High St UK reels with closures and job losses.
- 28 June 2011 20:40112256But: working people were encouraged, in fact almost pushed, into spending above their means. Few if any regulations or safety nets regarding mortgages or credit card spending, stock market vendors going apeshit with other peoples money. banks doing exactly what they pleased when they pleased with whom they pleased. Of course each individual is responsible for their own behaviour, but there are regulations and safeguards for a reason, and those who threw other peoples money about with abandon should really be called to account. They haven't and they won't be, because they have the money and the influence, and it is the people who were stupid enough to follow the moneyed people into their own Hell who are now bailing them out for absolutely no return.
- 28 June 2011 20:40112257Did I say that out loud........?
- 28 June 2011 20:55112261Yes..and well done.
It was a certain handbag wielding PM that did the encouraging by scrapping credit regulations (ie) a certain % deposit before obtaining HP. Encouraging house purchasing by doing away with the 10% minimum deposit then a max of 2.5 x your main income and the list goes on.Marek
I think therefore I am (not a Tory supporter) - 28 June 2011 21:00112266Bloody Hell - remember the 80's? I remember clearly when Mrs T came to power and we (my little group) predicted, well, this.
- 28 June 2011 21:03112268Bern - you have a hint of some of the problems Brown caused in your rant.
He did change the regulation of the banks allowing (and openly encouraging them in his Mansion House speech in 1998) to take risks. That opened up the USA with lots of small vulnerable banks open for takeover and the then unknown hangover from Clinton's misbegotten policies.
He did get the Bank of England inflation brief wrong - the result interest rates kept too low for too long, hence a housing bubble and a massive splurge on credit cards.
He did discourage saving and investing by reducing the tax incentives and reducing the amount that could be invested. The savings ratio dropped like a stone and people lacking the savings turned to those credit cards when they wanted to buy something.
He conveniently forgot the bit of Keynes that said he should balance the deficit and repay debt in the growth part of the cycle so you can allow a deficit to build and increase debt in the slowdown phase. Instead in 2001 as soon as electoral constraints were off he went on a deficit spending splurge year after year. That is the root of the main current problem, the structural deficit.
Not sure where the stock-market gets the blame in all this from you as it has been struggling ever since the dot-com crash in 2000. Perhaps you are thinking about the fixed interest trades with that dodgy toxic American debt created by the Clinton regime. Again that is down to that 1997 regulation change and the banks getting heavily into the USA.
Brown thought he 'banned boom and bust' - complete nonsense, he had might as well have said he had banned nighttime. The problem was he clearly believed it and ran the economy as if the good times would never end. Totally and completely bonkers.
Now we are paying the price....and yes, ordinary people are paying the price and that is what you get for voting Labour. Those of us who really should have a grudge are those of us who did not vote in that Blair/Brown rabble.
If there was any justice in the world then only those who voted Labour should have to pay the price
- 28 June 2011 21:07112270#23 - Marek, you are straying into areas that it would be wise for you to avoid. The scrapping of those controls were a key factor in the British economic recovery in the 80's. The lengths some people will go to to blame Mrs T for today's problems beggar belief. No-one in their right mind and with only a small amount of knowledge has suggested re-introducing such controls, even in the Labour Party.
She also, at the same time introduced retail Financial Services regulation in the 1986 act to protect people from what you refer to. Labour threw that away for the 2000 act and what a disaster that is. - 28 June 2011 21:09112272excellent post barry, now tell us what the blues are doing to right things.
dogma from chosen economists is not an answer, an explanation that people can understand is.
you have often compared personal finances with government spending so you have a chance to educate us here. - 28 June 2011 21:11112273No rant, BarryW, and definitely no handbagging unless there is payment involved - which sums up the 80's for me!! It strikes me (pardon the expression) that while people insist on clinging to the left/right fantasy there will be no progress and the only winners will be the purveyors of pamphlets and buttons. Blair tried to champion and coin the Middle Way but it was simply the Right with a fluffy and odious exterior. There is no middle way, only a series of Ways which will involve evolution and conversations. Bin the ambidextrous approach and move on, towards the intelligent approach.
- 28 June 2011 21:17112276Howard - You know very well what the blues are trying to do with their 3.7% cuts over 5 years. In the USA Obama is cutting 3.9% over two years. Roughly 80% of the UK deficit is being dealt with by spending cuts and 20% by tax rises and in that respect is similar to the USA.
Obama has got it more right than Osborne going for quicker and deeper cuts. Personally I would cut even more deeply than Obama because I prefer a short sharp pain than a longer drawn out agony. - 28 June 2011 21:18112277I am all for the intelligent way Bern but I suspect you and I might disagree on what the intelligent way is - nothing to do with left or right either...
- 28 June 2011 21:24112280Barry, there is no way the present spending-cuts can even reduce the national debt (£900+billion), not even over a period of many years.
They might just suffice to reach a point where there is no annual budget deficit, but only by tightening spending even more and increasing taxes, and that would take a few years still.
But by then, so many people will have lost their job, or not got a job in the first place, and many will have lost their house through not having a job and not being able to pay the mortgage. And much more of the same and similar.
So there has to be another way. That's where people start speaking of fat cats.
As always, on this issue you are alone against the whole Forum,
Chanters, Drums and Drones Potty Time http://youtu.be/99fMqpjnXYA
Rule Britannia!
Kent First http://youtu.be/04F3mAP3fV4 Keep banging on http://youtu.be/qYCU_SKmkGQ - 29 June 2011 06:54112311Alexander - the deficit the the amount being spent every year, every day, over and above what the government has income. You either increase income, ie increase taxes or cut spending - there is no other way. For as long as you spend more than you have in income you keep adding to the debt and it cannot carry on. You have to create a budget surplus before you can even start paying down debt.
The government is dealing with it in a proportion of 20% tax rises and 80% cuts. I would personally prefer it 100% cuts seeing how bloated public spending became.
Worth pointing out that if we do not get shot of the deficit and pay down debt before the next downturn then we will be back at square one, you cannot hang about with this.
You go on about 'fat cats' this is crass nonsense. There is no way you can deal with the problem by high re distributive taxation as experience has shown you actually reduce tax income that way.
You are wrong by the way, I am not alone against the whole forum.