General News

[grobyfox1990]

5 hours ago, HighPeakFox said:

Is there a reason you're making this personal?

Yes an in joke from the previous days trump back n forth posts. Relax dude, Phil and I got a thing 

[Lionator]

4 hours ago, The Horse's Mouth said:

We really are finished as a country aren’t we 

We have an aging population and we need to pay for it. The whole of the west is experiencing the same issues (America aside as opioids are dealing with that problem). 

[Trav Le Bleu]

5 minutes ago, grobyfox1990 said:

Yes an in joke from the previous days trump back n forth posts. Relax dude, Phil and I got a thing 

 

[HighPeakFox]

40 minutes ago, grobyfox1990 said:

Yes an in joke from the previous days trump back n forth posts. Relax dude, Phil and I got a thing 

OK, thanks for explaining - I try to keep out of such stuff so am a little slow.

[CosbehFox]

 

genuinely lovely that 

[ealingfox]

7 hours ago, South Shire Fox said:

Guessing you dont own a petrol/diesel car then? Not to mention how raising fuel prices directly affects the increased prices at the supermarket

 

Correct. More budget should go to public transport, active travel schemes and EV infrastructure. 

 

Even a 1p increase would have afforded the retention of the £2 bus fare cap, with a couple of hundred million left over.

[Innovindil]

Chancellor Rachel Reeves tells the BBC it's likely her tax-raising Budget may affect pay for workers, as businesses will have to absorb the costs of paying more National Insurance or give out smaller pay rises

 

Well at least she realises it'll be the workers that actually pay the bill. 

[Babylon]

14 hours ago, SkidsFox said:

Thank you. Go back a couple of years (when I ran a shop here in NW London) there was a place took over by a ME barber. He'd moved from working in a place a mile up the road but fancied running his own business. It turned out he couldn't attract enough customers so closed up shop and went back to working for someone else. The Albanian hairdresser next door almost closed too because of lack of trade, but then started renting out chairs (and those who rented chairs brought in the customers).

I'm afraid there's a lot of wishful Schrodingers' thinking going on here. Migrants are only here to take benefits and freebies, but if they do have the cojones to start their own business (and starting a barbers or fast food can be a low cost way to start up) then obviously it's all money-laundering (clue in most cases it's not).

The lads I know explain it pretty clearly really, coming over here from another country with a sketchy grasp of the language in many cases. You're likely to end up in a warehouse or factory doing long hours for hard graft andd little money. There are very little other opportunities to start with, so picking up a pair of clippers is an avenue out of that. 

[Sampson]

6 hours ago, The Horse's Mouth said:

We really are finished as a country aren’t we 

It’s the same in every western country tbh and even many developing nations now too (see how China’s pension system is bankrupt in many regions for example) No country no knows how to deal with population ageing and no country has been able to successfully get the birth rate up. Meanwhile, no country has been able to deal with the political fall out of the immigration that’s needed to successfully deal with population ageing or the populists who are using endless anti-immigrant rhetoric for their own ends. 
 

Reality is, older people are naturally the ones who use the majority of public money - be it healthcare, disability benefits or pensions, and when most of your country is over 50, you don’t have enough workers to generate that public money and even the richest country isn’t going to be able to afford it. 

Edited 31 October 2024 by Sampson

[leicsmac]

24 minutes ago, Sampson said:

It’s the same in every western country tbh and even many developing nations now too (see how China’s pension system is bankrupt in many regions for example) No country no knows how to deal with population ageing and no country has been able to successfully get the birth rate up. Meanwhile, no country has been able to deal with the political fall out of the immigration that’s needed to successfully deal with population ageing or the populists who are using endless anti-immigrant rhetoric for their own ends. 
 

Reality is, older people are naturally the ones who use the majority of public money - be it healthcare, disability benefits or pensions, and when most of your country is over 50, you don’t have enough workers to generate that public money and even the richest country isn’t going to be able to afford it. 

Yeah.

 

There's a demographic crisis on the way that no one really wants to talk about casually, much less politically.

 

Incentivising higher birth rates of "natives" won't work either because it'll simply contribute to an ongoing world population growth that will end very, very badly.

 

There are no good options on this one, I don't think - it will be about trying to pick the best bad one.

