Politics Thread (encompassing Brexit) - 21 June 2017 onwards

[leicsmac]

12 hours ago, Sampson said:

 

Like the way the Left have somehow managed to convince some of their followers that things like gay marriage and abortion are somehow Left/Right issues when they have very little to with being left or right and they seem to never acknowledge Cameron's Centre-Right government with introducing gay marriage (and the fact the majority of countries who have introduced gay marriage have done so by Centrist and Right wing governments).

 

Economics is everything! It's what puts food on your table, it's what gets you jobs, it's what stops or creates wars, it's what facilitates or puts barriers up to innovation. it's how you solve huge global problems, it's what provides individual freedom or not, it's what resources are used and what comes into this country, it's the way the world works, it's what's made the world what it is today. Economics is not just how much tax you or you don't pay or whether you can buy a house or not, it should be the first thing anyone interested in politics reads and learns about. Economics is the study of the human-made world in the same way Physics is a study of the natural world.

 

I think John Maynard Keynes (probably one of the top 5 most important  and influential British people in history (as is Adam Smith)) put it best: “The ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed, the world is ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influences, are usually slaves of some defunct economist.”

2

 

Firstly, thank you for the comprehensiveness of your reply!

 

I'll cover the first paragraph quoted here briefly first as I do have something to say on that: neither gay marriage nor abortion are particularly hot potato issues in the UK (and any government could indeed have done the legal stuff on them)...but here in the US they most definitely are, and it is absolutely a left/right issue. You only need to look at the main band of opposition towards both of those things to see that. I would also posit that it is similar around the world: the main opposition to abortion and gay marriage will always be religious conservative; hence, right wing in their beliefs. (Of course, that particular ideology is only one small subset of the right and doesn't nearly cover all of them). I'd also love to see proof that right/centrist governments around the world were responsible for both of those things becoming legal in the countries they have...first time I've ever seen the Obama administration described as centrist/right wing, though touche about the Nixon one, haha.

 

Now..on the economics front...

 

I absolutely agree that economics is a hugely important thing to a lot of people, and is responsible for a lot of the moving and shaking on the Earth today. With that in mind, however...it is also a fact that the economic systems we use are entirely human-crafted and only work because people believe they are important (like the whole idea of money, for instance: it only has the value humans ascribe to it). It is not even close to being a hard science in the way that physics is: it is a belief system - several different ones, actually, all fighting for supremacy in the sure belief that they supply the codex of the way that humans should behave and lead to prosperity for as many people as possible in as short a time as possible. And all, in their own way, reducing at least some people to the proper position of a semicolon on a spreadsheet.

 

I don't deny the very real importance that the distribution of money has in todays society; of course, you can see its influence everywhere, as you put very well. But like money itself, it only has the value we ascribe to it, and that changes - how much use is money or economic systems to a sick or dead man, for instance, beyond maybe easing his suffering and taking care of the body (not that he'd care much about the latter)? And seeing as humans are (by certain standards) very short-lived, unlike other areas of science it does not concern itself with the truly long-term...something I consider to be very important indeed. Economic ideas of any kind, after all, only work when you have at least a reasonably stable civilisation in which they can be applied. The real value, long term...lies in humans themselves and the resources we have to work with, here and elsewhere - not in arbitrary systems that apply value to them. And even though we're not close to such a thing yet, long term humans have to be using the present economic systems as a method to work towards a time where money is outmoded and unimportant...nothing more.

 

You might ask why I consider those concerns more important than more immediate economic ones when everyone else doesn't: and really...that comes down to this; at least someone has to look at the future beyond the end of their own lives, or that future might not be very bright.

 

3 hours ago, MattP said:

Only a person in a wealthy country could say this, FWP's personified.

 

As Sampson said, a good economy policy delivering wealth to a country is one of the things that keeps a nation happy, you wouldn't be so blaise about economics if you had to stand in line for 3 hours a day to be given your ration of turnips as they do in some countries.

 

 

2

I've largely covered this above, but I'll add a bit; as above, I don't deny that it has importance and that I personally have benefitted from economic works in various places up until now. However, once again - that wealth and resultant happiness only has the value that humans put on it, and as such it could change very quickly indeed. Thus, I consider other things in the long term more important.

