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Do you think there will be a Deal or No Deal?

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Red Dreams said:
Are the Lib/Dems pushing that?

I don't consider dismantling the Welfare state funny tbh.
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Sadly no. They pledge to marginally increase CGT and CT as well as ending some CGT reliefs, which I have mixed feelings about. But they make no mention of personal tax. The party is currently in a more neoliberal rather than social democratic arc, which for me is lamentable. From an economic policy standpoint they're just the least worse option the way I see it.

Neither do I, but I do found whataboutism funny. I'm sure you can tell difference between finding a statement's contents funny and finding its timing and placement funny.
 
Mr Pigeon said:
feck this country. Stop the planet, I want to get off. Send me to Mars ffs.
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It's only going to get worse. We'll end up with a hard right government soon enough and a severe global recession seems likely. Through in increasing unrest around climate change and what could go wrong eh!
 
MadMike said:
Sadly no. They pledge to marginally increase CGT and CT as well as ending some CGT reliefs, which I have mixed feelings about. But they make no mention of personal tax. The party is currently in a more neoliberal rather than social democratic arc, which for me is lamentable. From an economic policy standpoint they're just the least worse option the way I see it.

Neither do I, but I do found whataboutism funny. I'm sure you can tell difference between finding a statement's contents funny and finding its timing and placement funny.
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Seriously. Nationalization of essential services like Railways and Energy is needed.
The profit motive must be removed.
We need a strong welfare state to protect people falling through the crack. Having said that I am all for elimination of waste and abuse.

The duty of any government should be to benefit the majority without harming anyone. For those that rode the gravy train so long, its time to pay the fare.

We are not going to make it as a nation if we don't pull together.

Too many lives at stake.

I absolutely do not trust the Lib/Dems and I think the Tories need to be lynched.
 
I find myself wondering would it have been best if May's deal went through. No one would have been "happy", but all sides may have been content enough to move on.

I can't see this issue ever going away if we leave with no deal or if we don't leave at all.
 
Its impossible to negotiate from a position of weakness.
When the government could have it did not.
Here we are after a political gamble the went tits up.

Now its the blame game.

The Tories have zero credibility.

The Lib/Dems need to work with Labour for the good of the country.
Both sides need to compromise of course. But that cannot happen with making pre conditions about who either side can work with.
I'm assuming these leaders actually care about the country of course.
 
Smores said:
It's only going to get worse. We'll end up with a hard right government soon enough and a severe global recession seems likely. Through in increasing unrest around climate change and what could go wrong eh!
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Ah, ok. That makes me feel much better thanks :lol:
 
Red Dreams said:
Seriously. Nationalization of essential services like Railways and Energy is needed.
The profit motive must be removed.
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But why? What's the rationale? Their profits are capped anyway and they are strictly regulated on that. The only people who can claim to be taking a large "profits" are a the CEOs and BoD who get large salaries but these are
a) an absolute drop in the ocean compared to the running costs these companies have, and therefore a red herring. And...
b) Govt would have to pay similar salaries to attract people with the right skillset in those roles. We see that in local govt all the time.

The only "advantage" I can see of nationalising railways is that the train ticket can then be subsidised by taxes. Therefore tickets appear to be cheap. Which I don't agree with, because that's a blanket discount for anyone both to the person struggling financially and to millionaires. I prefer giving discounts to people that can't afford it or find it onerous. Not to mention the waste generally created by state run companies. Same concept applies to energy.

People somehow think state ownership is panacea, but there's no study that supports this notion.

Red Dreams said:
We need a strong welfare state to protect people falling through the crack. Having said that I am all for elimination of waste and abuse.

The duty of any government should be to benefit the majority without harming anyone. For those that rode the gravy train so long, its time to pay the fare.

We are not going to make it as a nation if we don't pull together.

Too many lives at stake.

I absolutely do not trust the Lib/Dems and I think the Tories need to be lynched.
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Again, I support the notion of the welfare state as it was up until 2010 before its dismantling. Though public support for it was very low.
(support for the welfare state among Labour voters was at 79% in 1987 and only 36% in 2011. The "scroungers" rhetoric was winning the argument)

The Corbyn policies go way beyond that though and they won't only touch those who "rode the gravy train". In fact, those will just up sticks and feck off. It's the rest that will bear the brunt of his policies.

At a time when the nation will be vulnerable due to Brexit and jobs will be at risk, he plans to both go on a spending spree and declare war on capital. Seems reckless at the least.
 
