There is general scepticism about the success of Brexit but it's done. I've got two misgivings.
Do the general public WANT to go back to arguing about the EU? I've not seen any polling that says it's salient.
Would the Rejoiners vote to rejoin if we don't keep our previous opt outs? The polling I've seen on this brings the rejoin figures down considerably.
I don't think it's worth the bother. There's votes in it but that's for the likes of the Lib Dems, not Labour. For Labour it's a divisive argument.
I can’t see the point in going back in. We’ve left and it’s never going to be the same. Can’t we just try and make what we’ve got work.
That's essentially what Suank and Starmer, in slightly different ways, tried to do. And it's not the only reason they both failed, but the lack of Brexit Triumph made both their jobs harder. Of course it's possible that there's a way of Making Brexit Work and we just haven't collectively found it yet.
It's possible.
Brexit has worked.
We have operated independently, reclaimed control over our laws etc and the ability to kick the bastards out if we don't like them, an ability we have exercised.
We have also stopped paying the EU membership fees.
And we have outgrown our European peers like Germany.
What more do you want?
Any problems now are of our making and we need to fix them.
Last sentence is plain nonsense.
How is the closure of Hormuz a problem of our making that we can fix?
Or umpteen other global issues.
C'mon.
We control our ability to react to global issues.
We also could and should have chosen to invest in our own energy sources, both hydrocarbons and renewables, and not acted to both block on shore wind, and block North Sea development.
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
"What is driving this narrative? Why is the UK churning through its leaders almost as quickly as Italy once did? Why do voters and MPs bequeath and remove their support with seemingly such casual ease? In short, is Britain becoming ungovernable?"
There is general scepticism about the success of Brexit but it's done. I've got two misgivings.
Do the general public WANT to go back to arguing about the EU? I've not seen any polling that says it's salient.
Would the Rejoiners vote to rejoin if we don't keep our previous opt outs? The polling I've seen on this brings the rejoin figures down considerably.
I don't think it's worth the bother. There's votes in it but that's for the likes of the Lib Dems, not Labour. For Labour it's a divisive argument.
I can’t see the point in going back in. We’ve left and it’s never going to be the same. Can’t we just try and make what we’ve got work.
That's essentially what Suank and Starmer, in slightly different ways, tried to do. And it's not the only reason they both failed, but the lack of Brexit Triumph made both their jobs harder. Of course it's possible that there's a way of Making Brexit Work and we just haven't collectively found it yet.
It's possible.
Brexit has worked.
We have operated independently, reclaimed control over our laws etc and the ability to kick the bastards out if we don't like them, an ability we have exercised.
We have also stopped paying the EU membership fees.
And we have outgrown our European peers like Germany.
What more do you want?
Any problems now are of our making and we need to fix them.
You'll be telling us next the Hanas are squeaky clean pacifists.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
As I said there is no depth to Leon's thought processes. It is just so so superficial.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
Helps with the mental strain of a medical bankruptcy, I guess.
All Labour leaders are vilified. In different ways, but all get it. The next one will get the same treatment. Doesn’t matter who they are or what they do.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
We do fine, generally.
But a nurse on $40000 here might wonder, but for UK-USA FoM, could she be on $140000?
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
"And that's my case for persisting with Brexit and voting for Farage."
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
All Labour leaders are vilified. In different ways, but all get it. The next one will get the same treatment. Doesn’t matter who they are or what they do.
I seem to have missed the bit where Major or Sunak (to a name just two) got an easy ride in the press.
All PMs get hammered.
Tony Blair managed to not get hammered (much) for a while, by a combination of tight message control and fairly good economic performance. This was an exception.
There should be a permanent banning of the franchise for any utterance like this.
It is perfectly possible for anyone to be worse than who's currently in office and pissing you off.
It's really shit logic.
Nah Burnham will be an improvement on comms alone
Burnham is orders of magnitude more chippy than Starmer. Chippiness is not great in a politician (Kemi has it too, in her own way).
I am a big admirer of chippiness.
I just think he comes across well in interviews. He doesn’t really answer questions but he’s better at it than others.
I have not been paying much attention to Burnham while he's been off living in the rain. When he last ran for the Labour leadership, which is the last time I paid him serious attention, I thought he seemed a bit of an empty suit. But he may well have improved since then. I agree he will likely be a lot better than Starmer, even if he hasn't got any better.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
@Leon_VotedForStarmer is this a kind thing to say? Is it a necessary thing to say? Is it an important thing to say? If it is none of these things then maybe you shouldn't be saying it.
All Labour leaders are vilified. In different ways, but all get it. The next one will get the same treatment. Doesn’t matter who they are or what they do.
I seem to have missed the bit where Major or Sunak (to a name just two) got an easy ride in the press.
All PMs get hammered.
Tony Blair managed to not get hammered (much) for a while, by a combination of tight message control and fairly good economic performance. This was an exception.
There’s a hard press when you leave d day early or call you own team bastards but there’s next level when you’re demon eyes, or your dead dad become a target, or they claim you’re a soviet mole. Starmer has been vilified to a remarkable extent before he’d even done anything.
The point is that whoever comes next for Labour will get hammered, however chippy they are today. It’s part of job.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
"This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago"
I mean, where to start with this? Maybe nowhere. What is wrong with you?
"Serious people no longer care about GDP, at all, whether it is GDP by PPP or nominal, or GDP per capita, it is all nonsense. What matters is the number of free milk fountains per hectare"
I knew you guys were dumb, I didn't realise you were THIS dumb
There should be a permanent banning of the franchise for any utterance like this.
It is perfectly possible for anyone to be worse than who's currently in office and pissing you off.
It's really shit logic.
Nah Burnham will be an improvement on comms alone
Burnham is orders of magnitude more chippy than Starmer. Chippiness is not great in a politician (Kemi has it too, in her own way).
I am a big admirer of chippiness.
I just think he comes across well in interviews. He doesn’t really answer questions but he’s better at it than others.
I have not been paying much attention to Burnham while he's been off living in the rain. When he last ran for the Labour leadership, which is the last time I paid him serious attention, I thought he seemed a bit of an empty suit. But he may well have improved since then. I agree he will likely be a lot better than Starmer, even if he hasn't got any better.
I still think he’s a bit of an empty suit. But he can do human connection and empathy in a way Starmer cannot.
All Labour leaders are vilified. In different ways, but all get it. The next one will get the same treatment. Doesn’t matter who they are or what they do.
I seem to have missed the bit where Major or Sunak (to a name just two) got an easy ride in the press.
All PMs get hammered.
Tony Blair managed to not get hammered (much) for a while, by a combination of tight message control and fairly good economic performance. This was an exception.
All Labour leaders are vilified. In different ways, but all get it. The next one will get the same treatment. Doesn’t matter who they are or what they do.
I seem to have missed the bit where Major or Sunak (to a name just two) got an easy ride in the press.
All PMs get hammered.
Tony Blair managed to not get hammered (much) for a while, by a combination of tight message control and fairly good economic performance. This was an exception.
There’s a hard press when you leave d day early or call you own team bastards but there’s next level when you’re demon eyes, or your dead dad become a target, or they claim you’re a soviet mole. Starmer has been vilified to a remarkable extent before he’d even done anything.
The point is that whoever comes next for Labour will get hammered, however chippy they are today. It’s part of job.
The Left loves to demonise Conservatives (and other opponents). But thinks it's unnatural when the favour is returned.