[Guest MattP]

5 minutes ago, Fox Ulike said:

I want it to be in proportion to the % wealth  that they own.

 

On a global scale, the richest 1% own 99% of the wealth (according to Oxfam).  So that's how much they should pay.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-35339475

 

How much do you think they should pay?

What proportion is that then?

 

I don't support a wealth tax, I've just told you that, unless we have a global tax system (which is not going to happen) it's totally pointless.

 

3 minutes ago, Buce said:

32 trillion dollars is stashed in offshore accounts to avoid tax; the Tories have done nothing to retrieve any of that (for obvious reasons) - maybe Labour will do better.

That's just not true, this Tory government has actually collected more than any other previously.

 

Again though, how are Labour going to do this, they keep telling us they are going to try and get it, but never a reason how. Do you really think these countries in the Carribbean and gong to destroy their own economies by allowing us to raid their banks?

[Carl the Llama]

12 minutes ago, Innovindil said:

Who's trolling? You said people would be fine with giving up their hard earned money to "help the country" which clearly would mean helping the poorer of our country. Then went babbling out about people not wanting to live with refuse. 

 

Not my fault your metaphor was offensive. 

 

Fallen from your high horse. So sad. 

 

I'm not going to entertain you further in here while you're behaving like this, check your pms.

[Buce]

Just now, MattP said:

What proportion is that then?

 

I don't support a wealth tax, I've just told you that, unless we have a global tax system (which is not going to happen) it's totally pointless.

 

That's just not true, this Tory government has actually collected more than any other previously.

 

Again though, how are Labour going to do this, they keep telling us they are going to try and get it, but never a reason how. Do you really think these countries in the Carribbean and gong to destroy their own economies by allowing us to raid their banks?

 

Nothing squared is still nothing.

 

Many of them are British dependencies.

[Guest MattP]

Just now, Buce said:

Nothing squared is still nothing.

 

Many of them are British dependencies.

So...we are going to do it how?

[Buce]

2 minutes ago, MattP said:

So...we are going to do it how?

 

I'm not the person to ask, I don't have the political power or knowledge.

 

But by claiming the Tories have done so, you are accepting that it's possible.

[Sampson]

4 minutes ago, Fox Ulike said:

It's a good point.

 

I think the first step though is agreeing if it's necessary to tax more money from the billionaires. Do you agree with this?

 

Once we have a society that's agreed upon the need for wealth distribution from mega rich people, we can then work out how we could go about doing it.

 

I mean honestly, who needs a billion pounds? It's obscene.

What do you think people do with that billion pounds though and how did they create it?

 

Do you honestly think they just hoard it for no reason or do they invest it in up and coming companies with innovative ideas, do they create a company and ideas which creates tens of thousands of jobs for people, do they try and sell products and services to billions of people which makes their lives better and more efficient? 

 

People make money because other people like what they do so give money to them! That's the laws of supply and demand, no one makes money with useless products and services that no one wants because no one gives them anything for it!

 

Capitalism has many many flaws, but the reason it's the least bad Economic system humans have ever come up with is because it allows society to dictate what they want through supply and demand and people who create innovative ideas which people like to make money off it therefore investing in infrastructure of their company creating wealth, jobs and technological improvements along the way and they can also invest in businesses who's ideas they like through the stock market (which is essentially just crowd funding).

 

If Elon Musk or Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg or any other capitalist come up with products and services people like and in some cases even make the world better when they find ways to sell them to the masses and create tens of thousands of jobs and create lots of wealth for the international economy in the process.

 

No, markets are not perfect and yes, plenty of greedy make money from capitalism and it's perfectly natural to feel annoyed at wealth imbalance but wealth imbalance isn't some huge conspiracy there to keep rich people happy and **** the majority that only you and a few others have woken up to. It's there for a reason!

 

What happens if you force all business to pay extra tax - those businesses either go to other countries, cannot afford to create extra or new jobs, do not create extra wealth which goes back into the economy through investment or spending etc. or they do not create products and services that make people's lives better.

 

Maybe one day, we'll find a system which is better than Capitalism but mass wealth redistribution in Socialism absolutely is a tried and failed method. It curbs innovation which makes things like food, travel, electricity, heat etc. cheaper, better and more efficient and it causes so much less wealth creation.