Red Dreams said:
Seriously. Nationalization of essential services like Railways and Energy is needed.
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Well yeah. We had these things nationalized for years, and people said it was inefficient. And now they are privatized and they’re overly expensive and inefficient. Yet apparent re-nationalizing them is communism? Seriously?
 
Kentonio said:
Well yeah. We had these things nationalized for years, and people said it was inefficient. And now they are privatized and they’re overly expensive and inefficient. Yet apparent re-nationalizing them is communism? Seriously?
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And nationalisation of the railways actually has widespread support that cuts across political identity. A fair few polls have shown more Lib Dems and Tories support it than oppose it.
 
Kentonio said:
Well yeah. We had these things nationalized for years, and people said it was inefficient. And now they are privatized and they’re overly expensive and inefficient. Yet apparent re-nationalizing them is communism? Seriously?
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First off, how you nationalise companies matters. When banks were in trouble and got essentially nationalised by the Tories, they bought their shares up. They didn't screw shareholders by giving them 0% interest bonds at prices the govt dictates. Imagine if 5 years after Royal Mail got sold, it was forcibly nationalised at half the price. That's state theft pure and simple and an indication that govt is not to be trusted in business.

Secondly, the prime reason UK train tickets are so expensive compared to the rest of Europe (bar Norway) is that those tickets get subsidised by tax payers and ours aren't. The second is that ours have different pricing models, similar to airlines where "walk-in" prices can be very expensive but booking in advance can be a lot cheaper. Usually the expensive walk-in prices are what's being quoted and compared with other nations. And finally, it's many small operators who are operating limited-time, limited-area monopolies as opposed to one, unified service. Which makes it inefficient. At least that's what I've read.

But no, nationalising some service providers (like we do with NHS for example) is of course not communism. That's an absurd notion, whoever makes it.

EDIT:
The personal reason I'm generally against state-run companies, unless absolutely necessary, is that, being a Greek, I've been traumatised by witnessing extremely poorly run state businesses that became a burden to the tax payer to the point where they nearly brought the country to its knees.
 
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@MadMike

You keep saying 'state theft'.
The State is the people. How can you steal from yourself?

And you can set standards of performance for Public owned entities. You do not have to pay huge amounts for CEO's either.
The only requirement is efficiency and cost control. Not a profit motive.
 
Red Dreams said:
@MadMike

You keep saying 'state theft'.
The State is the people. How can you steal from yourself?
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It's a very simple concept mate. The state is all the people of a country. The shareholders are some people and not necessarily of that country.

Example: I have 10k shares in Apple. If the US state nationalises it without giving me the market price of the stock back, they're stealing from me plain and simple. And I see 0 benefit from that.

And it's not about "me" either. Foreign (and local) pension funds have invested and are shareholders in some of the companies that operate energy, rail and post in the UK. Nationalising those at below market prices is screwing over foreign pensioners.

You get the picture?

Red Dreams said:
And you can set standards of performance for Public owned entities.
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What happens when those are not met, who picks up the tab?

Red Dreams said:
You do not have to pay huge amounts for CEO's either.
The only requirement is efficiency and cost control. Not a profit motive.
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You don't pay huge amounts, you don't get good people. I'm sure you could find footballers to play for Man United for 100k per year instead of per week. I doubt they'd be as good.

Not that it matters like I said. The salaries of a handful of high ranking executives are a drop in the ocean and a red herring. Just something exploited by sensationalists to draw the ire of the people
 
MadMike said:
It's a very simple concept mate. The state is all the people of a country. The shareholders are some people and not necessarily of that country.

Example: I have 10k shares in Apple. If the US state nationalises it without giving me the market price of the stock back, they're stealing from me plain and simple. And I see 0 benefit from that.

And it's not about "me" either. Foreign (and local) pension funds have invested and are shareholders in some of the companies that operate energy, rail and post in the UK. Nationalising those at below market prices is screwing over foreign pensioners.

You get the picture?


What happens when those are not met, who picks up the tab?



You don't pay huge amounts, you don't get good people. I'm sure you could find footballers to play for Man United for 100k per year instead of per week. I doubt they'd be as good.

Not that it matters like I said. The salaries of a handful of high ranking executives are a drop in the ocean and a red herring. Just something exploited by sensationalists to draw the ire of the people
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FFS man.

I'm concerned about the British public.
You are describing the very reason we should not privatize.

That's like saying we should not have Single payer for fear of hurting investments in For Profit Health Insurance. They can invest in other investments. Get the picture?
 
Red Dreams said:
FFS man.

I'm concerned about the British public.
You are describing the very reason we should not privatize.