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
@Leon_VotedForStarmer is this a kind thing to say? Is it a necessary thing to say? Is it an important thing to say? If it is none of these things then maybe you shouldn't be saying it.
1. @kjh waded into a conversation where he wasn't even mentioned - and started arguing with me
All Labour leaders are vilified. In different ways, but all get it. The next one will get the same treatment. Doesn’t matter who they are or what they do.
I seem to have missed the bit where Major or Sunak (to a name just two) got an easy ride in the press.
All PMs get hammered.
Tony Blair managed to not get hammered (much) for a while, by a combination of tight message control and fairly good economic performance. This was an exception.
And by making a deal with Rupert Murdoch.
That wouldn't work nowadays. Social Media is an uncontrollable mob rather than a newspaper magnate with an agenda.
All Labour leaders are vilified. In different ways, but all get it. The next one will get the same treatment. Doesn’t matter who they are or what they do.
I seem to have missed the bit where Major or Sunak (to a name just two) got an easy ride in the press.
All PMs get hammered.
Tony Blair managed to not get hammered (much) for a while, by a combination of tight message control and fairly good economic performance. This was an exception.
And by making a deal with Rupert Murdoch.
That wouldn't work nowadays. Social Media is an uncontrollable mob rather than a newspaper magnate with an agenda.
Are Murdoch via Fox etc and Marshall via GBeebies etc not influencing the agenda?
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
And also there's very basic things like road surfaces. Ours have declined recently but they are still better than the average road in the outer suburbs of New York state (and I gather they are worse elsewhere). I will grant that some in Sicily are awful.
All Labour leaders are vilified. In different ways, but all get it. The next one will get the same treatment. Doesn’t matter who they are or what they do.
I seem to have missed the bit where Major or Sunak (to a name just two) got an easy ride in the press.
All PMs get hammered.
Tony Blair managed to not get hammered (much) for a while, by a combination of tight message control and fairly good economic performance. This was an exception.
And by making a deal with Rupert Murdoch.
That wouldn't work nowadays. Social Media is an uncontrollable mob rather than a newspaper magnate with an agenda.
Are Murdoch via Fox etc and Marshall via GBeebies etc not influencing the agenda?
Certainly so. But without the hegemony of Murdoch.
All Labour leaders are vilified. In different ways, but all get it. The next one will get the same treatment. Doesn’t matter who they are or what they do.
I seem to have missed the bit where Major or Sunak (to a name just two) got an easy ride in the press.
All PMs get hammered.
Tony Blair managed to not get hammered (much) for a while, by a combination of tight message control and fairly good economic performance. This was an exception.
There’s a hard press when you leave d day early or call you own team bastards but there’s next level when you’re demon eyes, or your dead dad become a target, or they claim you’re a soviet mole. Starmer has been vilified to a remarkable extent before he’d even done anything.
The point is that whoever comes next for Labour will get hammered, however chippy they are today. It’s part of job.
The Left loves to demonise Conservatives (and other opponents). But thinks it's unnatural when the favour is returned.
Not only that, they've spent a decade cancelling rightwing people all over the shop - literally ruining their lives. Now Elon owns X and the boot is - to an extent - on the other foot (tho, leftwingers, note, do not get cancelled) and they are whining and mewling
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
Well remembered but you didn't get the facts quite right.
I was actually in Cambridge in November 2024 and had been invited to have dinner at the top table at Peterhouse College. It wasn't just myself and my wife but a large group of us looking at your posts and laughing ourselves silly as you got caught out lying spectacularly. You can refresh your memory by looking back at the post.
The fact that you remember that post I think says it all. I remember it because it was my 70th birthday. What is your reason for remembering something that happened a year and half ago and was so insignificant.
Rattled a bit by it were we? Having some doubts over our intellectual abilities are we? Have we been humiliated a few times tonight by a few here that are somewhat brighter than you like @Benpointer?
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
@Leon_VotedForStarmer is this a kind thing to say? Is it a necessary thing to say? Is it an important thing to say? If it is none of these things then maybe you shouldn't be saying it.
1. @kjh waded into a conversation where he wasn't even mentioned - and started arguing with me
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
@Leon_VotedForStarmer is this a kind thing to say? Is it a necessary thing to say? Is it an important thing to say? If it is none of these things then maybe you shouldn't be saying it.
1. @kjh waded into a conversation where he wasn't even mentioned - and started arguing with me
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
"This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago"
I mean, where to start with this? Maybe nowhere. What is wrong with you?
"Serious people no longer care about GDP, at all, whether it is GDP by PPP or nominal, or GDP per capita, it is all nonsense. What matters is the number of free milk fountains per hectare"
I knew you guys were dumb, I didn't realise you were THIS dumb
Yes, that's exactly right. There's not much point in an economy that does not deliver good outcomes for the people who live there - whether that is decent private incomes or great public services or free milk fountains (can you imagine the cleaning). GDP per capita strongly correlates with such outcomes - but it takes a bit more than that to achieve this.
Finland has a GDP per capita roughly the same as Mississippi. They live 10 years longer, their murder rate is 90% lower, their poverty rate is 90% lower, prison rate 95% lower. They have the best educational outcomes in the world - while 75% of 10 year olds in Mississippi cannot read. Which of the two countries do you think people in Britain wish to emulate?
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
And also there's very basic things like road surfaces. Ours have declined recently but they are still better than the average road in the outer suburbs of New York state (and I gather they are worse elsewhere). I will grant that some in Sicily are awful.
ANOTHER ridiculous statement. I have done four roadtrips around the USA in the last four years. The Deep South. Ohio to DC and back. The Natchez Trace from Nashville to Nola. The entire Pacific Coast from LA to Seattle
American roads are notably good, especially given that they have a more extreme climate and a lot of traffic
Are some in disrepair? Yes. But so are roads half a mile from me, in arguably the wealthiest corner of Europe
There is general scepticism about the success of Brexit but it's done. I've got two misgivings.
Do the general public WANT to go back to arguing about the EU? I've not seen any polling that says it's salient.
Would the Rejoiners vote to rejoin if we don't keep our previous opt outs? The polling I've seen on this brings the rejoin figures down considerably.
I don't think it's worth the bother. There's votes in it but that's for the likes of the Lib Dems, not Labour. For Labour it's a divisive argument.
I can’t see the point in going back in. We’ve left and it’s never going to be the same. Can’t we just try and make what we’ve got work.
That's essentially what Suank and Starmer, in slightly different ways, tried to do. And it's not the only reason they both failed, but the lack of Brexit Triumph made both their jobs harder. Of course it's possible that there's a way of Making Brexit Work and we just haven't collectively found it yet.
It's possible.
Brexit has worked.
We have operated independently, reclaimed control over our laws etc and the ability to kick the bastards out if we don't like them, an ability we have exercised.
We have also stopped paying the EU membership fees.
And we have outgrown our European peers like Germany.
What more do you want?
Any problems now are of our making and we need to fix them.
Last sentence is plain nonsense.
How is the closure of Hormuz a problem of our making that we can fix?
Or umpteen other global issues.
C'mon.
We control our ability to react to global issues.
We also could and should have chosen to invest in our own energy sources, both hydrocarbons and renewables, and not acted to both block on shore wind, and block North Sea development.
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
Well remembered but you didn't get the facts quite right.
I was actually in Cambridge in November 2024 and had been invited to have dinner at the top table at Peterhouse College. It wasn't just myself and my wife but a large group of us looking at your posts and laughing ourselves silly as you got caught out lying spectacularly. You can refresh your memory by looking back at the post.
