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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. " The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now " When you look at the breakdown of gas and electric bills the profit is only 2% not many companies would run with that little profit. | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. " Privatisation has its place, but not in terms of essential services and utilities etc. I’m too the right of the very right most of the time; but private individuals should not be profiting and carving up things like water, power and transportation etc. The railways are are a prime example with the now over complicated and inefficient system we now see. | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now When you look at the breakdown of gas and electric bills the profit is only 2% not many companies would run with that little profit." UK’s 6 biggest energy firms made more than £1 billion in profit before the price increase , gas , electric and water are basic Human requirements, | |||
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" Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. " It's not that easy. Government and private companies have different kind of pressure. Private companies face pressure every quarter to deliver results and are forced to be efficient. Government offices on the other hand don't face that pressure. Many of the workers get unionised too. That makes it hard to fire them. In a private organisation, the pressure seeps from the top. Lack of results will result in the CEO getting fired. He puts the pressure on VPs who put pressure on directors and so on until the last employee. In a government organization, the top most part of the hierarchy is the government that gets elected every five years. It doesn't matter if they perform poorly in between. Private organisations are efficient but they have a tendency to cause external damage. One of the main type of damage they do is pollution. This is where the government must play its role and pass laws to protect the environment | |||
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" Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. It's not that easy. Government and private companies have different kind of pressure. Private companies face pressure every quarter to deliver results and are forced to be efficient. Government offices on the other hand don't face that pressure. Many of the workers get unionised too. That makes it hard to fire them. In a private organisation, the pressure seeps from the top. Lack of results will result in the CEO getting fired. He puts the pressure on VPs who put pressure on directors and so on until the last employee. In a government organization, the top most part of the hierarchy is the government that gets elected every five years. It doesn't matter if they perform poorly in between. Private organisations are efficient but they have a tendency to cause external damage. One of the main type of damage they do is pollution. This is where the government must play its role and pass laws to protect the environment" Each new party that gets in power changes a department’s name but keeps the same structure with the same heads in charge. They are not sacked for incompetence. The marketing paperwork looks new and that’s it. The governments being in charge you mention are MPs who in reality have no concept of how most of the major organisations work. I’ve experienced this first hand and it’s only when you see it first hand that you realise they just tinker with the ideas every five years and don’t get to the root of the problem . As you pollution you must be having a laugh . The state controlled utilities just poured everything down the rivers . Coal waste , sewage waste, public transport buses polluting our streets ( thank the euro ratings for making that a lot better) etc etc . Railways all used to empty their toilets onto the tracks . ( the last few only recently banned in 2020) We are following the USA with this government in areas such as the control of the legal process by politicians but also potentially allowing substandard practices by big companies such as food and chemicals . So vote Tory and you will get less in standards . In the USA you have to prove they are doing wrong they don’t have to prove they are being careful or safe. Hence the high food poisoning levels and poisoned water supplies scandals . Flint being one of the more famous. Certain states are better but not much . So now we can see these industries being run far more efficiently it’s time those profits were re invested for all our futures not just shareholders. Why do we allow billions in dividends to be paid and yet 400k raw sewage incidents last year alone. I can accept violent storms on rare occasions but that number is infrastructure not storms. | |||
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" Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. It's not that easy. Government and private companies have different kind of pressure. Private companies face pressure every quarter to deliver results and are forced to be efficient. Government offices on the other hand don't face that pressure. Many of the workers get unionised too. That makes it hard to fire them. In a private organisation, the pressure seeps from the top. Lack of results will result in the CEO getting fired. He puts the pressure on VPs who put pressure on directors and so on until the last employee. In a government organization, the top most part of the hierarchy is the government that gets elected every five years. It doesn't matter if they perform poorly in between. Private organisations are efficient but they have a tendency to cause external damage. One of the main type of damage they do is pollution. This is where the government must play its role and pass laws to protect the environment Each new party that gets in power changes a department’s name but keeps the same structure with the same heads in charge. They are not sacked for incompetence. The marketing paperwork looks new and that’s it. The governments being in charge you mention are MPs who in reality have no concept of how most of the major organisations work. I’ve experienced this first hand and it’s only when you see it first hand that you realise they just tinker with the ideas every five years and don’t get to the root of the problem . As you pollution you must be having a laugh . The state controlled utilities just poured everything down the rivers . Coal waste , sewage waste, public transport buses polluting our streets ( thank the euro ratings for making that a lot better) etc etc . Railways all used to empty their toilets onto the tracks . ( the last few only recently banned in 2020) We are following the USA with this government in areas such as the control of the legal process by politicians but also potentially allowing substandard practices by big companies such as food and chemicals . So vote Tory and you will get less in standards . In the USA you have to prove they are doing wrong they don’t have to prove they are being careful or safe. Hence the high food poisoning levels and poisoned water supplies scandals . Flint being one of the more famous. Certain states are better but not much . So now we can see these industries being run far more efficiently it’s time those profits were re invested for all our futures not just shareholders. Why do we allow billions in dividends to be paid and yet 400k raw sewage incidents last year alone. I can accept violent storms on rare occasions but that number is infrastructure not storms. " As for the structure of management, my point is that the MPs do not have a motivation to change anything. Private organisations have to change and adapt. If not, they will fail. An MP in power will stay in power for 5 years. Why would he care about efficiency of the organisation? Why sack people for incompetence and face head aches like labour strikes when you can let the system just be? As for pollution, I said the government must double down on it. Not that the government is already doing it well. | |||
