empire.

And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price

Because of deliberate inflation by your party, with catastrophic results for the UK economy.

Who cares about the UK economy if Tory voters are rich?

It's also bizarre that HYUFD compares extreme values in the UK (Surrey or London) with the average US house price. Like comparing NYC house prices with the average UK price. One might think he's trying to persuade us of something.

PS Just for the record, this is what he said, before he edits it: "And home owners in Surrey or London have assets almost double the US average house price"

The average UK house price is now £372,812, still higher than the average US house price of $384,500 at the current rate of
£1= $1.3.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/news/house-price-index/
https://www.noradarealestate.com/blog/housing-prices/

This is not a good thing, given that the average US buyer gets a whole lot more square footage for their $.

In the UK the older property owning generation is holding the next hostage & forcing them to pay through the nose for shelter in order to line their own pockets to pay for their expensive cruises.

Economically this is not productive & it’s far from obvious why a fortunate subset of the population deserve this unearned income.

The younger generation in the UK, especially in the South are and will inherit more than any generation before them

We've been through this before. The younger generation don't inherit anything. Their much older parents do.

Some will via gifts for deposits from grandparents or from their parents

And those (the vast majority) who don't?

The majority do now 'Nearly two-thirds of parents have helped their children with a deposit for a new home, forking out an average of £32,440'
https://www.zoopla.co.uk/discover/property-news/revealed-how-much-the-bank-of-mum-and-dad-gives-children-for-deposits/

"Breaking: Nearly two-thirds of Romanov's have helped their children with..."

I mean, it's not a great historical trend. And there are so many fewer train stations these days. Imagine the over-crowding.

kle4 said:

HYUFD said:

kle4 said:

HYUFD said:

kle4 said:

MaxPB said:

Gardenwalker said:

Councils have too little power, or perhaps too little of the power we want (placemaking), and too much of the power we don’t want (pettifogging).

The result is a lowest common denominator disaster zone.

No, councils have too much power. It's time to smash planning committees to pieces and just get rid of all of them.

Planning committees can only do what government permits them to do (when they go beyond that, as they frequently do, their decisions get overturned). The local planning policies their councils pass have to be signed off as sound under national rules.

Also, something like 90+% of applications don't get near a planning committee.

Fundamentally the problem with planning committees is that local councils want the planning system to be a way of saying No to things, whereas central government (historically) wants the planning system to be a way of saying Yes to things.

It's a balance which was already leaning too far toward No, and since Boris's failed attempt at reform and the current government's retreat to pleasing its absolute core, has now been smashed as the government no longer even wants it to say Yes anymore.

59% of UK voters oppose allowing more housing to be built on the green belt. Planning cttees only reflect what their voters think

https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/survey-results/daily/2023/05/17/d5ba5/1

Which is not their job, which is to judge applications against local and national planning policy (also, I don't know why you are bringing housing on the Green Belt into it, planning committees consider a lot more than matters in the Green Belt as you know).

Of course, there will always be an element of recognising local sentiment, that's life and politics, and some policies are judgement calls (eg the what is 'in keeping' question, or what impact is there on local amenity etc) and committees can reasonably take a view different to an officer recommendation, and that can be upheld by an inspector. Most committee members are sensible (and since they will be from across a local authority area to some degree, not wholly parochial) and look for the edge cases they can refuse for defendable reasons.

But as you also know but pretend not to know because you think it is funny, if the only thing planning committees do is listen to their local voters and ignore planning policies, it does no good for those voters because the decisions get approved anyway, just not by them.

I mean seriously, if you refuse something that is obviously in line with policy and it then gets approval anyway by an inspector (which happens a lot), do you seriously think you get a benefit from local voters for it? Especially when your local opponent is likely to be just as opposed to the development as you are.

No! All the voters will remember is that the housing got built anyway - and you just have to hope they don't blame you.

ETA: Oh, and if you are on your local planning committee do be sure not to state publicly that you think the only thing that matters is reflecting what the local voters think about an application - it could open up the committee's decision to challenge, particularly if the vote was close, on the basis the stated reasons for refusal were not the reason reasons, and you were acting irrationally. Try to always slip in at least one planning policy reason for opposing - and better than that LD MP and her 5G ridiculousness (notably in that case the official reason for refusal was something else).

Of course planning decisions have to be in line with the local plan but increasingly councils offering lots of new greenbelt housing in their local plans, especially Tory ones, have been thrown out by local voters in favour of NIMBY LD, Green and Independent councils who adjust their local plans in a more NIMBY direction accordingly. After Chesham and Amersham Gove too has scrapped mandatory central government new housing targets too

I was unclear on whether they actually had been made advisory, not mandatory, or whether that was merely part of the latest reform proposals.

However, certainly many local authorities have already started treating them as advisory so it matters little..

What is the case, however, is notwithstanding that new Local Plans still have to identify sufficient sites - though naturally councils will low ball the numbers as much as they can.

And here's thing thing - you can never go low enough for NIMBYs. Yes, I'm a planning hawk compared to the average voter, but you simply won't build enough houses without making councils permit them (yes, developers are also very disreputable on the issue as well), since there will always be a group of voters unhappy. You will never satisfy those who, in practice, are simply against anything.