The fact that you remember that post I think says it all. I remember it because it was my 70th birthday. What is your reason for remembering something that happened a year and half ago and was so insignificant.
Rattled a bit by it were we? Having some doubts over our intellectual abilities are we? Have we been humiliated a few times tonight by a few here that are somewhat brighter than you like @Benpointer?
I remember it because your sequence of replies was possibly the most cringe-inducing moment in my entire time on PB - no exaggeration. It caused me physical pain as my gonads tried to burrow their way back into my lungs
Apparently, the Iranians are exporting increasing amounts of oil to China via rail. The question is whether that is enough for the Iranian regime to survive on.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
"This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago"
I mean, where to start with this? Maybe nowhere. What is wrong with you?
"Serious people no longer care about GDP, at all, whether it is GDP by PPP or nominal, or GDP per capita, it is all nonsense. What matters is the number of free milk fountains per hectare"
I knew you guys were dumb, I didn't realise you were THIS dumb
Yes, that's exactly right. There's not much point in an economy that does not deliver good outcomes for the people who live there - whether that is decent private incomes or great public services or free milk fountains (can you imagine the cleaning). GDP per capita strongly correlates with such outcomes - but it takes a bit more than that to achieve this.
Finland has a GDP per capita roughly the same as Mississippi. They live 10 years longer, their murder rate is 90% lower, their poverty rate is 90% lower, prison rate 95% lower. They have the best educational outcomes in the world - while 75% of 10 year olds in Mississippi cannot read. Which of the two countries do you think people in Britain wish to emulate?
In large part because that GDP is much more evenly distributed. A lot of US GDP is accrued to a tiny minority. This was true when I lived there 50 years ago, but much worse since.
I'm not clear what point is being made by the comparison with US prosperity ?
Europe using the US, and more to the point, neither are we. Our future economic fate largely rests largely with Europe (and always has), whether we're in or out of the EU.
The US is a continental petro state with the largest capital market in the world. That is not something we can emulate.
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
It was funny though - that incident. You thought you could park in a disabled spot in France even though you're neither French nor disabled.
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
@Leon_VotedForStarmer is this a kind thing to say? Is it a necessary thing to say? Is it an important thing to say? If it is none of these things then maybe you shouldn't be saying it.
1. @kjh waded into a conversation where he wasn't even mentioned - and started arguing with me
2. he then started insulting me
3. I have repaid the compliment
Do please tell me where I am going wrong
I dunno, it all seemed a bit OTT.
It is ok. I don't mind. Quite enjoying it really. Good to see him rattled and realise he isn't quite as bright as he thinks.
I see that Johnson's Mayoral legacy is still paying a dividend, under the 99 lease deal that West Ham signed they get a 50% rent reduction if they're relegated while the GLA still have to cover costs and stewarding for more games.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
"This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago"
I mean, where to start with this? Maybe nowhere. What is wrong with you?
"Serious people no longer care about GDP, at all, whether it is GDP by PPP or nominal, or GDP per capita, it is all nonsense. What matters is the number of free milk fountains per hectare"
I knew you guys were dumb, I didn't realise you were THIS dumb
Yes, that's exactly right. There's not much point in an economy that does not deliver good outcomes for the people who live there - whether that is decent private incomes or great public services or free milk fountains (can you imagine the cleaning). GDP per capita strongly correlates with such outcomes - but it takes a bit more than that to achieve this.
Finland has a GDP per capita roughly the same as Mississippi. They live 10 years longer, their murder rate is 90% lower, their poverty rate is 90% lower, prison rate 95% lower. They have the best educational outcomes in the world - while 75% of 10 year olds in Mississippi cannot read. Which of the two countries do you think people in Britain wish to emulate?
I've been to both, and yes I would absolutely rather live in New Orleans compared to.... Helsinki
New Orleans is a glorious capital of hedonism, and swooningly beautiful, with amazing food, amazing music and amazing Gulf oysters. Helsinki is.... boring but pleasant, with hideous winters. They do know how to use dill, however
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
A couple of points that I hope aren't controversial:
The American model is more efficient at generating GDP.
The "European" (whether that's UK or continental) range of models is more efficient at turning less GDP into more human thriving.
Both bits matter, and I'm pretty sure that, once a country is rich enough, the second one matters more.
Apparently, the Iranians are exporting increasing amounts of oil to China via rail. The question is whether that is enough for the Iranian regime to survive on.
One of the advantages of a dictatorial regime is that public opinion doesn't matter much. Iran knows that time is on its side.
Apparently, the Iranians are exporting increasing amounts of oil to China via rail. The question is whether that is enough for the Iranian regime to survive on.
As long as they can pay the army, police and IRGC the rest of the population can’t exactly protest .
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
@Leon_VotedForStarmer is this a kind thing to say? Is it a necessary thing to say? Is it an important thing to say? If it is none of these things then maybe you shouldn't be saying it.
1. @kjh waded into a conversation where he wasn't even mentioned - and started arguing with me
2. he then started insulting me
3. I have repaid the compliment
Do please tell me where I am going wrong
I dunno, it all seemed a bit OTT.
I dunno, it all seems a bit "Miss! Miss! @Leon is being mean to me!"
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
It was funny though - that incident. You thought you could park in a disabled spot in France even though you're neither French nor disabled.
It was. And the hole he dug just got deeper and deeper and it got funnier and funnier. We were sitting around the laptop laughing. We had consumed quite a lot of port by then though.
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
It was funny though - that incident. You thought you could park in a disabled spot in France even though you're neither French nor disabled.
It was. And the hole he dug just got deeper and deeper and it got funnier and funnier. We were sitting around the laptop laughing. We had consumed quite a lot of port by then though.
Andy Burnham’s allies have accused Wes Streeting of trying to derail the mayor’s campaign for No 10 by reopening Labour’s Brexit battles and playing into the hands of Reform UK
His intervention prompted a furious response from Burnham’s supporters, who said it was a deliberate attempt to elevate Brexit as an issue in the Leave-voting seat of Makerfield, which the mayor of Greater Manchester must win to contest the party leadership
One Burnham ally said: “Wes’s only hope at becoming the next leader is for Andy to lose the by-election. [Streeting’s] comments … are counterproductive to Labour winning this by-election. It’s very transparent.”
An MP close to Burnham said it was a “a roll of the dice” by Streeting because “he can see the writing is on the wall”. A friend of Burnham said Streeting was “clearly trying to create a dividing line.”
Andy Burnham’s allies have accused Wes Streeting of trying to derail the mayor’s campaign for No 10 by reopening Labour’s Brexit battles and playing into the hands of Reform UK
His intervention prompted a furious response from Burnham’s supporters, who said it was a deliberate attempt to elevate Brexit as an issue in the Leave-voting seat of Makerfield, which the mayor of Greater Manchester must win to contest the party leadership
One Burnham ally said: “Wes’s only hope at becoming the next leader is for Andy to lose the by-election. [Streeting’s] comments … are counterproductive to Labour winning this by-election. It’s very transparent.”
An MP close to Burnham said it was a “a roll of the dice” by Streeting because “he can see the writing is on the wall”. A friend of Burnham said Streeting was “clearly trying to create a dividing line.”
Everyone in Labour wants a leadership contest that involves "a battle of ideas". Just don't mention the B-word.
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
Well remembered but you didn't get the facts quite right.