 

Yes, it causes greater Economic equality - but only because it keeps everyone poorer and a nation poorer and less technologically and systematically innovative.

 

It's absolutely fair to compare Corbyn to Trump tbf (and I hate the Daily Mail abd the hard Right so dont give me that). They're both Populists who just spout anything to try and appeal to the working man. Just at opposite ends of the spectrum.

[Guest MattP]

2 minutes ago, Buce said:

I'm not the person to ask, I don't have the political power or knowledge.

 

But by claiming the Tories have done so, you are accepting that it's possible.

The amounts are pitiful though, the Tories crowed about 8 billion over 5 years and even Labour don't believe they can raise more than 20 billion from it in a term - 35 trillion may be hidden but that figure is made up mainly of pensions and shares no government even can have access to anyway.

 

Ironically, in the last parliament it was Labour BLOCKING attempts to punish tax avoiders.

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/04/28/labour-accused-hypocrisy-blocking-measures-crackdown-86billion/

[James.]

2 minutes ago, MattP said:

I understand the case, I'm just trying to work out what the point of it is.

 

We have 104 billionaires in the UK, so even if you take 10million each off of them it would rake in just over a billion pounds, which is less than 0.2% of our total tax rate. So we put a wealth tax on the highest earners, send a message to the World we are anti-wealth, assumed as anti-business and it raises a pittance, it's probably the daftest idea I've heard yet so I fully expect the Labour party to take this on.

 

The sooner we work out a proper tax system rather than chasing money off billionaire boogeymen the better, I thought we had finally left this nonsense behind.

I think you are taking the example I gave a little too literally. The principle is we should have a better way of forcing a more even distribution of wealth.

 

I spent nearly 6 months living in Mumbai and every day I saw extreme wealth next to extreme poverty. I have never gotten over the sense of injustice and disgust at how that situation is tolerated and often simply ignored as if it is just the way it is and nothing can or should be done about it. How can you have such wealth alongside people who cannot afford to feed or cloth their children?

 

I guess what I'm talking about is beyond the scope of national politics and laws - reading the thread just triggered that same sense of wrongness that I felt in India about the state of our society and prompted me to think about mechanisms that might go some way to addressing it.

[Buce]

1 minute ago, MattP said:

The amounts are pitiful though, the Tories crowed about 8 billion over 5 years and even Labour don't believe they can raise more than 20 billion from it in a term - 35 trillion may be hidden but that figure is made up mainly of pensions and shares no government even can have access to anyway.

 

Ironically, in the last parliament it was Labour BLOCKING attempts to punish tax avoiders.

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/04/28/labour-accused-hypocrisy-blocking-measures-crackdown-86billion/

 

20 billion is pitiful?

 

Yet £186 million clawed back from the EU per week is worth leaving the EU for?

 

Double standards there.

[Guest MattP]

4 minutes ago, Buce said:

20 billion is pitiful?

 

Yet £186 million clawed back from the EU per week is worth leaving the EU for?

 

Double standards there.

Apologies,  I meant pitiful in terms of the pointime that 35 trillion is hidden away.

 

Also my decision to leave EU was nothing to do with wealth or finance. 

[Rincewind]

Some billionaires could spend on a breakfast what others have to live on for a month. Would it not be nice for them to spend just half of that so someone else can make a better choice between eating and heating.

Some of the most generous people I have met have had little themselves. They know what it is like to struggle.

Some don't know where the next £1 is coming from and some don't know where the next £1000 is coming fromThe difference being the first can only feed the electric meter one day, the second can feed it or 18 months.

[Innovindil]

3 minutes ago, Rincewind said:

Some billionaires could spend on a breakfast what others have to live on for a month. Would it not be nice for them to spend just half of that so someone else can make a better choice between eating and heating.

Some of the most generous people I have met have had little themselves. They know what it is like to struggle.

Some don't know where the next £1 is coming from and some don't know where the next £1000 is coming fromThe difference being the first can only feed the electric meter one day, the second can feed it or 18 months.

Of course it would. Some billionaires do. Like Bill gates. The good he's done with his fortune should be held as a shining light to others. 