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" Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. It's not that easy. Government and private companies have different kind of pressure. Private companies face pressure every quarter to deliver results and are forced to be efficient. Government offices on the other hand don't face that pressure. Many of the workers get unionised too. That makes it hard to fire them. In a private organisation, the pressure seeps from the top. Lack of results will result in the CEO getting fired. He puts the pressure on VPs who put pressure on directors and so on until the last employee. In a government organization, the top most part of the hierarchy is the government that gets elected every five years. It doesn't matter if they perform poorly in between. Private organisations are efficient but they have a tendency to cause external damage. One of the main type of damage they do is pollution. This is where the government must play its role and pass laws to protect the environment Each new party that gets in power changes a department’s name but keeps the same structure with the same heads in charge. They are not sacked for incompetence. The marketing paperwork looks new and that’s it. The governments being in charge you mention are MPs who in reality have no concept of how most of the major organisations work. I’ve experienced this first hand and it’s only when you see it first hand that you realise they just tinker with the ideas every five years and don’t get to the root of the problem . As you pollution you must be having a laugh . The state controlled utilities just poured everything down the rivers . Coal waste , sewage waste, public transport buses polluting our streets ( thank the euro ratings for making that a lot better) etc etc . Railways all used to empty their toilets onto the tracks . ( the last few only recently banned in 2020) We are following the USA with this government in areas such as the control of the legal process by politicians but also potentially allowing substandard practices by big companies such as food and chemicals . So vote Tory and you will get less in standards . In the USA you have to prove they are doing wrong they don’t have to prove they are being careful or safe. Hence the high food poisoning levels and poisoned water supplies scandals . Flint being one of the more famous. Certain states are better but not much . So now we can see these industries being run far more efficiently it’s time those profits were re invested for all our futures not just shareholders. Why do we allow billions in dividends to be paid and yet 400k raw sewage incidents last year alone. I can accept violent storms on rare occasions but that number is infrastructure not storms. As for the structure of management, my point is that the MPs do not have a motivation to change anything. Private organisations have to change and adapt. If not, they will fail. An MP in power will stay in power for 5 years. Why would he care about efficiency of the organisation? Why sack people for incompetence and face head aches like labour strikes when you can let the system just be? As for pollution, I said the government must double down on it. Not that the government is already doing it well." I agree with your comments here totally 
We must however come up with a way to hold the top level management in state industries accountable and stop the huge amounts of money moving to shareholders rather than a better infrastructure. I don’t have the answers I just can see it’s not working for the Great majority of the U.K. | |||
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"So political parties are bad for your health and wealth? "It appears that their incompetence over the last 40 years rings true to that! I’m constantly reading on here some individuals who keep complaining others ( including me) are always putting this country down. If they are so patriotic as they claim why aren’t they also shouting the loudest to stop this rot running through our politics. The fact that the country is being systematically robbed by our richest year after year should have them screaming about it!! How can you be loyal to a party which encourages and legalises theft of taxpayers money. Why aren’t the government saying to the water companies no more dividends until the raw sewage incidents stop! To the PPE theft pay the money back for non usable kit or go to jail. You claim too much dole for a few weeks and you do minimum community service. Why are we so pathetic at holding these people to account . Funding and lobbying? Maybe, also our bias media is a reason, but our FPTP is also another very good reason. The majority don’t have a say. | |||
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"I am far from socialist in my outlook, but I absolutely agree that core infrastructure should be owned and operated by the nation. The issue that we have in this country is that the political system that we have in place would mean that these services would (like the NHS) become political playthings by whatever incumbent Government was in office. Look at the way the NHS is treated and imagine that multiplied with gas, electricity, water, sewerage, railways and buses. We need a major overhaul of our political system so that all of our essential services can be run autonomously and free from political interference whilst still being accountable to the people." That does indeed sound like the holy grail of systems. Problem with public owned, especially if unions are involved is that the workers or unions hold the government to ransom event time they fancy a pay rise. When your boss (MP's) are seeking 're ellection they don't want essential services going on strike. As others mention private seems more efficient but often more interested in share holders than investing in the companies | |||
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"busines has far too much say in politics in this country. holding the government to ransom with threats to starve parties of funds (particularly their chums in successive conservative and unionsit party governments)unless they comply with demands made or empty threats to withdraw business to other countries, has held this country back from development. only by ending the culture of access capitalism will the situation improve for hard working people. "It is remarkable and telling that we have privatised energy in the UK and the UK government is using a socialist to help the people Veil of so called energy loans, were the money can only go to the energy companies. Plain and simple it is a bail out for the energy companies. Name any other time the government out of the blue has offered the individual a personal loan? Capitalise the profit and socialise the debt is privatisation | |||
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"busines has far too much say in politics in this country. holding the government to ransom with threats to starve parties of funds (particularly their chums in successive conservative and unionsit party governments)unless they comply with demands made or empty threats to withdraw business to other countries, has held this country back from development. only by ending the culture of access capitalism will the situation improve for hard working people.