I was actually in Cambridge in November 2024 and had been invited to have dinner at the top table at Peterhouse College. It wasn't just myself and my wife but a large group of us looking at your posts and laughing ourselves silly as you got caught out lying spectacularly. You can refresh your memory by looking back at the post.
The fact that you remember that post I think says it all. I remember it because it was my 70th birthday. What is your reason for remembering something that happened a year and half ago and was so insignificant.
Rattled a bit by it were we? Having some doubts over our intellectual abilities are we? Have we been humiliated a few times tonight by a few here that are somewhat brighter than you like @Benpointer?
I remember it because your sequence of replies was possibly the most cringe-inducing moment in my entire time on PB - no exaggeration. It caused me physical pain as my gonads tried to burrow their way back into my lungs
Lol. You are just making stuff up now, because my contribution was actually very minimal. It was others taking the piss out of you.
I'm not clear what point is being made by the comparison with US prosperity ?
Europe using the US, and more to the point, neither are we. Our future economic fate largely rests largely with Europe (and always has), whether we're in or out of the EU.
The US is a continental petro state with the largest capital market in the world. That is not something we can emulate.
Though, of course, Europe has some of the potential to do that. And a bit more of it, were we in the EU.
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
@Leon_VotedForStarmer is this a kind thing to say? Is it a necessary thing to say? Is it an important thing to say? If it is none of these things then maybe you shouldn't be saying it.
1. @kjh waded into a conversation where he wasn't even mentioned - and started arguing with me
2. he then started insulting me
3. I have repaid the compliment
Do please tell me where I am going wrong
I dunno, it all seemed a bit OTT.
I dunno, it all seems a bit "Miss! Miss! @Leon is being mean to me!"
All Labour leaders are vilified. In different ways, but all get it. The next one will get the same treatment. Doesn’t matter who they are or what they do.
I seem to have missed the bit where Major or Sunak (to a name just two) got an easy ride in the press.
All PMs get hammered.
Tony Blair managed to not get hammered (much) for a while, by a combination of tight message control and fairly good economic performance. This was an exception.
There’s a hard press when you leave d day early or call you own team bastards but there’s next level when you’re demon eyes, or your dead dad become a target, or they claim you’re a soviet mole. Starmer has been vilified to a remarkable extent before he’d even done anything.
The point is that whoever comes next for Labour will get hammered, however chippy they are today. It’s part of job.
The Left loves to demonise Conservatives (and other opponents). But thinks it's unnatural when the favour is returned.
The left don't have 95% of the media setting the political agenda in a very slanted direction.
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
It was funny though - that incident. You thought you could park in a disabled spot in France even though you're neither French nor disabled.
It was. And the hole he dug just got deeper and deeper and it got funnier and funnier. We were sitting around the laptop laughing. We had consumed quite a lot of port by then though.
One of those PB moments that sticks in memory. Funny how some do.
All Labour leaders are vilified. In different ways, but all get it. The next one will get the same treatment. Doesn’t matter who they are or what they do.
I seem to have missed the bit where Major or Sunak (to a name just two) got an easy ride in the press.
All PMs get hammered.
Tony Blair managed to not get hammered (much) for a while, by a combination of tight message control and fairly good economic performance. This was an exception.
There’s a hard press when you leave d day early or call you own team bastards but there’s next level when you’re demon eyes, or your dead dad become a target, or they claim you’re a soviet mole. Starmer has been vilified to a remarkable extent before he’d even done anything.
The point is that whoever comes next for Labour will get hammered, however chippy they are today. It’s part of job.
The Left loves to demonise Conservatives (and other opponents). But thinks it's unnatural when the favour is returned.
The left don't have 95% of the media setting the political agenda in a very slanted direction.
How much of that percentage do you allocate to TikTok, Instagram and Facebook?
Andy Burnham’s allies have accused Wes Streeting of trying to derail the mayor’s campaign for No 10 by reopening Labour’s Brexit battles and playing into the hands of Reform UK
His intervention prompted a furious response from Burnham’s supporters, who said it was a deliberate attempt to elevate Brexit as an issue in the Leave-voting seat of Makerfield, which the mayor of Greater Manchester must win to contest the party leadership
One Burnham ally said: “Wes’s only hope at becoming the next leader is for Andy to lose the by-election. [Streeting’s] comments … are counterproductive to Labour winning this by-election. It’s very transparent.”
An MP close to Burnham said it was a “a roll of the dice” by Streeting because “he can see the writing is on the wall”. A friend of Burnham said Streeting was “clearly trying to create a dividing line.”
Everyone in Labour wants a leadership contest that involves "a battle of ideas". Just don't mention the B-word.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
"This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago"
I mean, where to start with this? Maybe nowhere. What is wrong with you?
"Serious people no longer care about GDP, at all, whether it is GDP by PPP or nominal, or GDP per capita, it is all nonsense. What matters is the number of free milk fountains per hectare"
I knew you guys were dumb, I didn't realise you were THIS dumb
Yes, that's exactly right. There's not much point in an economy that does not deliver good outcomes for the people who live there - whether that is decent private incomes or great public services or free milk fountains (can you imagine the cleaning). GDP per capita strongly correlates with such outcomes - but it takes a bit more than that to achieve this.
Finland has a GDP per capita roughly the same as Mississippi. They live 10 years longer, their murder rate is 90% lower, their poverty rate is 90% lower, prison rate 95% lower. They have the best educational outcomes in the world - while 75% of 10 year olds in Mississippi cannot read. Which of the two countries do you think people in Britain wish to emulate?
I've been to both, and yes I would absolutely rather live in New Orleans compared to.... Helsinki
New Orleans is a glorious capital of hedonism, and swooningly beautiful, with amazing food, amazing music and amazing Gulf oysters. Helsinki is.... boring but pleasant, with hideous winters. They do know how to use dill, however
Andy Burnham’s allies have accused Wes Streeting of trying to derail the mayor’s campaign for No 10 by reopening Labour’s Brexit battles and playing into the hands of Reform UK
His intervention prompted a furious response from Burnham’s supporters, who said it was a deliberate attempt to elevate Brexit as an issue in the Leave-voting seat of Makerfield, which the mayor of Greater Manchester must win to contest the party leadership
One Burnham ally said: “Wes’s only hope at becoming the next leader is for Andy to lose the by-election. [Streeting’s] comments … are counterproductive to Labour winning this by-election. It’s very transparent.”
An MP close to Burnham said it was a “a roll of the dice” by Streeting because “he can see the writing is on the wall”. A friend of Burnham said Streeting was “clearly trying to create a dividing line.”
Everyone in Labour wants a leadership contest that involves "a battle of ideas". Just don't mention the B-word.
Maybe, I dunno, have some ideas for actually ruling the country, rather than your big idea being that you want to rule it less?
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
"This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago"
I mean, where to start with this? Maybe nowhere. What is wrong with you?
"Serious people no longer care about GDP, at all, whether it is GDP by PPP or nominal, or GDP per capita, it is all nonsense. What matters is the number of free milk fountains per hectare"
I knew you guys were dumb, I didn't realise you were THIS dumb
Yes, that's exactly right. There's not much point in an economy that does not deliver good outcomes for the people who live there - whether that is decent private incomes or great public services or free milk fountains (can you imagine the cleaning). GDP per capita strongly correlates with such outcomes - but it takes a bit more than that to achieve this.