[grobyfox1990]

33 minutes ago, Sampson said:

It’s the same in every western country tbh and even many developing nations now too (see how China’s pension system is bankrupt in many regions for example) No country no knows how to deal with population ageing and no country has been able to successfully get the birth rate up. Meanwhile, no country has been able to deal with the political fall out of the immigration that’s needed to successfully deal with population ageing or the populists who are using endless anti-immigrant rhetoric for their own ends. 
 

Reality is, older people are naturally the ones who use the majority of public money - be it healthcare, disability benefits or pensions, and when most of your country is over 50, you don’t have enough workers to generate that public money and even the richest country isn’t going to be able to afford it. 

Good post, and we can see what will develop if an ageing population continues, see Japan and v low growth/productivity.

There's an ageing population crisis and we have designed our world for people to live even longer, probably down to the deep rooted religious belief that death is the worst thing imaginable and must be avoided at all costs. There's an inflection point coming. Only so long the old can build high walls around themselves and dominate resources before the young revolt.

Much like warming, there's a pretty obvious way to resolve this crisis that people won't talk about until it's too late, again prob due to religious beliefs. That's democracy and its the best of all the bad options IMO.

[Greg2607]

16 hours ago, Tommy G said:

Because I don’t view life through the lens of “it’s not as rubbish as it was  so it must be better”.

This budget is an economic tragedy and will affect everyone posting on this forum negatively - whether you chose to believe this or not is up to you. 
 

The way the tories ran the country during Covid was a joke, Boris is a joke, Truss is an ever bigger joke. Who is arguing with that?
 

Doesn’t mean you can’t now comment on a budget where a government is trying to tax their way out of it - and blatantly lie through their teeth during the election process, this is what Labour does and it will all unfold over the current term.
 

They aren’t well supported and the popularity nosedive has been devastating since July. 

 

 

 

Given Tom's job, he will be well placed to know how this will impact on SME's and jobs in general.   However, I do think that business will need to shoulder some of the burden of tax increases, as will those of us with broader shoulders. 

 

In my eyes, the uplift in Carers Allowance, Minimum Wage and Apprentice Wages as well as an uplift for those under 21 is a real positive for those that are most in need. It means that they will be shielded from the rise in bus fares as their extra earnings will far outweigh the extra bus cost. 

 

I think Farmers have been hard done by and the £1m cap on IHT really isn't large enough for most farms and absolutely will result in sales having to be made to pay for the IHT bill. 

 

The bit that I struggle to see, is how we drive wage growth as a country. it's criminally low and is the root cause of all of the "cost of living" crisis. This budget does nothing to help that in general terms with the added cost of employment for business. (i do realise that is contradictory to my above point about businesses shouldering the burden more) - That being said, even without that extra burden, they really weren't driving wage growth anyway and below inflation wage rises is just the norm for the UK.

 

[Lionator]

25 minutes ago, grobyfox1990 said:

Good post, and we can see what will develop if an ageing population continues, see Japan and v low growth/productivity.

There's an ageing population crisis and we have designed our world for people to live even longer, probably down to the deep rooted religious belief that death is the worst thing imaginable and must be avoided at all costs. There's an inflection point coming. Only so long the old can build high walls around themselves and dominate resources before the young revolt.

Much like warming, there's a pretty obvious way to resolve this crisis that people won't talk about until it's too late, again prob due to religious beliefs. That's democracy and its the best of all the bad options IMO.

You don’t resolve it, you just wait. 

[Spudulike]

16 hours ago, urban.spaceman said:

He’s outright lying.

 

That report is into the March budget and confirms the Tories and Treasury lied to them in February when the figure was £9.5bn. It has since risen. 

BBC Verify....

 

What have we learned about the £22bn ‘black hole’?published at 09:56

09:56

By Anthony Reuben

In her Budget announcement yesterday, Rachel Reeves referred again to the £22bn “black hole” that she claimed to have found in the public finances when she arrived at the Treasury.

She referred to a report from the Office for Budget Responsibility, saying: “Had they known about these undisclosed pressures that have since come to light, then their spring Budget forecast for spending would have been and I quote, ‘materially different’.”

