Politics Thread (encompassing Brexit) - 21 June 2017 onwards

[Guest]

6 minutes ago, Webbo said:

France's and Portugal's unemployment is twice ours. Germany is benefiting from an undervalued currency and Canada's economy shrunk a little last quarter. You've picked on 1 statistic to pretend everything is a disaster.

 

If the roles were reversed we'd be having the same argument only you'd be saying unemployment was more important. 

The BOE only this week said that the world economy is booming whilst ours is only just growing. This is due to austerity and, latterly, Brexit.

[Rogstanley]

13 minutes ago, Webbo said:

France's and Portugal's unemployment is twice ours. Germany is benefiting from an undervalued currency and Canada's economy shrunk a little last quarter. You've picked on 1 statistic to pretend everything is a disaster.

 

If the roles were reversed we'd be having the same argument only you'd be saying unemployment was more important. 

Obviously I can't speak for everyone, but wage growth is the most important measure for me. For me, the whole point of a functioning economy is to improve the lives of ordinary people via improved wages. Right now we have an economy that serves business, as evidenced by the fact that businesses are raking in record profits, but it does not serve ordinary people, as evidenced by the fact that wages have fallen in real terms. Funnily enough prioritising the wants of business over the needs of people is what Tory governments always get criticised for. Their supporters always defend them, saying it's not true and yet, seven years in, here we are.

Edited 6 November 2017 by Rogstanley

[Guest MattP]

6 minutes ago, toddybad said:

The BOE only this week said that the world economy is booming whilst ours is only just growing. This is due to austerity and, latterly, Brexit.

Brexit hasn't happened yet and the country is still borrowing far more than it raises, austerity is just a buzzword that doesn't mean much - in reality we are just borrowing less money and starting to get closer to living within our means as a country. 

 

We pay about 50billion in interest on our debt per year now, I have no idea what figure that needs to get to before everyone agrees we need to do something about it.

[Guest Kopfkino]

8 minutes ago, Rogstanley said:

What more proof do you want than the official government statistics which say wages have gone down?

 

The average median salary has decreased but that doesn't mean anyone is worse off. If a tonne of people move from benefits to low skilled employment that pays below the median wage then the median wage comes down but nobody is worse off. In fact those people are better off because they are earning rather than claiming benefits and absolutely no proof anyone else is worse off. Now had we shed a load of low-paid jobs and seen our median wage rise as a result (as has happened in Spain) you'd be proclaiming success. It's ****ing basic GCSE Maths ffs. Since the crisis, only in 2011 have real wages not risen for those in continuous employment (accounting for 80% of workers).

[Buce]

11 minutes ago, MattP said:

Brexit hasn't happened yet and the country is still borrowing far more than it raises, austerity is just a buzzword that doesn't mean much - in reality we are just borrowing less money and starting to get closer to living within our means as a country. 

 

We pay about 50billion in interest on our debt per year now, I have no idea what figure that needs to get to before everyone agrees we need to do something about it.

 

Nobody disagrees that the debt needs to come down.

 

The disagreement comes over who should shoulder the burden, and it is disproportionately the poor who do so.

[Rogstanley]

12 minutes ago, MattP said:

Brexit hasn't happened yet and the country is still borrowing far more than it raises, austerity is just a buzzword that doesn't mean much - in reality we are just borrowing less money and starting to get closer to living within our means as a country. 

 

We pay about 50billion in interest on our debt per year now, I have no idea what figure that needs to get to before everyone agrees we need to do something about it.

I think we all agree on doing something about it. Its just that the 'something' doesn't have to be austerity which disproportionatly hits people who have the least to offer while providing additional profits for people who already have more than enough (and I'm saying that as somebody who is categorically not a socialist before someone jumps in with the whole capitalism vs socialism irrelvance).

 

Seriously, have a good look at Portugal. They've ended austerity and decreased their deficit. It's a model we might want to think about following.

[Guest]

20 minutes ago, MattP said:

Brexit hasn't happened yet and the country is still borrowing far more than it raises, austerity is just a buzzword that doesn't mean much - in reality we are just borrowing less money and starting to get closer to living within our means as a country. 

 

We pay about 50billion in interest on our debt per year now, I have no idea what figure that needs to get to before everyone agrees we need to do something about it.

This is all meaningless. You borrow to grow then growth takes over. We aren't growing* and are carrying out anti growth policies.

 

 

 

 

*much

Edited 6 November 2017 by Guest

[Webbo]

39 minutes ago, Rogstanley said:

Obviously I can't speak for everyone, but wage growth is the most important measure for me. For me, the whole point of a functioning economy is to improve the lives of ordinary people via improved wages. Right now we have an economy that serves business, as evidenced by the fact that businesses are raking in record profits, but it does not serve ordinary people, as evidenced by the fact that wages have fallen in real terms. Funnily enough prioritising the wants of business over the needs of people is what Tory governments always get criticised for. Their supporters always defend them, saying it's not true and yet, seven years in, here we are.