That's like saying we should not have Single payer for fear of hurting investments in For Profit Health Insurance. They can invest in other investments. Get the picture?
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Not privatising a state business is an opinion and we can agree to disagree on that. I believe in only keeping nationalised things that I deem absolutely essential. I personally put Healthcare and Education on that list, but not Rail or Post. You're entitled to your own opinion.

Re-nationalising at below market prices is state theft. The fact you're not challenging that anymore suggests to me you got the picture. And that's progress to me.
 
MadMike said:
Not privatising a state business is an opinion and we can agree to disagree on that. I believe in only keeping nationalised things that I deem absolutely essential. I personally put Healthcare and Education on that list, but not Rail or Post. You're entitled to your own opinion.

Re-nationalising at below market prices is state theft. The fact you're not challenging that anymore suggests to me you got the picture. And that's progress to me.
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Do you not invest in recently privatised business in the knowledge that it could indeed be renationalised in the future? After all, though I stand to be corrected on this, aren't they normally sold off for a pretty low price?

I personally think privatisation should not have happened anywhere near as much as it has in this country. Short term gains for the government of the day, with little thought for the long term.
 
MadMike said:
Not privatising a state business is an opinion and we can agree to disagree on that. I believe in only keeping nationalised things that I deem absolutely essential. I personally put Healthcare and Education on that list, but not Rail or Post. You're entitled to your own opinion.

Re-nationalising at below market prices is state theft. The fact you're not challenging that anymore suggests to me you got the picture. And that's progress to me.
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You are the perfect Tory/LIB Dem voter.
Its your kind of thinking that has brought us to this.

All Lip Service and crocodile tears.

You forgot to mention the Widows and Orphans Funds.
Once again you miss the point. You can invest in other investments. Its not like a switch being turned off.
Therefore its obvious I do not buy into the scenario you paint.

EDIT:

So Health Care should be off limit.
Its being slowly dismantled in front of your eyes.

Next step?
 
Flying high said:
Do you not invest in recently privatised business in the knowledge that it could indeed be renationalised in the future?
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Nope, not really. Not in the West at least.

Generally in the history of nationalisations it's been mostly struggling companies that were taken over by the government to protect either the business customers (i.e. Banks and peoples' deposits, Rail companies and their service etc.) or to protect the employees (failing Shipyards for example). And in those cases the stocks are worth feck all by the time, but the shareholders still get renumerated what they're worth.

Forced re-nationalisations of healthy companies at below market prices are the kinda stuff that happens in Latin America (https://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/02/world/americas/02bolivia.html) and the West laughs at them for being run like "banana republics" and the only foreign investors involved there are risk takers of the highest order.
Flying high said:
After all, though I stand to be corrected on this, aren't they normally sold off for a pretty low price?
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You will be corrected then. They get sold either via bid/offer auctions or via floating on the stock exchange. Pretty much like any other company. Thus they fetch whatever the market is willing to pay at the time. Why would they sold at a low price?

Flying high said:
I personally think privatisation should not have happened anywhere near as much as it has in this country. Short term gains for the government of the day, with little thought for the long term.
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I can respect that opinion, though like I said I disagree. Many non-essential (like Mail) businesses when run by the state they become bloated and run at a huge cost to the tax payer. We're, more often than not, well rid.
 
Red Dreams said:
You are the perfect Tory/LIB Dem voter.
Its your kind of thinking that has brought us to this.

All Lip Service and crocodile tears.

You forgot to mention the Widows and Orphans Funds.
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And I could say that you're the archetypal socialist supporter. All "good intentions" but no fecking clue how to run an economy until it all collapses, like it's done time and again. But that would be a patronising statement and that gets us nowhere don't you think?

Red Dreams said:
Once again you miss the point. You can invest in other investments. Its not like a switch being turned off.
Therefore its obvious I do not buy into the scenario you paint.
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I'll take the house you paid 200k, that is now worth 300k, and will give you 50k in coupons over the next 20 years. It's not theft, there's other houses you can buy. :lol:

If you want to nationalise them normally, in a way you don't want to scare off businesses and investors, you raise capital via bonds (like a mortgage) and you buy them out at their price. Give them their money back to invest elsewhere. Don't steal it from them. Corbyn is not proposing to buy them back, he's proposing to steal them back like a Latin American dictator.

Red Dreams said:
EDIT:

So Health Care should be off limit.
Its being slowly dismantled in front of your eyes.

Next step?
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I strongly object against dismantling public health. What else do you want me to say?
 
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MadMike said:
And I could say that you're the archetypal socialist supporter. All "good intentions" but no fecking clue how to run an economy until it all collapses, like it's done time and again. But that would be a patronising statement and that gets us nowhere don't you think?