But Rishi Sunak said the OBR had declined to support her claims of a £22bn black hole, saying: “It actually appears nowhere in their report.”

The OBR asked the Treasury for an estimate of the pressures on departmental spending that should have been known about for the March forecast and was told about £9.5bn worth.

So the OBR did find that there were things that it should have been told about for its March forecast, but not as much as the £22bn claimed by the government.

 

 

[leicsmac]

49 minutes ago, grobyfox1990 said:

Good post, and we can see what will develop if an ageing population continues, see Japan and v low growth/productivity.

There's an ageing population crisis and we have designed our world for people to live even longer, probably down to the deep rooted religious belief that death is the worst thing imaginable and must be avoided at all costs. There's an inflection point coming. Only so long the old can build high walls around themselves and dominate resources before the young revolt.

Much like warming, there's a pretty obvious way to resolve this crisis that people won't talk about until it's too late, again prob due to religious beliefs. That's democracy and its the best of all the bad options IMO.

Interesting - I'd have it the other way round, from a religious perspective death is OK because according to a lot of them you live again afterwards. It's the nonreligious that think death is the worst possible outcome, because of the oblivion that entails for them. I'll personally happily admit to being deeply thanatophobic and having that shape my worldview significantly.

[Sampson]

1 hour ago, leicsmac said:

Yeah.

 

There's a demographic crisis on the way that no one really wants to talk about casually, much less politically.

 

Incentivising higher birth rates of "natives" won't work either because it'll simply contribute to an ongoing world population growth that will end very, very badly.

 

There are no good options on this one, I don't think - it will be about trying to pick the best bad one.

Even if you manage to get higher birth rates today (which no western country has still been able to do despite a myriad of different policies in different countries trying), it takes about a quarter of a century  for anyone born today to be able to become a trained nurse or doctor for example and that if we really push for higher birth rates that likely even takes many parents, especially mothers out of the workforce for a few years whilst they’re caring for their children’s. So it’s not something you can solve anytime soon.

 

You can increase retirement age of course, but even then many companies will simply not hire 68 year olds and it’s very difficult for older people to find work or they are unable to work for medical or health reasons, so in a lot of cases you’re just moving the public outgoings from pension to job seeker or disability benefits which doesn’t solve anything either. It’s also very difficult to even do this politically, as we saw with the fallout for the winter fuel allowance here or the riots in France for raising retirement age by 2 years - it’s an easy win for populists to rally against and claim is a disgrace etc.

 

It’s something which no country seems able to solve and even if they knew how, the political optics of it are extremely difficult too.

 

I think just our modern individualistic lifestyles are just not really compatible with high birth rates and everyone having 2.4 children tbh and there’s not really a lot wrong with that from an individual point of view, even if it’s a huge problem society has to face. No one owes their country children and we all only live once, more and more people and couples prefer to prioritise other things than spending their 30s and 40s raising 3 children, in that case I don’t know even if financial encouragement for having more children would really solve much.

Edited 31 October 2024 by Sampson

[grobyfox1990]

1 hour ago, Lionator said:

You don’t resolve it, you just wait. 

Problem is, much like warming, you can wait but by then the damage could be irreversible

[grobyfox1990]

1 hour ago, leicsmac said:

Interesting - I'd have it the other way round, from a religious perspective death is OK because according to a lot of them you live again afterwards. It's the nonreligious that think death is the worst possible outcome, because of the oblivion that entails for them. I'll personally happily admit to being deeply thanatophobic and having that shape my worldview significantly.

Yeh good point. I have no idea of what old school Methodist culture prescriptively says but death isn't really dealt with in the West. When my grandparents died (all above 80) I remember lots of condolences coming in. Dude, they're over 80, this is natural life, it's to be celebrated not mourned. Covid response was also interesting, we took every step possible to avoid death at all cost, never mind the collateral damage. 

PS before Phil Bowman weighs in, I fully agreed with the lockdown at the time

[David Hankey]

It seems some on here think that the aged are the problem, what bunkum.

 

They have paid into the system for decades.

 

Remember, we are all a drain on resources, from the cradle to the grave.

[grobyfox1990]

2 minutes ago, David Hankey said:

It seems some on here think that the aged are the problem, what bunkum.