It is remarkable and telling that we have privatised energy in the UK and the UK government is using a socialist to help the people
Veil of so called energy loans, were the money can only go to the energy companies.
Plain and simple it is a bail out for the energy companies.
Name any other time the government out of the blue has offered the individual a personal loan?
Capitalise the profit and socialise the debt is privatisation" | |||
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"busines has far too much say in politics in this country. holding the government to ransom with threats to starve parties of funds (particularly their chums in successive conservative and unionsit party governments)unless they comply with demands made or empty threats to withdraw business to other countries, has held this country back from development. only by ending the culture of access capitalism will the situation improve for hard working people.
It is remarkable and telling that we have privatised energy in the UK and the UK government is using a socialist to help the people
Veil of so called energy loans, were the money can only go to the energy companies.
Plain and simple it is a bail out for the energy companies.
Name any other time the government out of the blue has offered the individual a personal loan?
Capitalise the profit and socialise the debt is privatisation" indeed | |||
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"Capitalise the profit and socialise the debt is privatisation" did you actually mean 'privatise the profit and nationalise the debt'? | |||
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"I am far from socialist in my outlook, but I absolutely agree that core infrastructure should be owned and operated by the nation. The issue that we have in this country is that the political system that we have in place would mean that these services would (like the NHS) become political playthings by whatever incumbent Government was in office. Look at the way the NHS is treated and imagine that multiplied with gas, electricity, water, sewerage, railways and buses. We need a major overhaul of our political system so that all of our essential services can be run autonomously and free from political interference whilst still being accountable to the people." It always looks like nationalisation of something will make it better. I lived most of my life in India. The moment people get money, they try their best to use private services over government services. We have government run railways where you have toilets where you just want to die the moment you step in. We had a government owned mobile operator which is going to shut down soon. They were the butt of all jokes when it comes to service. Every government office is rampant with corruption. All most all these demands to nationalise come with a condition that we need to make politicians more accountable. Politicians do not have skills to run massive enterprises. It is close to impossible to make them accountable. And there is no pressure on government run enterprises to work efficiently. That's the reason why any attempt at socialism fails inevitably. | |||
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"Capitalise the profit and socialise the debt is privatisation did you actually mean 'privatise the profit and nationalise the debt'? " In the context of my post, that is what the energy loans are an individual debt to bail out and stop the energy companies from going under and they will know how much they will receive between themselves by the government own figures. If it was a nationalised debt we all would pay but as always it will be the needy and poor who will ultimately pay.  | |||
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"I am far from socialist in my outlook, but I absolutely agree that core infrastructure should be owned and operated by the nation. The issue that we have in this country is that the political system that we have in place would mean that these services would (like the NHS) become political playthings by whatever incumbent Government was in office. Look at the way the NHS is treated and imagine that multiplied with gas, electricity, water, sewerage, railways and buses. We need a major overhaul of our political system so that all of our essential services can be run autonomously and free from political interference whilst still being accountable to the people. It always looks like nationalisation of something will make it better. I lived most of my life in India. The moment people get money, they try their best to use private services over government services. We have government run railways where you have toilets where you just want to die the moment you step in. We had a government owned mobile operator which is going to shut down soon. They were the butt of all jokes when it comes to service. Every government office is rampant with corruption. All most all these demands to nationalise come with a condition that we need to make politicians more accountable. Politicians do not have skills to run massive enterprises. It is close to impossible to make them accountable. And there is no pressure on government run enterprises to work efficiently. That's the reason why any attempt at socialism fails inevitably." i disagree with your theories. the juvenile notion that nationalisation bad privatisation good has been proven as bogus from the results that we currently suffer due to 1980's monetarist experiments. the conservative and unionist party constantly brag about their supposed fiscal accumen on account of having mp's who are experienced business experts prior to joining the house. if they are so expert then it leaves the silent majority wondering why they perpetually lurch from economic crisis to economic crisis. | |||