 

But there is a difference between wanting and forcing. And that's where the difficulties lay. 

[Sampson]

33 minutes ago, leicsmac said:

 

Firstly, thank you for the comprehensiveness of your reply!

 

I'll cover the first paragraph quoted here briefly first as I do have something to say on that: neither gay marriage nor abortion are particularly hot potato issues in the UK (and any government could indeed have done the legal stuff on them)...but here in the US they most definitely are, and it is absolutely a left/right issue. You only need to look at the main band of opposition towards both of those things to see that. I would also posit that it is similar around the world: the main opposition to abortion and gay marriage will always be religious conservative; hence, right wing in their beliefs. (Of course, that particular ideology is only one small subset of the right and doesn't nearly cover all of them). I'd also love to see proof that right/centrist governments around the world were responsible for both of those things becoming legal in the countries they have...first time I've ever seen the Obama administration described as centrist/right wing, though touche about the Nixon one, haha.

 

Now..on the economics front...

 

I absolutely agree that economics is a hugely important thing to a lot of people, and is responsible for a lot of the moving and shaking on the Earth today. With that in mind, however...it is also a fact that the economic systems we use are entirely human-crafted and only work because people believe they are important (like the whole idea of money, for instance: it only has the value humans ascribe to it). It is not even close to being a hard science in the way that physics is: it is a belief system - several different ones, actually, all fighting for supremacy in the sure belief that they supply the codex of the way that humans should behave and lead to prosperity for as many people as possible in as short a time as possible. And all, in their own way, reducing at least some people to the proper position of a semicolon on a spreadsheet.

 

I don't deny the very real importance that the distribution of money has in todays society; of course, you can see its influence everywhere, as you put very well. But like money itself, it only has the value we ascribe to it, and that changes - how much use is money or economic systems to a sick or dead man, for instance, beyond maybe easing his suffering and taking care of the body (not that he'd care much about the latter)? And seeing as humans are (by certain standards) very short-lived, unlike other areas of science it does not concern itself with the truly long-term...something I consider to be very important indeed. Economic ideas of any kind, after all, only work when you have at least a reasonably stable civilisation in which they can be applied. The real value, long term...lies in humans themselves and the resources we have to work with, here and elsewhere - not in arbitrary systems that apply value to them. And even though we're not close to such a thing yet, long term humans have to be using the present economic systems as a method to work towards a time where money is outmoded and unimportant...nothing more.

 

You might ask why I consider those concerns more important than more immediate economic ones when everyone else doesn't: and really...that comes down to this; at least someone has to look at the future beyond the end of their own lives, or that future might not be very bright.

 

I've largely covered this above, but I'll add a bit; as above, I don't deny that it has importance and that I personally have benefitted from economic works in various places up until now. However, once again - that wealth and resultant happiness only has the value that humans put on it, and as such it could change very quickly indeed. Thus, I consider other things in the long term more important.

Obama is absolutely a Centrist to Centre-Right politician. I understand America never had a Socialist movement like the rest of the world so you've got a weird distorted view of things but the guy is overwhelmingly in favour of the free market.

 

Go and read about the Weimar Republic where money became so worthless it essentially didn't exist and why it led to the Nazi Party coming into power. Or Hungary following the Second World War after becoming a Soviet puppet state.

 

The alternative to money is a Barter System. Every human being can be as nice and as well intentioned as they want but they still only have limited labour time and most of us want leisure time too. Once you give up money, everyone has to barter their specialised skills away and to who they will help provide them to in their limited labour time and that is incredibly inefficient especially as most products require many different steps to happen.

 

Money allows an extremely quick and standardised means of exchange - that's literally all it is - a way you get an amount for the favours you have provided to others so you can spend it so other people can provide favours to you - society and the laws of supply and demand decides what each favour is worth and that's all money represents.

 

Of course plenty of people abuse money and get greedy but money is absolutely an inherently good thing. The alternative is having to go to someone (who could be the other side of the world and speaking a completely different language to you) and barter a favour out of their limited labour hours and hope they don't have 30,000 other people also trying to use their particular expertise in society in their limited amount of labour hours.

