Economy question

[Chicken Runner61]

You have to watch the ones in Grantham especially carefully. Or at least their daughters.

She was only the grocers daughter but she certainly knew how to ruin the country

 

[Lord Bracknell]

Bang on...

Loved the greengrocer reference. Trouble is, it's too complicated to debate in 'sound bites '....too easy to be dumbed down by fascist Aussi propagandists.

Remember when we had a Tory prime minister who used matchstick to work out how the economy functioned?

 

[Hugh'sDad]

Remember when we had a Tory prime minister who used matchstick to work out how the economy functioned?

That Premier was using a book about nail manufacturing in the Eighteenth century as a guide.
Absolute simpleton.

 

[RexCathedra]

That Premier was using a book about nail manufacturing in the Eighteenth century as a guide.
Absolute simpleton.

If by 'nails' you mean 'pins', more harm has come from reading 'just the famous bits' from An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of The Wealth of Nations than any other I can think of, except the Bible.

Give me a candidate who can spout bits from The Theory of Moral Sentiments:

The very beginning is a good place to start.

How selfish soever man may be supposed, there are evidently some principles in his nature, which interest him in the fortune of others, and render their happiness necessary to him, though he derives nothing from it except the pleasure of seeing it. Of this kind is pity or compassion, the emotion which we feel for the misery of others, when we either see it, or are made to conceive it in a very lively manner. That we often derive sorrow from the sorrow of others, is a matter of fact too obvious to require any instances to prove it; for this sentiment, like all the other original passions of human nature, is by no means confined to the virtuous and humane, though they perhaps may feel it with the most exquisite sensibility. The greatest ruffian, the most hardened violator of the laws of society, is not altogether without it.

 

[Chicken Runner61]

I'm not defending New labour but in 2008 when the WORLD economy crashed and created austerity across the globe New labour were only carrying on from where Maggie and Major left off They didn't change or curb anything that was being done when they took over in 97 they just complicated the tax and benefits system even more whilst trusting the city and big business to finance and privatise it further.

If you take the issues that are important, the economy, Europe, the banks, the NHS pensions funds and unemployment in most cases the tories started the rot in the back end of the last century when they sold off the utilities, destroyed social values and family life and made it socially acceptable to be long term unemployed because they destroyed jobs and services. If New labour was anything other than a load of left wing tories they would have reversed and recreated a lot what was destroyed before 97 but all they did was to create new benefits and complicate household finance and taxation further.

And the same things are going to happen again because there isn't one party out there that is going to do anything but change the branding of the deckchairs of the titanic

 

[RexCathedra]

...t all they did was to create new benefits and complicate household finance and taxation further.

I'm curious what the 'new benefits' were.... There aren't many places in the developed world where social provision is being extended, and not contracted.

 

[beorhthelm]

There's a difference between debt and deficit. A deficit is the difference between incomings and spending in one year. Debt is deficits added up over the years. The Tories initial plan was to get rid of the deficit in the 2010-15 parliament; they actually only got rid of about half of it (which is what Labour were planning back in 2010) and this is the reason why Cooper correctly states that they've borrowed an extra £200bn than they planned.

given that Labour had the same projections on growth to hand in 2010, planned less cuts/more spending, by how much do you expect they would have reduced the deficit? its rhetorical, of course we dont know, but there is no way in hades the deficit would have been less. the stated aim of Balls along the way, to spend more to try and fuel growth, would have possibly increased growth while definately increasing debt.

 

[Hugh'sDad]

If by 'nails' you mean 'pins', more harm has come from reading 'just the famous bits' from An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of The Wealth of Nations than any other I can think of, except the Bible.

A fair analogy......and both are, indeed, texts friable by the passage of time and science advancement.

Give me hard core Mad Max, anyday.

“Is not all the stupid chatter of most of our newspapers the babble of fools who suffer from the fixed idea of morality, legality, christianity and so forth, and only seem to go about free because the madhouse in which they walk takes in so broad a space?
MS 1844”

 

[knocky1]

She was only the grocers daughter but she certainly knew how to ruin the country

The Grocer was only her Father but he certainly knew how to ruin the young girls who worked for him. Reported in The Independent.

 

[knocky1]

Except he was a butcher needing his sausages handled. True I hasten to add.

 

[Chicken Runner61]

I'm curious what the 'new benefits' were.... There aren't many places in the developed world where social provision is being extended, and not contracted.