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"I am far from socialist in my outlook, but I absolutely agree that core infrastructure should be owned and operated by the nation. The issue that we have in this country is that the political system that we have in place would mean that these services would (like the NHS) become political playthings by whatever incumbent Government was in office. Look at the way the NHS is treated and imagine that multiplied with gas, electricity, water, sewerage, railways and buses. We need a major overhaul of our political system so that all of our essential services can be run autonomously and free from political interference whilst still being accountable to the people. It always looks like nationalisation of something will make it better. I lived most of my life in India. The moment people get money, they try their best to use private services over government services. We have government run railways where you have toilets where you just want to die the moment you step in. We had a government owned mobile operator which is going to shut down soon. They were the butt of all jokes when it comes to service. Every government office is rampant with corruption. All most all these demands to nationalise come with a condition that we need to make politicians more accountable. Politicians do not have skills to run massive enterprises. It is close to impossible to make them accountable. And there is no pressure on government run enterprises to work efficiently. That's the reason why any attempt at socialism fails inevitably. i disagree with your theories. the juvenile notion that nationalisation bad privatisation good has been proven as bogus from the results that we currently suffer due to 1980's monetarist experiments. the conservative and unionist party constantly brag about their supposed fiscal accumen on account of having mp's who are experienced business experts prior to joining the house. if they are so expert then it leaves the silent majority wondering why they perpetually lurch from economic crisis to economic crisis. "Puts hand up.... Err because it is working exactly to design. | |||
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"I am far from socialist in my outlook, but I absolutely agree that core infrastructure should be owned and operated by the nation. The issue that we have in this country is that the political system that we have in place would mean that these services would (like the NHS) become political playthings by whatever incumbent Government was in office. Look at the way the NHS is treated and imagine that multiplied with gas, electricity, water, sewerage, railways and buses. We need a major overhaul of our political system so that all of our essential services can be run autonomously and free from political interference whilst still being accountable to the people. It always looks like nationalisation of something will make it better. I lived most of my life in India. The moment people get money, they try their best to use private services over government services. We have government run railways where you have toilets where you just want to die the moment you step in. We had a government owned mobile operator which is going to shut down soon. They were the butt of all jokes when it comes to service. Every government office is rampant with corruption. All most all these demands to nationalise come with a condition that we need to make politicians more accountable. Politicians do not have skills to run massive enterprises. It is close to impossible to make them accountable. And there is no pressure on government run enterprises to work efficiently. That's the reason why any attempt at socialism fails inevitably. i disagree with your theories. the juvenile notion that nationalisation bad privatisation good has been proven as bogus from the results that we currently suffer due to 1980's monetarist experiments. the conservative and unionist party constantly brag about their supposed fiscal accumen on account of having mp's who are experienced business experts prior to joining the house. if they are so expert then it leaves the silent majority wondering why they perpetually lurch from economic crisis to economic crisis. "Can you show me the "proof" you have about nationalisation being better than privatisation? Free markets do face issues once in awhile. But the problems you faced with free markets are nothing compared to downright starvation and deaths that happen when nationalised market fails. All the economic "crisis" you talk about and still UK's unemployment rate is at a much healthy position. If you need to see the real difference between government owned markets and free markets, you just have to look at India and China before and after they liberalised their markets. If India hadn't broken out of government controlled market in 1990s, it would have been a massive disaster for the country given the population explosion that happened after. Same with China. | |||
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"I am far from socialist in my outlook, but I absolutely agree that core infrastructure should be owned and operated by the nation. The issue that we have in this country is that the political system that we have in place would mean that these services would (like the NHS) become political playthings by whatever incumbent Government was in office. Look at the way the NHS is treated and imagine that multiplied with gas, electricity, water, sewerage, railways and buses. We need a major overhaul of our political system so that all of our essential services can be run autonomously and free from political interference whilst still being accountable to the people. It always looks like nationalisation of something will make it better. I lived most of my life in India. The moment people get money, they try their best to use private services over government services. We have government run railways where you have toilets where you just want to die the moment you step in. We had a government owned mobile operator which is going to shut down soon. They were the butt of all jokes when it comes to service. Every government office is rampant with corruption. All most all these demands to nationalise come with a condition that we need to make politicians more accountable. Politicians do not have skills to run massive enterprises. It is close to impossible to make them accountable. And there is no pressure on government run enterprises to work efficiently. That's the reason why any attempt at socialism fails inevitably. i disagree with your theories. the juvenile notion that nationalisation bad privatisation good has been proven as bogus from the results that we currently suffer due to 1980's monetarist experiments. the conservative and unionist party constantly brag about their supposed fiscal accumen on account of having mp's who are experienced business experts prior to joining the house. if they are so expert then it leaves the silent majority wondering why they perpetually lurch from economic crisis to economic crisis.