Finland has a GDP per capita roughly the same as Mississippi. They live 10 years longer, their murder rate is 90% lower, their poverty rate is 90% lower, prison rate 95% lower. They have the best educational outcomes in the world - while 75% of 10 year olds in Mississippi cannot read. Which of the two countries do you think people in Britain wish to emulate?
I've been to both, and yes I would absolutely rather live in New Orleans compared to.... Helsinki
New Orleans is a glorious capital of hedonism, and swooningly beautiful, with amazing food, amazing music and amazing Gulf oysters. Helsinki is.... boring but pleasant, with hideous winters. They do know how to use dill, however
New Orleans is also in Louisiana
lol. Fair
However my wider point remains. I would rather live in the poorer bits of, say, the Deep South, than boring if somewhat prosperous bits of "Scandinavia"
I find Scandinavia incredibly dull. Even the toughest parts of America have a dynamism and energy that is lacking in much (but not all) of Europe
Andy Burnham’s allies have accused Wes Streeting of trying to derail the mayor’s campaign for No 10 by reopening Labour’s Brexit battles and playing into the hands of Reform UK
His intervention prompted a furious response from Burnham’s supporters, who said it was a deliberate attempt to elevate Brexit as an issue in the Leave-voting seat of Makerfield, which the mayor of Greater Manchester must win to contest the party leadership
One Burnham ally said: “Wes’s only hope at becoming the next leader is for Andy to lose the by-election. [Streeting’s] comments … are counterproductive to Labour winning this by-election. It’s very transparent.”
An MP close to Burnham said it was a “a roll of the dice” by Streeting because “he can see the writing is on the wall”. A friend of Burnham said Streeting was “clearly trying to create a dividing line.”
Everyone in Labour wants a leadership contest that involves "a battle of ideas". Just don't mention the B-word.
Burnham?
Boobs - given that Labour are contriving to give us another all male contest?
It's fascinating how the comments of the Centrist Dorks almost never contain data. Just effete opinions like
"Correlation causation conflation.
(like that - catchy)"
It's almost as if they don't have any evidence, just poignant yearning
"Cutting off our closest trading partner"
"Straight bananas har har har"
Fact free emotive drivel from the more intelligent and educated side of the argument.
I don't wish to be mean or coarse, that's not my style, but the PB Centrist Dads are stupid twats
You're posting that in solidarity with someone who doesn't understand key stage 3 level maths, the irony is appreciated.
Well Leon's logic abilities are also very limited so it isn't a surprise. It is so superficial. The other day he was having an economics argument with hyufd. Couldn't stop laughing it was so funny.
I remember when you were so amused by an argument about parking in France you shared it with your wife, and she was also "doubled over" in laughter, and then you went to a party in Newent and told all your "friends", and they were in "stitches"., Then you set up a website called "Leon's French Parking Problems" and it got five million fucking visitors and won a Pulitzer and the Nobel and then you held a global summit as you tattooed my face on your ridiculous caravanning face you stupid dismal ridiculous embarassing flailling dribbling sad testicle-shrinkingly-cringeworthy old TWAT
It was funny though - that incident. You thought you could park in a disabled spot in France even though you're neither French nor disabled.
It was. And the hole he dug just got deeper and deeper and it got funnier and funnier. We were sitting around the laptop laughing. We had consumed quite a lot of port by then though.
One of those PB moments that sticks in memory. Funny how some do.
As they say the best comedy is all down to the material and the delivery and in fairness to Leon he was faultless on both counts.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
A couple of points that I hope aren't controversial:
The American model is more efficient at generating GDP.
The "European" (whether that's UK or continental) range of models is more efficient at turning less GDP into more human thriving.
Both bits matter, and I'm pretty sure that, once a country is rich enough, the second one matters more.
How does the American model benefit us, as an independent country ?
We're never going to be part of the US; we're not big enough to copy them. We're certainly a good place, with our open markets, for them to asset strip and poach talent. But much more than that ?
Apparently, the Iranians are exporting increasing amounts of oil to China via rail. The question is whether that is enough for the Iranian regime to survive on.
Now if I were in the Chinese foreign ministry, I might be calculating that Iran gets about ( I believe shoot me down if I’m wrong) about $67bn per annum from oil , or about $33/34 bn between now and the US mid terms, which is chump change for the Chinese economy, and a nice soft loan to Iran (in Yuan of course) would tide them over and inflict maximum pressure on the Americans for minimal effort and risk.
Daily reminder that YIMBYism is about the self-interest of well paid graduates, not solving the housing crisis for those stuck on waiting lists.
Your value isn't based on your wage.
Labour must reject this grotesque social cleansing nonsense and build 000s of council homes.
Well the private sector isn't going to build council homes, the ensuing market correction will then help out the better paid graduates. Already happening according to the estate agent I talked to recently.
Andy Burnham’s allies have accused Wes Streeting of trying to derail the mayor’s campaign for No 10 by reopening Labour’s Brexit battles and playing into the hands of Reform UK
His intervention prompted a furious response from Burnham’s supporters, who said it was a deliberate attempt to elevate Brexit as an issue in the Leave-voting seat of Makerfield, which the mayor of Greater Manchester must win to contest the party leadership
One Burnham ally said: “Wes’s only hope at becoming the next leader is for Andy to lose the by-election. [Streeting’s] comments … are counterproductive to Labour winning this by-election. It’s very transparent.”
An MP close to Burnham said it was a “a roll of the dice” by Streeting because “he can see the writing is on the wall”. A friend of Burnham said Streeting was “clearly trying to create a dividing line.”
Streeting has resigned from the cabinet and is calling for Starmer to be replaced. Why on earth shouldn't he set out alternative policy ideas ? It is - yet again - the height of entitled arrogance for the Burnham camp to expect everyone just to roll over for him.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
A couple of points that I hope aren't controversial:
The American model is more efficient at generating GDP.
The "European" (whether that's UK or continental) range of models is more efficient at turning less GDP into more human thriving.
Both bits matter, and I'm pretty sure that, once a country is rich enough, the second one matters more.
How does the American model benefit us, as an independent country ?
We're never going to be part of the US; we're not big enough to copy them. We're certainly a good place, with our open markets, for them to asset strip and poach talent. But much more than that ?
How about the Taiwanese model with government spending of around 18% of GDP?
Andy Burnham’s allies have accused Wes Streeting of trying to derail the mayor’s campaign for No 10 by reopening Labour’s Brexit battles and playing into the hands of Reform UK
His intervention prompted a furious response from Burnham’s supporters, who said it was a deliberate attempt to elevate Brexit as an issue in the Leave-voting seat of Makerfield, which the mayor of Greater Manchester must win to contest the party leadership
One Burnham ally said: “Wes’s only hope at becoming the next leader is for Andy to lose the by-election. [Streeting’s] comments … are counterproductive to Labour winning this by-election. It’s very transparent.”
An MP close to Burnham said it was a “a roll of the dice” by Streeting because “he can see the writing is on the wall”. A friend of Burnham said Streeting was “clearly trying to create a dividing line.”
Streeting has resigned from the cabinet and is calling for Starmer to be replaced. Why on earth shouldn't he set out alternative policy ideas ? It is - yet again - the height of entitled arrogance for the Burnham camp to expect everyone just to roll over for him.
Apparently, the Iranians are exporting increasing amounts of oil to China via rail. The question is whether that is enough for the Iranian regime to survive on.