Tax Credits and working tax credits - a complex waste of money that encouraged divorce, separation and single parent families which in turn created a shortage of housing and house inflation, buy to let and increased rents which again made the housing situation worse which encouraged the banks to lend more which created a bigger boom which turned to bust and austerity which caused more hardship divorce and separation which results in more benefits and on and on and on.

I'm all for helping people who need help but giving people benefits to work was dumber than giving them benefit not to work. Its another reason we have zero hour contracts and why some people can't/don't work more than 16 hours or they are worse off!!!

The whole tax and benefit system needs to be closed down and reintroduced with a fairer simpler system but they can't do it because the current system is so complex you would harshly effect people who are dependant on it in the while it is sorted out

 

[knocky1]

Property sales have had an impact on reducing the deficit.

 

[Hugh'sDad]

... its rhetorical, of course we dont know, but there is no way in hades the deficit would have been less. the stated aim of Balls along the way, to spend more to try and fuel growth, would have possibly increased growth while definately increasing debt.

So which is it? An unknown?...A knowable lunknown...

 

[RexCathedra]

Tax Credits and working tax credits - a complex waste of money that encouraged divorce, separation and single parent families which in turn created a shortage of housing and house inflation, buy to let and increased rents which again made the housing situation worse which encouraged the banks to lend more which created a bigger boom which turned to bust and austerity which caused more hardship divorce and separation which results in more benefits and on and on and on.

I'm all for helping people who need help but giving people benefits to work was dumber than giving them benefit not to work. Its another reason we have zero hour contracts and why some people can't/don't work more than 16 hours or they are worse off!!!

The whole tax and benefit system needs to be closed down and reintroduced with a fairer simpler system but they can't do it because the current system is so complex you would harshly effect people who are dependant on it in the while it is sorted out

Sounds like an argument for the UBI.....

 

[drew]

If you earn £40,000 a year, you'd probably be happy with outgoings of £39,000 a year (ie no deficit). You'd also be happy if you had a mortgage of £120,000, even though you were carrying a substantial debt, that you weren't going to clear for at least another 20 years.

That's a novel idea. I assumed all Tories purchase their properties with cash in hand and have never had to get a mortgage!

They halved it but not in absolute terms, only as a percentage of GDP.

George O has put on more than debt in this parliament than he actually inherited.

The only reason we have our head above water is some people are still prepared to lend to us at 2%

In summary the Tories have grown the economy but only with a massive increment of personal and public debt

They moved the goalposts. When they came in they said they would eradicate the deficit during the lifetime of the government. It was, I believe £170b in 2010 and most people would take cutting by half to be that it is now less than £85b. However, they are now measuring it in terms of a percentage of GDP and I believe on that basis they can argue that it has halved because GDP is higher now than in 2010.

 

[Hampster Gull]

The whole tax and benefit system needs to be closed down and reintroduced with a fairer simpler system but they can't do it because the current system is so complex you would harshly effect people who are dependant on it in the while it is sorted out

I think there is something in this. Perhaps we should just get rid of the whole lot of credits,benefits etc and replace it with a minimum income for all. And thats it. Stop pandering to the middle classes with all sort of give backs of their own money, lets look after the weakest and incentivise work.

 

[Norman Baker suck my lozenge]

One burning question for Me is,why are we borrowing Billions to give it all away?
I certainly wouldn't go asking for a loan just so India could send an Indian into space.
Perhaps I'm the only one but I really don't get this.

 

[jackanada]

One burning question for Me is,why are we borrowing Billions to give it all away?
I certainly wouldn't go asking for a loan just so India could send an Indian into space.
Perhaps I'm the only one but I really don't get this.

We give them billions from the public purse, in return they give hundreds of millions to our arms firms creating private profit.
All you have to do to understand any of our governments policies is to understand increasing wealth inequality is the goal.

 

[Lincoln Imp]

You have to watch the ones in Grantham especially carefully. Or at least their daughters.

You leave Grantham out of it. Nice town. Anyway, he wasn't a greengrocer. A right snob though, according to my father.

 

[Norman Baker suck my lozenge]

We give them billions from the public purse, in return they give hundreds of millions to our arms firms creating private profit.
All you have to do to understand any of our governments policies is to understand increasing wealth inequality is the goal.

Seems crazy doesn't it?
The far more sensible option would for us to spend our money on our own armed forces.
I'll never understand the old school tie bollox.