Can you show me the "proof" you have about nationalisation being better than privatisation?
Free markets do face issues once in awhile. But the problems you faced with free markets are nothing compared to downright starvation and deaths that happen when nationalised market fails. All the economic "crisis" you talk about and still UK's unemployment rate is at a much healthy position.
If you need to see the real difference between government owned markets and free markets, you just have to look at India and China before and after they liberalised their markets. If India hadn't broken out of government controlled market in 1990s, it would have been a massive disaster for the country given the population explosion that happened after. Same with China. "i disagree with the blurb you wrote there as it appears to be randomly comparing uncomparible scenarios, aluding to a nonsensical fakery about nationalisation causing death and other ludicrous falsehoods. | |||
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"I am far from socialist in my outlook, but I absolutely agree that core infrastructure should be owned and operated by the nation. The issue that we have in this country is that the political system that we have in place would mean that these services would (like the NHS) become political playthings by whatever incumbent Government was in office. Look at the way the NHS is treated and imagine that multiplied with gas, electricity, water, sewerage, railways and buses. We need a major overhaul of our political system so that all of our essential services can be run autonomously and free from political interference whilst still being accountable to the people. It always looks like nationalisation of something will make it better. I lived most of my life in India. The moment people get money, they try their best to use private services over government services. We have government run railways where you have toilets where you just want to die the moment you step in. We had a government owned mobile operator which is going to shut down soon. They were the butt of all jokes when it comes to service. Every government office is rampant with corruption. All most all these demands to nationalise come with a condition that we need to make politicians more accountable. Politicians do not have skills to run massive enterprises. It is close to impossible to make them accountable. And there is no pressure on government run enterprises to work efficiently. That's the reason why any attempt at socialism fails inevitably. i disagree with your theories. the juvenile notion that nationalisation bad privatisation good has been proven as bogus from the results that we currently suffer due to 1980's monetarist experiments. the conservative and unionist party constantly brag about their supposed fiscal accumen on account of having mp's who are experienced business experts prior to joining the house. if they are so expert then it leaves the silent majority wondering why they perpetually lurch from economic crisis to economic crisis.
Can you show me the "proof" you have about nationalisation being better than privatisation?
Free markets do face issues once in awhile. But the problems you faced with free markets are nothing compared to downright starvation and deaths that happen when nationalised market fails. All the economic "crisis" you talk about and still UK's unemployment rate is at a much healthy position.
If you need to see the real difference between government owned markets and free markets, you just have to look at India and China before and after they liberalised their markets. If India hadn't broken out of government controlled market in 1990s, it would have been a massive disaster for the country given the population explosion that happened after. Same with China.
i disagree with the blurb you wrote there as it appears to be randomly comparing uncomparible scenarios, aluding to a nonsensical fakery about nationalisation causing death and other ludicrous falsehoods."Thanks for the insightful argument. That was really eye opening and contributed a lot to the debate. I guess you are the type that reads a headline in the news and goes giving a speech about issues. Try reading some books about how economics in different countries changed over a period of time. There is a reason why all successful countries embraced free markets. | |||
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"Nothing is broke." Guess you don’t get out much.,  | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now " there is a proven success for the policy of other countries who retained control of their infrastructure by way of nationalisation. one of the bigger benefits has been the ability of foreign countries nationalised services to exploits large profits from services which are tendered to franchise in the UK. | |||
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"Why is everyone saying we have to lurch from one to the other form of structure. To compare India to the U.K. or China is rubbish based purely on their populations they have a huge raft of issues we don’t. India has a huge unemployed younger generation or if they are employed they are in low skill jobs even though a large proportion are very well educated . Chinas rich elite are ruling off their fellow countrymen and as long as they pay the piper ( communist party) their dues then all is well with the world. Just like Russia don’t take the piss and you will be safe. Step out of line and you’re in jail or worse. The fact we have such poor public services is clear and whilst the old (40 years ago ) system didn’t work the fully privatised system is failing badly . It’s needs to be changed away from free markets free for alls . Only I believe on critical infrastructure such as energy and water along with health care and social care. Spouting political rhetoric from theoretical books is why we have such extreme views. But so far both have proven to be failures for the common worker. . Anyone for some middle ground here? Utilities are always the safe bets when markets are jittery or falling. Ok to have that security you don’t get dividends only the price . Or maybe dividends are only paid when targets are met . The private sector needs cleaning up too. 25% of the FTSE 100 have pension deficits for their employees and yet still are paying dividends . Remember Maxwell and Enron?? " I agree
Private public services require strong regulation and legislation, failing that go public with robust 360 feedback/appraisals, training, KPIs and re-investment. Employ specialists and allow them to do their best. Maintain reserves and pensions also.