Now if I were in the Chinese foreign ministry, I might be calculating that Iran gets about ( I believe shoot me down if I’m wrong) about $67bn per annum from oil , or about $33/34 bn between now and the US mid terms, which is chump change for the Chinese economy, and a nice soft loan to Iran (in Yuan of course) would tide them over and inflict maximum pressure on the Americans for minimal effort and risk.
You can't export much oil by train though. It'll be a tiny fraction of their normal exports.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I know what the meme is, and it contains truth. My question is: what’s the sequitur? What’s the “therefore”?
The Europoor meme is almost entirely promulgated by Americans. I don’t think it’s because they really want us to do better, and are enthusiastically offering advice. So what is it? Simply a way of making themselves feel good? They’ve been richer than most of us for the better part of a century, yet the meme is recent.
We don’t, at least in polite company, deluge the internet with memes about how relatively poor those once powerful Greeks, or Egyptians, or Carthaginians are these days.
My hunch is this has very little to do with Europe and a lot to do with US domestic psychology and politics.
Apparently, the Iranians are exporting increasing amounts of oil to China via rail. The question is whether that is enough for the Iranian regime to survive on.
Now if I were in the Chinese foreign ministry, I might be calculating that Iran gets about ( I believe shoot me down if I’m wrong) about $67bn per annum from oil , or about $33/34 bn between now and the US mid terms, which is chump change for the Chinese economy, and a nice soft loan to Iran (in Yuan of course) would tide them over and inflict maximum pressure on the Americans for minimal effort and risk.
You can't export much oil by train though. It'll be a tiny fraction of their normal exports.
Yes exactly. But the Chinese can easily afford to replace the cash flow for Iran for six months without the Iranians exporting so much as a barrel.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
"This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago"
I mean, where to start with this? Maybe nowhere. What is wrong with you?
"Serious people no longer care about GDP, at all, whether it is GDP by PPP or nominal, or GDP per capita, it is all nonsense. What matters is the number of free milk fountains per hectare"
I knew you guys were dumb, I didn't realise you were THIS dumb
Yes, that's exactly right. There's not much point in an economy that does not deliver good outcomes for the people who live there - whether that is decent private incomes or great public services or free milk fountains (can you imagine the cleaning). GDP per capita strongly correlates with such outcomes - but it takes a bit more than that to achieve this.
Finland has a GDP per capita roughly the same as Mississippi. They live 10 years longer, their murder rate is 90% lower, their poverty rate is 90% lower, prison rate 95% lower. They have the best educational outcomes in the world - while 75% of 10 year olds in Mississippi cannot read. Which of the two countries do you think people in Britain wish to emulate?
I've been to both, and yes I would absolutely rather live in New Orleans compared to.... Helsinki
New Orleans is a glorious capital of hedonism, and swooningly beautiful, with amazing food, amazing music and amazing Gulf oysters. Helsinki is.... boring but pleasant, with hideous winters. They do know how to use dill, however
New Orleans is also in Louisiana
lol. Fair
However my wider point remains. I would rather live in the poorer bits of, say, the Deep South, than boring if somewhat prosperous bits of "Scandinavia"
I find Scandinavia incredibly dull. Even the toughest parts of America have a dynamism and energy that is lacking in much (but not all) of Europe
But, each to their own
Well go and live there. Your wider point is irrelevant to our political choices.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
"This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago"
I mean, where to start with this? Maybe nowhere. What is wrong with you?
"Serious people no longer care about GDP, at all, whether it is GDP by PPP or nominal, or GDP per capita, it is all nonsense. What matters is the number of free milk fountains per hectare"
I knew you guys were dumb, I didn't realise you were THIS dumb
Yes, that's exactly right. There's not much point in an economy that does not deliver good outcomes for the people who live there - whether that is decent private incomes or great public services or free milk fountains (can you imagine the cleaning). GDP per capita strongly correlates with such outcomes - but it takes a bit more than that to achieve this.
Finland has a GDP per capita roughly the same as Mississippi. They live 10 years longer, their murder rate is 90% lower, their poverty rate is 90% lower, prison rate 95% lower. They have the best educational outcomes in the world - while 75% of 10 year olds in Mississippi cannot read. Which of the two countries do you think people in Britain wish to emulate?
I've been to both, and yes I would absolutely rather live in New Orleans compared to.... Helsinki
New Orleans is a glorious capital of hedonism, and swooningly beautiful, with amazing food, amazing music and amazing Gulf oysters. Helsinki is.... boring but pleasant, with hideous winters. They do know how to use dill, however
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
"This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago"
I mean, where to start with this? Maybe nowhere. What is wrong with you?
"Serious people no longer care about GDP, at all, whether it is GDP by PPP or nominal, or GDP per capita, it is all nonsense. What matters is the number of free milk fountains per hectare"
I knew you guys were dumb, I didn't realise you were THIS dumb
Yes, that's exactly right. There's not much point in an economy that does not deliver good outcomes for the people who live there - whether that is decent private incomes or great public services or free milk fountains (can you imagine the cleaning). GDP per capita strongly correlates with such outcomes - but it takes a bit more than that to achieve this.
Finland has a GDP per capita roughly the same as Mississippi. They live 10 years longer, their murder rate is 90% lower, their poverty rate is 90% lower, prison rate 95% lower. They have the best educational outcomes in the world - while 75% of 10 year olds in Mississippi cannot read. Which of the two countries do you think people in Britain wish to emulate?
I've been to both, and yes I would absolutely rather live in New Orleans compared to.... Helsinki
New Orleans is a glorious capital of hedonism, and swooningly beautiful, with amazing food, amazing music and amazing Gulf oysters. Helsinki is.... boring but pleasant, with hideous winters. They do know how to use dill, however
New Orleans isn't in Mississippi.
It'll probably be part of the sea by the end of the century
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
"This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago"
I mean, where to start with this? Maybe nowhere. What is wrong with you?
"Serious people no longer care about GDP, at all, whether it is GDP by PPP or nominal, or GDP per capita, it is all nonsense. What matters is the number of free milk fountains per hectare"
I knew you guys were dumb, I didn't realise you were THIS dumb
Yes, that's exactly right. There's not much point in an economy that does not deliver good outcomes for the people who live there - whether that is decent private incomes or great public services or free milk fountains (can you imagine the cleaning). GDP per capita strongly correlates with such outcomes - but it takes a bit more than that to achieve this.
Finland has a GDP per capita roughly the same as Mississippi. They live 10 years longer, their murder rate is 90% lower, their poverty rate is 90% lower, prison rate 95% lower. They have the best educational outcomes in the world - while 75% of 10 year olds in Mississippi cannot read. Which of the two countries do you think people in Britain wish to emulate?
I've been to both, and yes I would absolutely rather live in New Orleans compared to.... Helsinki
New Orleans is a glorious capital of hedonism, and swooningly beautiful, with amazing food, amazing music and amazing Gulf oysters. Helsinki is.... boring but pleasant, with hideous winters. They do know how to use dill, however
New Orleans is also in Louisiana
lol. Fair
However my wider point remains. I would rather live in the poorer bits of, say, the Deep South, than boring if somewhat prosperous bits of "Scandinavia"
I find Scandinavia incredibly dull. Even the toughest parts of America have a dynamism and energy that is lacking in much (but not all) of Europe
But, each to their own
Well go and live there. Your wider point is irrelevant to our political choices.
One of the silliest bits of the Brexit debate was this idea that if we adopt policies similar to place X then we become like place X.
Let’s have an Australian-style points system. Then we’ll all live in eternal sunshine and spend our time surfing and having barbies. Let’s have a Norway-style deal and we’ll be an ultra-rich petrostate with a sovereign wealth fund.