You'd rather people in work had increased wages at the expense of mass unemployment? What happened to for the many not the few? Maybe businesses have record profits because they don't need to increase wages?

[Rogstanley]

21 minutes ago, KingGTF said:

 

The average median salary has decreased but that doesn't mean anyone is worse off. If a tonne of people move from benefits to low skilled employment that pays below the median wage then the median wage comes down but nobody is worse off. In fact those people are better off because they are earning rather than claiming benefits and absolutely no proof anyone else is worse off. Now had we shed a load of low-paid jobs and seen our median wage rise as a result (as has happened in Spain) you'd be proclaiming success. It's ****ing basic GCSE Maths ffs. Since the crisis, only in 2011 have real wages not risen for those in continuous employment (accounting for 80% of workers).

Ignore low skilled employment then. Wages have still fallen. Look at individual job areas, most have fallen. 

 

You're wrong, but even if you were right, what you would be saying is that we are being transformed from a relatively high skill, high wage country into one which has a much greater proportion of low skilled, low paid jobs, which itself is not a good thing. The downskilling of the population is hardky something you'd want to brag about. And before anyone says it, the jobs cone before the immigrants, not the other way around.

[Rogstanley]

2 minutes ago, Webbo said:

You'd rather people in work had increased wages at the expense of mass unemployment? What happened to for the many not the few? Maybe businesses have record profits because they don't need to increase wages?

Nowhere did i say I wanted 'mass unemployment'.

 

Would I accept slightly higher unemployment for higher wages and a better quality of jobs? To a point yes.

 

But that's not the choice, as Germany and others show, it isn't necessary to have high unemployment to raise wages. If anything the opposite is true.

 

The question really, for you, is do you think austerity has been a success? How many more years of falling wages are you willing to tolerate while deficit targets are continuously missed?

[Webbo]

2 minutes ago, Rogstanley said:

Nowhere did i say I wanted 'mass unemployment'.

 

Would I accept slightly higher unemployment for higher wages and a better quality of jobs? To a point yes.

 

But that's not the choice, as Germany and others show, it isn't necessary to have high unemployment to raise wages. If anything the opposite is true.

 

The question really, for you, is do you think austerity has been a success? How many more years of falling wages are you willing to tolerate while deficit targets are continuously missed?

You said that France and Portugal are doing better than us France's unemployment rate is 9.5%, Portugal's is 8.8%. It's no good just quoting Germany, they're the exception not the rule.

[Webbo]

26 minutes ago, toddybad said:

This is all meaningless. You borrow to grow then growth takes over. We aren't growing* and are carrying out anti growth policies.

 

 

 

 

*much

According to these figures the UK is predicted to growth faster than France and italy this year.

https://ec.europa.eu/info/business-economy-euro/economic-performance-and-forecasts/economic-forecasts/spring-2017-economic-forecast_en#economic-forecast-by-country

 

Germany too.

[Rogstanley]

1 minute ago, Webbo said:

You said that France and Portugal are doing better than us France's unemployment rate is 9.5%, Portugal's is 8.8%. It's no good just quoting Germany, they're the exception not the rule.

I could tolerate those numbers. But that's not the choice.

 

Has austerity been a success?

Edited 6 November 2017 by Rogstanley

[Webbo]

1 minute ago, Rogstanley said:

I could tolerate those numbers. But that's not the choice.

 

Has austerity been a success?

Well up until the Brexit vote, which although I voted leave the tories officially wanted us to remain, we had the fastest growing economy in the G7 , created the most jobs and more than halved the deficit so on balance I'd say yes. Even since the vote we're still growing faster than France and Italy.

[EnderbyFox]

 

[Guest MattP]

56 minutes ago, Buce said:

Nobody disagrees that the debt needs to come down.

 

The disagreement comes over who should shoulder the burden, and it is disproportionately the poor who do so.

Glad to hear it, I hope both parties can eventually come to an agreement that enshrines some sort of fiscal responsibility regarding debt and deficit into law.

 

51 minutes ago, toddybad said:

This is all meaningless. You borrow to grow then growth takes over. We aren't growing* and are carrying out anti growth policies.

 

 

 

 

*much

If if was just that easy, borrow then grow so much you outstrip your debt every country in the World would just do it.

 

Unfortunately it's far more complex than that. 

[Guest MattP]

Despite Brexit....

 

 

[Guest]

14 minutes ago, MattP said:

Glad to hear it, I hope both parties can eventually come to an agreement that enshrines some sort of fiscal responsibility regarding debt and deficit into law.