The current self-serving system is broken - red & blue parties both to blame & enjoy maintaining the status quo...IMO. | |||
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"Why is everyone saying we have to lurch from one to the other form of structure. To compare India to the U.K. or China is rubbish based purely on their populations they have a huge raft of issues we don’t. India has a huge unemployed younger generation or if they are employed they are in low skill jobs even though a large proportion are very well educated . Chinas rich elite are ruling off their fellow countrymen and as long as they pay the piper ( communist party) their dues then all is well with the world. Just like Russia don’t take the piss and you will be safe. Step out of line and you’re in jail or worse. The fact we have such poor public services is clear and whilst the old (40 years ago ) system didn’t work the fully privatised system is failing badly . It’s needs to be changed away from free markets free for alls . Only I believe on critical infrastructure such as energy and water along with health care and social care. Spouting political rhetoric from theoretical books is why we have such extreme views. But so far both have proven to be failures for the common worker. . Anyone for some middle ground here? Utilities are always the safe bets when markets are jittery or falling. Ok to have that security you don’t get dividends only the price . Or maybe dividends are only paid when targets are met . The private sector needs cleaning up too. 25% of the FTSE 100 have pension deficits for their employees and yet still are paying dividends . Remember Maxwell and Enron?? " Most countries which tried government ownership of market gave the same excuse - "It failed for them. Doesn't mean it will fail for us." There is both theoretical evidence and lot of practical evidence on why it doesn't work. I like free markets. But I won't act like it is perfect in every way. As I mentioned above, pollution is a problem. Exploitation of resources and crony capitalism are others that I can lift. I agree that the solution is a middle ground. But making it government owned is not the middle ground. It's the other extreme. The middle ground would be letting private businesses run it but the government setting strict parameters on how they function. | |||
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"Just an idea so feel free to rip apart . Regarding electricity . Why can’t the generation be in public hands but retail in private. That way a core of profit is retained for structural investment but competitive retail companies compete for customers . Maybe set up both private and commercial retail to adjust margin on the supply. The retailers have to pay the same rate issued to commercial or retail sellers so their margins are their only worry . Private will get a return but so would the generator ( the biggest share ) to re invest. I phones are sold to O2, Vodafone, 3 etc and I would think they all pay a similar price to the manufacturer but all retail at their own margin . The Brexit freedom should take care of cheaper imported energy undercutting shouldn’t it?? Btw that’s a joke because we could before Brexit being national security sensitive. The government can set the minimum charges . At the end of this it will also stop foreign interests owning our critical infrastructure . " It boils down to the same issues with government run enterprises. What happens when the energy demand goes up? Do you think the government is efficient enough to adapt? Again, I have seen it unfold in India where power supply is owned by government. There was hardly a power cut when I was a kid. Then when I was in my 20s, lots of people started getting computers and other electrical devices at home. You know what happened? For over 5 years, we had 6 hours of power cut every day. Simply because the government was too late to respond to the demand. You could brush it off saying UK is different from India. The underlying principle is same. What motive do they have? Private businesses will die if they don't keep customers happy. A government doesn't care. There are so many ways to win elections. And what exactly will your suggestion solve? If global gas prices go up, electricity generation cost will still go up. You either charge people more or collect it indirectly through taxes. | |||
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"Just an idea so feel free to rip apart . Regarding electricity . Why can’t the generation be in public hands but retail in private. That way a core of profit is retained for structural investment but competitive retail companies compete for customers . Maybe set up both private and commercial retail to adjust margin on the supply. The retailers have to pay the same rate issued to commercial or retail sellers so their margins are their only worry . Private will get a return but so would the generator ( the biggest share ) to re invest. I phones are sold to O2, Vodafone, 3 etc and I would think they all pay a similar price to the manufacturer but all retail at their own margin . The Brexit freedom should take care of cheaper imported energy undercutting shouldn’t it?? Btw that’s a joke because we could before Brexit being national security sensitive. The government can set the minimum charges . At the end of this it will also stop foreign interests owning our critical infrastructure . It boils down to the same issues with government run enterprises. What happens when the energy demand goes up? Do you think the government is efficient enough to adapt? Again, I have seen it unfold in India where power supply is owned by government. There was hardly a power cut when I was a kid. Then when I was in my 20s, lots of people started getting computers and other electrical devices at home. You know what happened? For over 5 years, we had 6 hours of power cut every day. Simply because the government was too late to respond to the demand. You could brush it off saying UK is different from India. The underlying principle is same. What motive do they have? Private businesses will die if they don't keep customers happy. A government doesn't care. There are so many ways to win elections. And what exactly will your suggestion solve? If global gas prices go up, electricity generation cost will still