 

Money is so so efficient. It's one of the greatest inventions humans have ever come up with and probably the single biggest invention above any other that have got us to where we are as a society and as educated and well informed as all of human history and the shared information over the ages has allowed us to get.

 

No one will deny that like any system there aren't huge flaws with it, but pretty much everything from scientific, technological and societal innovation come from it. Money is one of the main things that seperate humans from Chimpanzees or other society based animals like ants or bees.

 

It's what allows 7 billion humans to interact with each other and work with each other whereas sociological research seems to suggest that 150 people is about the maximum a group can work with each other without such systems.

 

I do not believe there will ever or can ever be an Economic future where it doesn't exist without completely destroying human societal efficiency because the Barter System is just such a horribly inefficient alternative to it. 

 

So yes, Economics matters and will always matter while human society exists.

Edited 27 September 2017 by Sampson

[Guest MattP]

Comfortably my favourite newspaper headline of the day.

 

"Run on the pound likely under Labour, warns Labour"

[Fox Ulike]

4 minutes ago, Sampson said:

What do you think people do with that billion pounds though and how did they create it?

 

Do you honestly think they just hoard it for no reason or do they invest it in up and coming companies with innovative ideas, do they create a company and ideas which creates tens of thousands of jobs for people, do they try and sell products and services to billions of people which makes their lives better and more efficient? 

 

People make money because other people like what they do so give money to them! That's the laws of supply and demand, no one makes money with useless products and services that no one wants because no one gives them anything for it!

 

Capitalism has many many flaws, but the reason it's the least bad Economic system humans have ever come up with is because it allows society to dictate what they want through supply and demand and people who create innovative ideas which people like to make money off it therefore investing in infrastructure of their company creating wealth, jobs and technological improvements along the way and they can also invest in businesses who's ideas they like through the stock market (which is essentially just crowd funding).

 

If Elon Musk or Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg or any other capitalist come up with products and services people like and in some cases even make the world better when they find ways to sell them to the masses and create tens of thousands of jobs and create lots of wealth for the international economy in the process.

 

No, markets are not perfect and yes, plenty of greedy make money from capitalism and it's perfectly natural to feel annoyed at wealth imbalance but wealth imbalance isn't some huge conspiracy there to keep rich people happy and **** the majority that only you and a few others have woken up to. It's there for a reason!

 

What happens if you force all business to pay extra tax - those businesses either go to other countries, cannot afford to create extra or new jobs, do not create extra wealth which goes back into the economy through investment or spending etc. or they do not create products and services that make people's lives better.

 

Maybe one day, we'll find a system which is better than Capitalism but mass wealth redistribution in Socialism absolutely is a tried and failed method. It curbs innovation which makes things like food, travel, electricity, heat etc. cheaper, better and more efficient and it causes so much less wealth creation.

 

Yes, it causes greater Economic equality - but only because it keeps everyone poorer and a nation poorer and less technologically and systematically innovative.

 

It's absolutely fair to compare Corbyn to Trump tbf (and I hate the Daily Mail abd the hard Right so dont give me that). They're both Populists who just spout anything to try and appeal to the working man. Just at opposite ends of the spectrum.

 

Trying to reduce poverty doesn't necessarily have to involve a full-on Socialist revolution, Comrade 

 

I think you should try harder to envisage a world that isn't at either end of the extremes. A capitalist system which tries to prevent people from living in poverty isn't too much to ask.

 

 

[Buce]

4 minutes ago, MattP said:

Comfortably my favourite newspaper headline of the day.

 

"Run on the pound likely under Labour, warns Labour"

 

It's a lie, though, isn't it.

 

Fake news.

[Guest MattP]

Just now, Buce said:

It's a lie, though, isn't it.

 

Fake news.

Stretching the truth, but very funny.

 

I don't ever think we'll ever see a shadow chancellor again announce his economic policy on a stage, then move to a different stage to announce he'll make back up plans if it goes tits up.

 

They are certainly entertaining these Labour conferences, one thing I'll give them.

[Fox Ulike]

1 minute ago, Buce said:

 

It's a lie, though, isn't it.

 

Fake news.

Unfortunately not too far from the truth!

 

Seriously, what has happened to the Centre ground in British politics?

 

Is it so hard to be pro-business and support public services?