 

If if was just that easy, borrow then grow so much you outstrip your debt every country in the World would just do it.

 

Unfortunately it's far more complex than that. 

But when borrowing costs have been at their lowest level ever, that is precisely the time to invest in infrastructure. Instead we've taken money out of the economy. Its economically illiterate.

[Guest]

9 minutes ago, MattP said:

Despite Brexit....

 

 

QE continues. QE is the reason the stock markets are at record levels despite the real economy looking decidedly murky. 

[Rogstanley]

44 minutes ago, Webbo said:

Well up until the Brexit vote, which although I voted leave the tories officially wanted us to remain, we had the fastest growing economy in the G7 , created the most jobs and more than halved the deficit so on balance I'd say yes. Even since the vote we're still growing faster than France and Italy.

Of what use is an economy that is growing fast ordinary people aren't feeling the benefit? 

 

Pretty much the only reason the UK economy has grown at all over the last ten years is immigration, which you were criticising earlier on, so now I don't know what to believe. Is immigration good or bad?

 

So you're happy with progress on the deficit despite it being much slower than the conservatives said it would be?

[Guest Kopfkino]

22 minutes ago, Rogstanley said:

Ignore low skilled employment then. Wages have still fallen. Look at individual job areas, most have fallen. 

 

You're wrong, but even if you were right, what you would be saying is that we are being transformed from a relatively high skill, high wage country into one which has a much greater proportion of low skilled, low paid jobs, which itself is not a good thing. The downskilling of the population is hardky something you'd want to brag about. And before anyone says it, the jobs cone before the immigrants, not the other way around.

 

So austerity disproportionately impacts the poor but I have to ignore low skilled employment, typically the domain of the poor. Might that be because the median disposable income of the poorest has increased by the most in real terms since 2007. I am looking at individual job areas, I have the ONS figures for this in a tab and it tells a different story to you tell. The only fall is in leisure and care. I'd ask you to show me evidence but it won't be forthcoming. Fact is your oversimplification of a dynamic labour market doesn't actually tell us what is happening to individuals and in reality you have no idea. 

 

No what I am saying is your median figures do not account for people entering or leaving the workforce. Whereas if you look at people in work over both years in a two year period you find that wage growth hasn't been so bad. It could (I'm not saying this is true) equally be that those higher up the earnings scale are leaving the labour market (as happens because income and age correlate) and younger folk are joining the labour market at the bottom end. 

 

What you're actually saying is on average, the jobs held in 2016 do not pay very much better than those in 2008. But they are different jobs, held by different people. Fewer low-paying jobs could have been created so median real earnings would be higher and you'd not be moaning but more people would be unemployed or economically inactive but GDP per capita would be the same and those in work would be supporting more out of work. 

 

So I asked for proof that people are actually worse off and you can't give me proof because your median figures don't show that. Those that have maintained continuous employment are better off (by your measure) and those that have moved into employment are presumably better off. I am yet to see proof that individuals are actually worse but there is proof that those in continuous employment (80% of FT workers) are better off. 

 

I have at no point ever said this is optimal so the last point of bragging is not relevant. 

[Rogstanley]

9 minutes ago, toddybad said:

QE continues. QE is the reason the stock markets are at record levels despite the real economy looking decidedly murky. 

Also the collapse in the pound caused by the brexit vote. Most FTSE revenues come from abroad so are in no way a reflection of the health of the British economy. Simply when the pound collapses those foreign earnings are suddenly worth more and the shares suddenly become cheaper to anyone holding foreign currency. Looking at the ftse100 priced in dollars gives you a very different picture.

 

[Webbo]

6 minutes ago, Rogstanley said:

Of what use is an economy that is growing fast ordinary people aren't feeling the benefit? 

 

Pretty much the only reason the UK economy has grown at all over the last ten years is immigration, which you were criticising earlier on, so now I don't know what to believe. Is immigration good or bad?

 

So you're happy with progress on the deficit despite it being much slower than the conservatives said it would be?

That's why I voted for brexit.

[Guest MattP]

18 minutes ago, toddybad said:

QE continues. QE is the reason the stock markets are at record levels despite the real economy looking decidedly murky. 

You've just made that up haven't you?

[Guest]

38 minutes ago, Rogstanley said:

Also the collapse in the pound caused by the brexit vote. Most FTSE revenues come from abroad so are in no way a reflection of the health of the British economy. Simply when the pound collapses those foreign earnings are suddenly worth more and the shares suddenly become cheaper to anyone holding foreign currency. Looking at the ftse100 priced in dollars gives you a very different picture.

 

As seen here. Ftse at post Brexit vote low today