go up. You either charge people more or collect it indirectly through taxes." The private sector is struggling to cope and is importing power to make up the shortfall so just as you mentioned government being unable to adapt the private companies are also failing so we are no better off with private management and any profit is still being taken from the U.K. The private sector would apply pressure as well as government to provide service as they both have a vested interest. What’s to stop the state power generator importing excess needs? Your India reference has no baring as it’s a not the same at all . That country is relatively poor to a modern western country so has no chance of creating the basic infrastructure quickly it needs let alone creating enough energy. Leave urban areas in the U.K. and you still have paved roads and street lighting . Try that in all of India Look at the wages paid in India and the real poverty that has to be dealt with. India is modernising fast but has a long way to go. Our reliance on imported fuel will reduce if we build better infrastructure from guaranteed profits. Nuclear , EFW to name two simple strategies to increase capacity. Maybe coal conversion. Spending a lot of time abroad I have seen we are in the Stone age in many cases . In Scandinavia the local power stations use waste and wood to provide heating, electricity and hot water to the local residents. Our plants just create electricity due to no spending on infrastructure with our ridiculous building planning laws . ( Again look who’s lobbying and supporting the Tory party) In certain areas of Bergen you can put a bag of waste in a street bin and it is vacuumed to the waste management plant. Remember that when you’re pushing all your wheelie bins. They spent the oil tax money on their roads and trains along with modern power stations for the people of Norway. We gave our potential revenues away to the rich shareholders. With the push towards electric cars people will have to accept a lot more power generation sites in this country. | |||
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" The private sector is struggling to cope and is importing power to make up the shortfall so just as you mentioned government being unable to adapt the private companies are also failing so we are no better off with private management and any profit is still being taken from the U.K. The private sector would apply pressure as well as government to provide service as they both have a vested interest. What’s to stop the state power generator importing excess needs? " Government owned enterprise will make the situation even worse due to beaureacracy. They won't show the same urgency as private sector. " Your India reference has no baring as it’s a not the same at all . That country is relatively poor to a modern western country so has no chance of creating the basic infrastructure quickly it needs let alone creating enough energy. Leave urban areas in the U.K. and you still have paved roads and street lighting . Try that in all of India Look at the wages paid in India and the real poverty that has to be dealt with. India is modernising fast but has a long way to go. " India's wage structure and wealth shouldn't matter here. If this was run by private, there would have been electricity shortage. But companies would have fixed the issue in a year. It took the government over 5 years to fix the problem. Do you know how long they took just to take decision that they need to build more power plant? 2 years. And then ruling party changed who took all the projects in entirely different direction. To put things in perspective, all big cities in India have a terrific internet connectivity run by private companies. But they have really poor roads and public transport. They have amazing inter city bus services but terrible train services. Even for a poor country, every thing run by private companies turn efficient magically while people have been let down time and again by government services. If lack of wealth is the reason, private industries should have failed the same way, right? " Our reliance on imported fuel will reduce if we build better infrastructure from guaranteed profits. Nuclear , EFW to name two simple strategies to increase capacity. Maybe coal conversion. Spending a lot of time abroad I have seen we are in the Stone age in many cases . In Scandinavia the local power stations use waste and wood to provide heating, electricity and hot water to the local residents. Our plants just create electricity due to no spending on infrastructure with our ridiculous building planning laws . ( Again look who’s lobbying and supporting the Tory party) In certain areas of Bergen you can put a bag of waste in a street bin and it is vacuumed to the waste management plant. Remember that when you’re pushing all your wheelie bins. They spent the oil tax money on their roads and trains along with modern power stations for the people of Norway. We gave our potential revenues away to the rich shareholders. With the push towards electric cars people will have to accept a lot more power generation sites in this country. " Great ideas on power generation. This probably something UK can learn from. But remember that power demands in UK are different from power demands in Scandinavian countries. | |||
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" The private sector is struggling to cope and is importing power to make up the shortfall so just as you mentioned government being unable to adapt the private companies are also failing so we are no better off with private management and any profit is still being taken from the U.K. The private sector would apply pressure as well as government to provide service as they both have a vested interest. What’s to stop the state power generator importing excess needs? Government owned enterprise will make the situation even worse due to beaureacracy. They won't show the same urgency as private sector. Your India reference has no baring as it’s a not the same at all . That country is relatively poor to a modern western country so has no chance of creating the basic infrastructure quickly it needs let alone creating enough energy. Leave urban areas in the U.K. and you still have paved roads and street lighting . Try that in all of India Look at the wages paid in India and the real poverty that has to be dealt with. India is modernising fast but has a long way to go. India's wage structure and wealth shouldn't matter here. If this was run by private, there would have been electricity shortage. But companies would have fixed the issue in a year. It took the government over 5 years to fix the problem. Do you know how long they took just to take decision that they need to build more power plant? 