Don't build on green fields (and let's pretend it's all Green Belt!), go brownfield. No, don't build that many on that brownfield site. We need houses, but we don't have the infrastructure to support it. No, don't build the infrastructure either! And so on.

It's a race to the bottom. That's why it is a balance - sometimes government has to lead and give us what we need, not just what we demand. You know who might have been able to do that? A government with a huge majority in a period of major national transition.

HYUFD said:

kle4 said:

HYUFD said:

kle4 said:

HYUFD said:

kle4 said:

MaxPB said:

Gardenwalker said:

Councils have too little power, or perhaps too little of the power we want (placemaking), and too much of the power we don’t want (pettifogging).

The result is a lowest common denominator disaster zone.

No, councils have too much power. It's time to smash planning committees to pieces and just get rid of all of them.

Planning committees can only do what government permits them to do (when they go beyond that, as they frequently do, their decisions get overturned). The local planning policies their councils pass have to be signed off as sound under national rules.

Also, something like 90+% of applications don't get near a planning committee.

Fundamentally the problem with planning committees is that local councils want the planning system to be a way of saying No to things, whereas central government (historically) wants the planning system to be a way of saying Yes to things.

It's a balance which was already leaning too far toward No, and since Boris's failed attempt at reform and the current government's retreat to pleasing its absolute core, has now been smashed as the government no longer even wants it to say Yes anymore.

59% of UK voters oppose allowing more housing to be built on the green belt. Planning cttees only reflect what their voters think

https://yougov.co.uk/topics/politics/survey-results/daily/2023/05/17/d5ba5/1

Which is not their job, which is to judge applications against local and national planning policy (also, I don't know why you are bringing housing on the Green Belt into it, planning committees consider a lot more than matters in the Green Belt as you know).

Of course, there will always be an element of recognising local sentiment, that's life and politics, and some policies are judgement calls (eg the what is 'in keeping' question, or what impact is there on local amenity etc) and committees can reasonably take a view different to an officer recommendation, and that can be upheld by an inspector. Most committee members are sensible (and since they will be from across a local authority area to some degree, not wholly parochial) and look for the edge cases they can refuse for defendable reasons.

But as you also know but pretend not to know because you think it is funny, if the only thing planning committees do is listen to their local voters and ignore planning policies, it does no good for those voters because the decisions get approved anyway, just not by them.

I mean seriously, if you refuse something that is obviously in line with policy and it then gets approval anyway by an inspector (which happens a lot), do you seriously think you get a benefit from local voters for it? Especially when your local opponent is likely to be just as opposed to the development as you are.

No! All the voters will remember is that the housing got built anyway - and you just have to hope they don't blame you.

ETA: Oh, and if you are on your local planning committee do be sure not to state publicly that you think the only thing that matters is reflecting what the local voters think about an application - it could open up the committee's decision to challenge, particularly if the vote was close, on the basis the stated reasons for refusal were not the reason reasons, and you were acting irrationally. Try to always slip in at least one planning policy reason for opposing - and better than that LD MP and her 5G ridiculousness (notably in that case the official reason for refusal was something else).

Of course planning decisions have to be in line with the local plan but increasingly councils offering lots of new greenbelt housing in their local plans, especially Tory ones, have been thrown out by local voters in favour of NIMBY LD, Green and Independent councils who adjust their local plans in a more NIMBY direction accordingly. After Chesham and Amersham Gove too has scrapped mandatory central government new housing targets too

I was unclear on whether they actually had been made advisory, not mandatory, or whether that was merely part of the latest reform proposals.

However, certainly many local authorities have already started treating them as advisory so it matters little..

What is the case, however, is notwithstanding that new Local Plans still have to identify sufficient sites - though naturally councils will low ball the numbers as much as they can.

And here's thing thing - you can never go low enough for NIMBYs. Yes, I'm a planning hawk compared to the average voter, but you simply won't build enough houses without making councils permit them (yes, developers are also very disreputable on the issue as well), since there will always be a group of voters unhappy. You will never satisfy those who, in practice, are simply against anything.

Don't build on green fields (and let's pretend it's all Green Belt!), go brownfield. No, don't build that many on that brownfield site. We need houses, but we don't have the infrastructure to support it. No, don't build the infrastructure either! And so on.

It's a race to the bottom. That's why it is a balance - sometimes government has to lead and give us what we need, not just what we demand. You know who might have been able to do that? A government with a huge majority in a period of major national transition.

Starmer is welcome to propose building new housing all over the greenbelt if he wins the next election. We Tories would oppose him every step of the way in opposition if he does propose that and would also be joined by the LDs in opposing such plans

Theuniondivvie said:

Oh.

Jim_Miller said:

There are better statistics available on naturalization in the US, than on birth tourism. For example:
"USCIS welcomed 967,500 new citizens in fiscal year 2022 during naturalization ceremonies held across the United States and around the world. This is a 20% increase from last year and the highest number of naturalizations seen since FY 2008."
source: https://www.uscis.gov/citizenship-resource-center/naturalization-statistics

(Some of our politicians like to attend the naturalization ceremonies, especially the ones on July 4th.)