I'll take the house you paid 200k for and will give you 50k in coupons over the next 20 years. It's not theft, there's other houses you can buy. :lol:

If you want to nationalise them normally, in a way you don't want to scare off businesses and investors, you raise capital via bonds (like a mortgage) and you buy them out at their price. Give them their money to invest elsewhere. Don't steal it from them. Corbyn is not proposing to buy them back, he's proposing to steal them back like a Latin American dictator.



I strongly object against dismantling public health. What else do you want me to say?
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You Are speaking of the Lib/Dems/Tories right? ;)

:lol:
I like the straw man argument about the house.

NHS.

You 'strongly object to dismantling NHS'

I did not hear... But But how do you pay for it?

Oh. You Are going to vote LIB/Dem/Tory right? ;)
 
@MadMike I disagree with your last few posts in this thread generally, but to pick up on one specific point, using Mail as an example of a non-essential business which becomes bloated and a burden on the tax payer in public hands is ill-informed.

Royal Mail was enormously profitable as a state asset and remains enormously profitable as a private company. As everyone with a brain predicted, privatisation has led to quality of service and working conditions taking a hit and shareholders reaping the benefit. It's a shining example of where state ownership was a win-win and selling it off made zero sense for anyone except the vultures who snapped it up and their mates in government. Another example would be LNER, which was a disaster under its two most recent private franchise holders (most recently Virgin who sacked it in) but has been better, cheaper and more profitable in both of it's recent stints as a state-run enterprise.
 
Red Dreams said:
You Are speaking of the Lib/Dems/Tories right? ;)

:lol:
I like the straw man argument about the house.

NHS.

You 'strongly object to dismantling NHS'

I did not hear... But But how do you pay for it?

Oh. You Are going to vote LIB/Dem/Tory right? ;)
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I struggle to find either a point or sense in your posts now so I bid you goodnight.
 
MadMike said:
First off, how you nationalise companies matters. When banks were in trouble and got essentially nationalised by the Tories, they bought their shares up. They didn't screw shareholders by giving them 0% interest bonds at prices the govt dictates. Imagine if 5 years after Royal Mail got sold, it was forcibly nationalised at half the price. That's state theft pure and simple and an indication that govt is not to be trusted in business.
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Correct me if i'm wrong here but whenever anyone buys shares and invests in a company there is always the risk that if/when their shares are sold again they could lose some or all of their money.

How would this be any different?

And surely when someone chooses to invest in a company that was previously state owned for half a century they do so knowing that it being nationalized again is always a distinct possibility with a potential new government every 5 years or so.
 
jeff_goldblum said:
@MadMike I disagree with your last few posts in this thread generally, but to pick up on one specific point, using Mail as an example of a non-essential business which becomes bloated and a burden on the tax payer in public hands is ill-informed.

Royal Mail was enormously profitable as a state asset and remains enormously profitable as a private company. As everyone with a brain predicted, privatisation has led to quality of service and working conditions taking a hit and shareholders reaping the benefit. It's a shining example of where state ownership was a win-win and selling it off made zero sense for anyone except the vultures who snapped it up and their mates in government.
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I think there's a misunderstanding here. I didn't mean to suggest that Royal Mail was bloated and a burden. I placed the (Mail) immediately after the words "non-essential" to offer an example of a state run company that no longer needs to be run by the state. The example ending at non-essential. The rest of the sentence, regarding the bloating, is the risk associated with the state running a company.

I'm more of a believer in the state investing in companies, like the various sovereign wealth funds do, instead of running them. Again, when it's non-essential. Too much risk for the taxpayer for my liking.

jeff_goldblum said:
Another example would be LNER, which was a disaster under its two most recent private franchise holders (most recently Virgin who sacked it in) but has been better, cheaper and more profitable in both of it's recent stints as a state-run enterprise.
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That has indeed been a great success story so far. No denying it.
 
PSX-20190916-033835.jpg
 
stevoc said:
Correct me if i'm wrong here but whenever anyone buys shares and invests in a company there is always the risk that if/when their shares are sold again they could lose some or all of their money.

How would this be any different?
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I'm gonna go back into the housing market example....

You bought a house. The house price can go up or down, like a company share. It's an investment and it has a risk, it's dependent on the local housing market. You could lose money when you sell it.