 

They have paid into the system for decades.

 

Remember, we are all a drain on resources, from the cradle to the grave.

This is so untrue that you actually deserve the incoming Phil Bowman emoji

[Babylon]

1 hour ago, Sampson said:

Even if you manage to get higher birth rates today (which no western country has still been able to do despite a myriad of different policies in different countries trying), it takes about a quarter of a century  for anyone born today to be able to become a trained nurse or doctor for example and that if we really push for higher birth rates that likely even takes many parents, especially mothers out of the workforce for a few years whilst they’re caring for their children’s. So it’s not something you can solve anytime soon.

 

You can increase retirement age of course, but even then many companies will simply not hire 68 year olds and it’s very difficult for older people to find work or they are unable to work for medical or health reasons, so in a lot of cases you’re just moving the public outgoings from pension to job seeker or disability benefits which doesn’t solve anything either. It’s also very difficult to even do this politically, as we saw with the fallout for the winter fuel allowance here or the riots in France for raising retirement age by 2 years - it’s an easy win for populists to rally against and claim is a disgrace etc.

 

It’s something which no country seems able to solve and even if they knew how, the political optics of it are extremely difficult too.

 

I think just our modern individualistic lifestyles are just not really compatible with high birth rates and everyone having 2.4 children tbh and there’s not really a lot wrong with that from an individual point of view, even if it’s a huge problem society has to face. No one owes their country children and we all only live once, more and more people and couples prefer to prioritise other things than spending their 30s and 40s raising 3 children, in that case I don’t know even if financial encouragement for having more children would really solve much.

A nice starting point would be banning people owning 3+ homes, or companies having dozens or hundreds of housing stock. Bring down property prices, make it all affordable so people can afford to have children. Wildly unpopular for the rich of course and the general public won't like the fact their house price has gone down... but property needs to be viewed as a home again and not an investment. 

[Trav Le Bleu]

15 minutes ago, grobyfox1990 said:

This is so untrue that you actually deserve the incoming Phil Bowman emoji

I think the first part can be queried, but the rest?

[leicsmac]

21 minutes ago, grobyfox1990 said:

Yeh good point. I have no idea of what old school Methodist culture prescriptively says but death isn't really dealt with in the West. When my grandparents died (all above 80) I remember lots of condolences coming in. Dude, they're over 80, this is natural life, it's to be celebrated not mourned. Covid response was also interesting, we took every step possible to avoid death at all cost, never mind the collateral damage. 

PS before Phil Bowman weighs in, I fully agreed with the lockdown at the time

I do think that Eastern cultures have a healthier attitude towards the whole thing than we do, and I know my own stance may not be the healthiest either.

[Zear0]

Just now, Trav Le Bleu said:

I think the first part can be queried, but the rest?

Saying that people are a drain on resources is a bit weird.  Everyone consumes resources, so from that perspective it's correct, but given the discussion relates to economic contribution it's just plain wrong.

[Sampson]

39 minutes ago, David Hankey said:

It seems some on here think that the aged are the problem, what bunkum.

 

They have paid into the system for decades.

 

Remember, we are all a drain on resources, from the cradle to the grave.

Absolutely no one is saying the old are the problem - actually quite the opposite, people are saying the problem is that people aren’t having enough children so the older can’t be supported. No one is blaming the old or saying they should be happy to die or not be supported by the state, or that they haven’t paid into the system. The fact people are trying to spin discussions on population ageing and the demographic crisis as that is exactly one of the problems as to why populists get an easy win off it and why the political optics of the discussion are so difficult.

You’re completely misunderstanding the debate. It’s simply undeniable fact that the older a person is, the more on average they cost the health service, claim disability benefits or pensions, these stats are publishers on the ONS every year and can be found on the government website each year, last I remember a retired person costs the UK government more than twice as much as a working age person every year on average in terms of healthcare, pensions and disability benefits. That is absolutely not a moral judgement on that or to say they didn’t “earn” that by working hard. The issue isn’t the old people, it’s that people in western countries are not having enough children so the population is becoming made up not just a small proportion of older people as had always previously been the case, but becoming a population of a majority of older people and there are not enough working people now to pay into the system to support the older people. 

Edited 31 October 2024 by Sampson