 

Why don't 70% of the electorate vote Liberal Democrat??

 

I only ask because I have NO idea of the answers...

[Carl the Llama]

Just now, Fox Ulike said:

Unfortunately not too far from the truth!

 

Seriously, what has happened to the Centre ground in British politics?

 

Is it so hard to be pro-business and support public services?

 

Why don't 70% of the electorate vote Liberal Democrat??

 

I only ask because I have NO idea of the answers...

Because we all paid dearly for it last time a large number of voters backed the libs.

[Fox Ulike]

Just now, Carl the Llama said:

Because we all paid dearly for it last time a large number of voters backed the libs.

Ah yes. Now I remember.

 

You know that's probably not too far from the truth - that the Lib Dems perceived 'sell-out' in 2010 has left us with the stark choice between the extremes of right and left.

 

And Vince Cable is not the answer - and it doesn't even matter what the question is!

 

God help us.

[Guest MattP]

Liberal Democrats can't even get half their own members to vote for them these days.

 

Had it not been for the EU position they would have got my vote in the summer, was the most sensible manifesto of the lot.

[Fox Ulike]

1 minute ago, MattP said:

Liberal Democrats can't even get half their own members to vote for them these days.

 

Had it not been for the EU position they would have got my vote in the summer, was the most sensible manifesto of the lot.

Me too. I'd vote for them every time if I felt that they had even a remote chance of winning.

[Finnegan]

6 minutes ago, Fox Ulike said:

Unfortunately not too far from the truth!

 

Seriously, what has happened to the Centre ground in British politics?

 

Is it so hard to be pro-business and support public services?

 

Why don't 70% of the electorate vote Liberal Democrat??

 

I only ask because I have NO idea of the answers...

 

Lib Dems should disband for a year or so and pop up in time for the next GE masquerading as some sensible, balanced, modern liberal alternative to all the hysteria on both sides. 

 

This should be their time, really, there's a huge lack of common sense middle ground. Far too much awful, populist politics at the moment. I mean, it's the only reason we're leaving the ****ing EU. 

 

But the Lib Dems as they are are just unelectable. Years of being a joke fringe party and then the coalition disaster, they need an enormous makeover to ever be a credible vote. 

[Sampson]

39 minutes ago, Fox Ulike said:

 

Trying to reduce poverty doesn't necessarily have to involve a full-on Socialist revolution, Comrade 

 

I think you should try harder to envisage a world that isn't at either end of the extremes. A capitalist system which tries to prevent people from living in poverty isn't too much to ask.

 

 

But that's exactly what already does exist in Western and Central Europe, North America and countries like Australia, New Zealand, Japan, South Korea etc. now and that's what I believe in - the modern liberal capitalist state with checks and balances like minimum wage laws, anti-trust laws, competition laws etc. Socialised essentials like health care, schooling, police force etc. for services where the importance to offer to all vastly outweighs the inefficiencies which nationalisation inevitibly brings - Western Liberal modern day Capitalism already has brought people better qualities of lives than any other system - to the point that for the first time in history in the West more people die from obesity and suicide than they do of starvation - the problem is people concentrate too much on how much money they have compared to others rather than what their money can actually afford them in comparison to the past.

 

But there always has to be an element of financial inequality in this system and there has to be a class system. The problem is though, that doesn't necessarily mean people's lives and quality of life doesn't go up because of Economic inequality. The standard of living increase in Capitalist states over the past 100 or 200 odd years vastly outweighs pretty much any other system humans have ever devised because it naturally increases innovation and ideas which companies will make more money if they can sell these ideas to the masses.

 

No one is saying that wealth inequality isn't horrible but it's how societies move forward - it's how we innovate - because 99% of products and services offered won't benefit society in a big way, but that 1% that do - the Ford motor car or the cheap sliced bread which costs the average person 5 minutes of labour or the movie camera or the computer or the Lidl model supermarket - you need to allow the financial freedom for the 100% of products attempts to go through to allow these innovations so that what society dictates as the good ones can go through and you also need to allow for innovation creating competition too. You need to allow for the capitalists to create the national wealth so both they and other people invest in these ideas and create these jobs.

Edited 27 September 2017 by Sampson