A lot of the “we should trade more with places like New Zealand” was really just people envious of the All Blacks.
Just reposting this as as soon as I posted it a new thread opened !
I think Starmer had the right balance currently in terms of his EU reset . It gives something to those pro EU without becoming too divisive for those that voted to Leave .
When you look at polling on whether to rejoin it’s not the headline figure that’s important.
So the figure for rejoin according to YouGov is 55% but that drops to 36% when you caveat that with losing the UKs previous opt outs in terms of Schengen , the Euro and the rebate.
And in terms of government priorities 44% think it’s the wrong priority v 37% who think it should be .
I don’t think there’s an issue with putting it in a future Labour manifesto with the explicit understanding that the terms of re-joining are clearly laid out and agreed beforehand with the EU , something the Leave side failed to do with Brexit.
You can’t find many people more pro EU than me but I think this conversation is for down the road and not now.
Am I the only person who thinks that being in the EU with Schengen and the Euro is better than without?
Being in the Euro would lower the countries borrowing costs and I like Schengen but I don’t think we’re the voters any future rejoin campaign are worrying about.
In reality the UK could kick the Euro can far down the road as you can put in tests to join that you can never pass but most of the public don’t do nuance or grey areas . The stay out campaign will hammer the Euro issue .
... and rightly so.
Though plenty of reputable economists believe we should be in the Single Market, and maybe Schengen, very few support the UK's membership of the euro.
Being in the euro would be an economic catastrophe because it would mean that our monetary and exchange rate policy would be set, not according to our needs, but those of other countries, with whose economic cycles we are often not aligned.
Every generation except the current one in the last century has made this mistake, and every time it has ended in financial disaster. Adopting the gold standard after the first world war led to a perma-slump in the 1920s; using a fixed exchange rate after the Second World War impeded recovery until there was a large devaluation in 1949, pretty much the same thing happened in 1967, and shadowing and then joining the ERM gave us an unnecssary period of inflation then slump around 1990 before we were forced out in 1992.
Thank God we kept out of the euro which nearly collapsed (and probably would have collapsed completely had we been members) in 2012.
Still, if we need to repeat the same blunder again, so be it. But we shouldn't be in any illusions as to what happens to debtor countries in exchange rate mechanisms rigged in favour of creditors - short-lived boom followed by long-lasting or even permanent recession and one or more lost decades of growth as a result.
Joining the Euro is a decision that can only be taken once.
There are at least 19 examples of countries leaving currency unions, so it’s not an irrevocable decision.
But there are no examples of anyone quitting the euro. Because it is so inextricably tied in to the political union that goes with it, and because economics is a lot more complex these days
What's more, if the euro really did fracture, that would be a disaster not just for the economy leaving, but for all euro members. The currency would suddenly come into question, the foundations of the EU would tremble, and European debt would become way more expensive. Calamity
This is why, in extremis, Brussels will over-rule democratic votes and send in the euro-commissars to run countries - Italy, Greece - rather than risk anyone leaving the euro. But how long can they keep doing that without a major revolt? What happens if Le Pen wins in Paris? Or, even more extreme, the AfD in Germany?
The euro is a disaster waiting to happen
Everything's a disaster waiting to happen if you just big up the possible future negative developments.
Arguably, the disaster has already happened. European growth was meant to be boosted, significantly, by the euro. That's what all the europhile economists claimed. Has this happened? Let's check the numbers
Eurozone GDP grew 1.5% across 2025; the ECB projects 1.4% in 2025, 1.2% in 2026, and 1.4% in 2027 and 2028. That's, frankly, dismal. America is achieving twice this rate of growth, and has done for yeears. Look at the wider picture and it gets even worse. The eurozone has averaged something like 1.3% real GDP growth for a quarter of a century. The convergence with American living standards that was supposed to follow Maastricht has, to put it politely, not occurred. Europe has gone backwards
So the euro is shite
America has political and monetary union as it happens. And several other structural advantages. I doubt Europe would have matched its growth if it had simply kept all its little separate currencies.
Why?
Because it makes no sense. The overperformer of the two places is the one that has fully developed political and monetary union. Would it do even better as 50 sovereign states with 50 currencies? One can't know but my sense is not. Any case, the US v Europe economic performance delta is not down to currency technicalities. There's loads of factors.
It's massive energy surplus and exports are the oily elephant in the room and overlooked by so many deregulate and dehumanise types. Hard not to grow when you've so much energy coming out the wells.
And its global reserve currency.
Many many factors.
It's a beast, the US economy. Even Trump2 can't wreck it.
Do you think the Euro has been a success for Italy?
Not really. Nor was the Lire. Success or failure of a country's economy isn't mainly down to what currency it uses.
Has Italy's growth performance got better or worse under the Euro?
I'm not sure Mario Draghi would share your positive take on the European economy.
I can give you the answer
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Italy has averaged 0.4% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Italy averaged 2.4% real GDP growth per annum
Put it another way: in the 26 years before joining the euro, the Italian economy grew by about 55%. In the 26 years since, it has grown by 14%
Adopting the euro meant Italian growth was slashed to a fifth of what it was before. For Italy, the euro was a disaster
In the 26 years since the euro's inception (1999-2024), Japan has averaged 0.7% real GDP growth per annum
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
But remember Mississippi is significantly richer than the UK.
They have substantially more Ss. 4 of them. And 2 Ps. We have none.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
The meme is: even the poorest bits of America are now richer than most of Europe. And it is true, and it is now visibly true
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
I can only find one EU state with a lower life expectancy - Bulgaria. Their infant mortality is twice as high as Bulgaria's. They are more than twice as obese as the fattest EU country. Their murder rate is 5x the highest anywhere in the EU. Their absolute poverty rate is 28%, v the EU at about 6%.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
A couple of points that I hope aren't controversial:
The American model is more efficient at generating GDP.
The "European" (whether that's UK or continental) range of models is more efficient at turning less GDP into more human thriving.
Both bits matter, and I'm pretty sure that, once a country is rich enough, the second one matters more.
How does the American model benefit us, as an independent country ?
We're never going to be part of the US; we're not big enough to copy them. We're certainly a good place, with our open markets, for them to asset strip and poach talent. But much more than that ?
How about the Taiwanese model with government spending of around 18% of GDP?
The Taiwanese model was built on luck, an economically enlightened government which subsidised their nascent chip industry, and being a very cheap place (less than a fifth of the US per capita GDP) when they started.
Coping that is also not possible, unless you think we can impose something like an 80% cut in standard of living to make us a more attractive location for manufacturing ?
You do touch on something important, though, which is the growing importance of manufacturing to remain an advanced economy.
Burnhams comments on the EU aren’t exactly hidden away in a drawer . Reform had plenty of material to work with already .
Not sure this briefing to the Times helps much as it might get picked up by the general media and turn into a bigger story.
It's a foretaste of how bitter the Labour civil war over Starmer's replacement will be.
My straw poll of a few dozen Labour types over the last few days suggests Burnham is almost universally seen as the messiah. Whatever floats their boat I suppose. So I’m not convinced by the civil war thing.