The state comes and takes your house by force at below market price and doesn't even pay you cash but in instalments, over time. Can you see how that is entirely different, uncorrelated risk from the house market risk?

stevoc said:
And surely when someone chooses to invest in a company that was previously state owned for half a century they do so knowing that it being nationalized again is always a distinct possibility with a potential new government every 5 years or so.
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Not really a thing that happens very often at all. You can have a look at the history of nationalisations in Europe. Apart from Mitterands nationalisations in the 80s (which 2 years later got reversed) there's really not any examples of States taking back businesses unless it was to save them from financial trouble (2008-10 examples aplenty)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_nationalizations_by_country

But again, there's nothing weird or wrong in re-nationalising companies. It's under what circumstances and how you do it. A government that forcibly takes profit-making businesses into public ownership, is an untrustworthy government and you simply don't invest in that country again. And the UK will need investors after Brexit.
 
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Red Dreams said:
@MadMike

Though I disagree with almost everything you have posted here.
I'm sure you are a good guy.

So I take back my last post addressed to you. ;)
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No worries. We may disagree, but I understand where you’re coming from and I know you’re well meaning.

EDIT: People's political opinions tend to be shaped by their experiences. Like I mentioned, I spent the first half of my life in Greece. And there I saw a State that over-extended considerably in its effort to provide equitable living to the people that (along with a healthy dose of corruption, I must say) proceeded to feck it all up and bankrupt itself. And it turned a small but reasonably well off country, into a shithole.

That's made me very wary of large states. And there's nothing that I'd hate more than see a repeat of that here.
 
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MadMike said:
No worries. We may disagree, but I understand where you’re coming from and I know you’re well meaning.

EDIT: People's political opinions tend to be shaped by their experiences. Like I mentioned, I spent the first half of my life in Greece. And there I saw a State that over-extended considerably in its effort to provide equitable living to the people that (along with a healthy dose of corruption, I must say) proceeded to feck it all up and bankrupt itself. And it turned a small but reasonably well off country, into a shithole.

That's made me very wary of large states. And there's nothing that I'd hate more than see a repeat of that here.
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That corruption culture just doesn't exist in the UK. The tax-avoidance mindset neither.
 
@MadMike take a break. You’re now talking bollocks with no substance.

Before coming here and talking about state theft and whatnot read about how re-nationalisation will be achieved.

I can tell you that rail which you’ve been banging on about in the last few pages will be simply taken back into public ownership when franchise contracts are up for renewal. For others where contracts run longer, they will be scrutinised top to bottom to see if any break clauses are met such as chronic underinvestment, service delivery targets etc.

As for the energy sector the price will be determined by an independent valuer who will advise parliament which will in turn decide the final price. If shareholders don’t like this then there is an independent judiciary at their disposal to challenge it and win if their case has merits. I suspect there will be a run in the companies well before that happens anyway so buying price won’t be an issue.

As with every investment the first thing they tell you is “Your capital is at risk”. Anyone not prepared to lose their money shouldn’t be playing the stock market.
 
For the railways, making money on the busy commuter lines should be ploughed straight back into improving services in rural areas and making sure there's a truly national rail network. That would come under "efficiency" for me.
 
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MadMike said:
Not really a thing that happens very often at all. You can have a look at the history of nationalisations in Europe. Apart from Mitterands nationalisations in the 80s (which 2 years later got reversed) there's really not any examples of States taking back businesses unless it was to save them from financial trouble (2008-10 examples aplenty)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_nationalizations_by_country

But again, there's nothing weird or wrong in re-nationalising companies. It's under what circumstances and how you do it. A government that forcibly takes profit-making businesses into public ownership, is an untrustworthy government and you simply don't invest in that country again. And the UK will need investors after Brexit.
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This is problem with Corbyn and McDonnell. I'm not against state run water for example but they should buy it back at the market value. Many normal people have money in these companies either directly or indirectly. More importantly taking control over these fully functional companies much below market value has huge ramifications on business trust which affects everyone. UK will no longer have that and companies and investors will flee and look elsewhere.

They also have no problem seizing homes.

It's not clear what will happen to water companies.

https://www.ft.com/content/876e456e-6f42-11e9-bbfb-5c68069fbd15
https://www.ft.com/content/08e64ba0-ba93-11e9-96bd-8e884d3ea203
 
Penna said:
For the railways, making money on the busy commuter lines should be ploughed straight back into improving services in rural areas and making sure there's a truly national rail network. That would come under "efficiency" for me.
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Unfortunately commuter networks require large subsidies themselves, as everyone wants to use them for the same two hours in the morning and two hours at tea time, leaving an intensive network relatively unused for the rest of the time. Obviously you can gain some extra revenue with cheaper offers at off-peak times, and believe it or not the railway companies have quite sophisticated systems for working out how to maximise this, but the core of the problem remains.
 
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