Andy Burnham’s allies have accused Wes Streeting of trying to derail the mayor’s campaign for No 10 by reopening Labour’s Brexit battles and playing into the hands of Reform UK
His intervention prompted a furious response from Burnham’s supporters, who said it was a deliberate attempt to elevate Brexit as an issue in the Leave-voting seat of Makerfield, which the mayor of Greater Manchester must win to contest the party leadership
One Burnham ally said: “Wes’s only hope at becoming the next leader is for Andy to lose the by-election. [Streeting’s] comments … are counterproductive to Labour winning this by-election. It’s very transparent.”
An MP close to Burnham said it was a “a roll of the dice” by Streeting because “he can see the writing is on the wall”. A friend of Burnham said Streeting was “clearly trying to create a dividing line.”
Streeting has resigned from the cabinet and is calling for Starmer to be replaced. Why on earth shouldn't he set out alternative policy ideas ? It is - yet again - the height of entitled arrogance for the Burnham camp to expect everyone just to roll over for him.
A pathetic response to Streeting.
Pathetic but not wrong.
It's an analysis a serious contender wouldn't make a public fuss over even if they believed it.
Comments
In the 26 years PRECEDING the euro's inception (1973-1999) Japan averaged 3.1% real GDP growth per annum
Check it. The euro has had a far reaching impact.
Right now he’s inspiring hope and people don’t hate him.
It is perfectly possible for anyone to be worse than who's currently in office and pissing you off.
It's really shit logic.
I still search for the sequitur from the whole Europoor meme. Is it simply to make American social media types feel smug? Or is there some policy prescription?
We do fine, generally.
But a nurse on $40000 here might wonder, but for UK-USA FoM, could she be on $140000?
I'm not sure what your problem is, with actual data?
Compelling.
All PMs get hammered.
Tony Blair managed to not get hammered (much) for a while, by a combination of tight message control and fairly good economic performance. This was an exception.
He just comes across well, human.
This is why serious people moved away from GDP, in all its forms, some time ago.
The point is that whoever comes next for Labour will get hammered, however chippy they are today. It’s part of job.
I mean, where to start with this? Maybe nowhere. What is wrong with you?
"Serious people no longer care about GDP, at all, whether it is GDP by PPP or nominal, or GDP per capita, it is all nonsense. What matters is the number of free milk fountains per hectare"
I knew you guys were dumb, I didn't realise you were THIS dumb
Here we go again.
Monday markets tomorrow.
More desperate threats from the stain on humanity .
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cd0p4y9y48xo
2. he then started insulting me
3. I have repaid the compliment
Do please tell me where I am going wrong
What have stains on humanity ever done to you that you compare them to Trump?
I was actually in Cambridge in November 2024 and had been invited to have dinner at the top table at Peterhouse College. It wasn't just myself and my wife but a large group of us looking at your posts and laughing ourselves silly as you got caught out lying spectacularly. You can refresh your memory by looking back at the post.
The fact that you remember that post I think says it all. I remember it because it was my 70th birthday. What is your reason for remembering something that happened a year and half ago and was so insignificant.
Rattled a bit by it were we? Having some doubts over our intellectual abilities are we? Have we been humiliated a few times tonight by a few here that are somewhat brighter than you like @Benpointer?
And as per every weekend for the last few weeks - we have this:
WarMonitor🇺🇦🇬🇧
@WarMonitor3
Huge US airforce airlift operation today to bases all around the Middle East in preparation of now likely upcoming strikes on Iran.
https://x.com/WarMonitor3/status/2056070533167415488
Finland has a GDP per capita roughly the same as Mississippi. They live 10 years longer, their murder rate is 90% lower, their poverty rate is 90% lower, prison rate 95% lower. They have the best educational outcomes in the world - while 75% of 10 year olds in Mississippi cannot read. Which of the two countries do you think people in Britain wish to emulate?
American roads are notably good, especially given that they have a more extreme climate and a lot of traffic
Are some in disrepair? Yes. But so are roads half a mile from me, in arguably the wealthiest corner of Europe
Europe using the US, and more to the point, neither are we. Our future economic fate largely rests largely with Europe (and always has), whether we're in or out of the EU.
The US is a continental petro state with the largest capital market in the world. That is not something we can emulate.
New Orleans is a glorious capital of hedonism, and swooningly beautiful, with amazing food, amazing music and amazing Gulf oysters. Helsinki is.... boring but pleasant, with hideous winters. They do know how to use dill, however
The American model is more efficient at generating GDP.
The "European" (whether that's UK or continental) range of models is more efficient at turning less GDP into more human thriving.
Both bits matter, and I'm pretty sure that, once a country is rich enough, the second one matters more.
EXCLUSIVE from @MaxKendix
Andy Burnham’s allies have accused Wes Streeting of trying to derail the mayor’s campaign for No 10 by reopening Labour’s Brexit battles and playing into the hands of Reform UK
His intervention prompted a furious response from Burnham’s supporters, who said it was a deliberate attempt to elevate Brexit as an issue in the Leave-voting seat of Makerfield, which the mayor of Greater Manchester must win to contest the party leadership
One Burnham ally said: “Wes’s only hope at becoming the next leader is for Andy to lose the by-election. [Streeting’s] comments … are counterproductive to Labour winning this by-election. It’s very transparent.”
An MP close to Burnham said it was a “a roll of the dice” by Streeting because “he can see the writing is on the wall”. A friend of Burnham said Streeting was “clearly trying to create a dividing line.”
So you have just made that all up again.
You are not very good at this are you?
Mrs Peschcisolido has jumped ship.
Watch this space.
However my wider point remains. I would rather live in the poorer bits of, say, the Deep South, than boring if somewhat prosperous bits of "Scandinavia"
I find Scandinavia incredibly dull. Even the toughest parts of America have a dynamism and energy that is lacking in much (but not all) of Europe
But, each to their own
https://x.com/CHinchliffMP/status/2055962167401193809
Daily reminder that YIMBYism is about the self-interest of well paid graduates, not solving the housing crisis for those stuck on waiting lists.
Your value isn't based on your wage.
Labour must reject this grotesque social cleansing nonsense and build 000s of council homes.
We're never going to be part of the US; we're not big enough to copy them.
We're certainly a good place, with our open markets, for them to asset strip and poach talent. But much more than that ?
Already happening according to the estate agent I talked to recently.
Why on earth shouldn't he set out alternative policy ideas ? It is - yet again - the height of entitled arrogance for the Burnham camp to expect everyone just to roll over for him.
A pathetic response to Streeting.
The Europoor meme is almost entirely promulgated by Americans. I don’t think it’s because they really want us to do better, and are enthusiastically offering advice. So what is it? Simply a way of making themselves feel good? They’ve been richer than most of us for the better part of a century, yet the meme is recent.
We don’t, at least in polite company, deluge the internet with memes about how relatively poor those once powerful Greeks, or Egyptians, or Carthaginians are these days.
My hunch is this has very little to do with Europe and a lot to do with US domestic psychology and politics.
Not sure this briefing to the Times helps much as it might get picked up by the general media and turn into a bigger story.
Your wider point is irrelevant to our political choices.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/may/04/new-orleans-sea-levels-relocation-climate-crisis
Let’s have an Australian-style points system. Then we’ll all live in eternal sunshine and spend our time surfing and having barbies. Let’s have a Norway-style deal and we’ll be an ultra-rich petrostate with a sovereign wealth fund.
A lot of the “we should trade more with places like New Zealand” was really just people envious of the All Blacks.
Coping that is also not possible, unless you think we can impose something like an 80% cut in standard of living to make us a more attractive location for manufacturing ?
You do touch on something important, though, which is the growing importance of manufacturing to remain an advanced economy.