2 years. And then ruling party changed who took all the projects in entirely different direction. To put things in perspective, all big cities in India have a terrific internet connectivity run by private companies. But they have really poor roads and public transport. They have amazing inter city bus services but terrible train services. Even for a poor country, every thing run by private companies turn efficient magically while people have been let down time and again by government services. If lack of wealth is the reason, private industries should have failed the same way, right? Our reliance on imported fuel will reduce if we build better infrastructure from guaranteed profits. Nuclear , EFW to name two simple strategies to increase capacity. Maybe coal conversion. Spending a lot of time abroad I have seen we are in the Stone age in many cases . In Scandinavia the local power stations use waste and wood to provide heating, electricity and hot water to the local residents. Our plants just create electricity due to no spending on infrastructure with our ridiculous building planning laws . ( Again look who’s lobbying and supporting the Tory party) In certain areas of Bergen you can put a bag of waste in a street bin and it is vacuumed to the waste management plant. Remember that when you’re pushing all your wheelie bins. They spent the oil tax money on their roads and trains along with modern power stations for the people of Norway. We gave our potential revenues away to the rich shareholders. With the push towards electric cars people will have to accept a lot more power generation sites in this country. Great ideas on power generation. This probably something UK can learn from. But remember that power demands in UK are different from power demands in Scandinavian countries. " You’re missing the point as you are indoctrinated by how the state was run 30 plus years ago. Private sector works in other countries due to the ‘English Disease” being less prevalent. We need a much smarter approach. Of course wages and wealth in India matter. If the cash isn’t there to spend or be raised by taxes you can’t afford to invest in infrastructure so you can’t compare a wealthy western national with India’s relatively poor status. The pace of government will be slow due to the sheer scale of the country in both size and population along with communication. You mention good internet in the cities. Yes that’s where cell phones started here in the U.K. as they could make money due to the concentration of people and wealth. The government has since forced them to offer full national coverage even if it means at a loss. India doesn’t have those rules regarding internet I would suggest. Trains and tracks are very expensive to build so with limited funds and relatively poor customers of course it’s going to be shit. Buses are cheap and second hand imported buses even cheaper so to provide an good intercity service is easy. This is basic economics nothing to do with public private funding. Buses in this country make money on intercity but tell them to provide rural services and that’s a different matter, Yes our power generation is different across Europe but the basic needs are the same. Power, heating, hot water. The problem here is our very poor planning laws regarding integration with power consumption alongside home building. No thought is given to the fact extra houses need more power. This is 40 years of bad government planning not a public or private argument. Maybe fossil fuels can fill the gap while we build cleaner modern generational capacity. I don’t claim to know the solution but I can clearly see with power and our water services the experiment with the private sector is failing our nation. And remember I voted for it as I thought it’s as a good idea. It isn’t. | |||
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"One if the biggest failures of energy privatisation is the disincentive for renewables on domestic properties, due to refusal to embrace net metering. If you could install Solar PV and while at work and unable to fully use surplus energy, it would be pushed onto the grid in exchange for credits for 90% of the value you've exported. In many parts of the US and Australia, this is exactly how it works, so by exporting for example, 10kwh onto the Grid during the day and use 10kw during the night, you would only pay for 1kwh. It would mean that all private surplus could support business daytime demand, then at night, when energy is surplus on the Grid, its taken back in exchange for 10% reduction. Why is it not done here? Electricity companies and shareholders don't want it as 10% margin is not viable (although at todays wholesale rates, that's arguable). There is not enough profit involved and therefore this massive incentive for private installation of Solar and the effect on Climate change as well as reducing Gas demand, is missed." Power generation on the continent often has three revenue streams due to the planned infrastructure allowing one station to provide all three . So hot water heating and power to residential and industrial clients. We are seeing small shoots of this with Hydrogen use in the U.K. regarding industrial consumption but it won’t touch residential. Again years of under investment and no clear government plan. They just want to last five years of parliament and the private sector just want to make a profit . It has to change . | |||
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" You’re missing the point as you are indoctrinated by how the state was run 30 plus years ago. Private sector works in other countries due to the ‘English Disease” being less prevalent. We need a much smarter approach. " 30 years back? I am talking about how government runs services right now. Indian government even runs its own airlines. And that's the last option anyone picks. " Of course wages and wealth in India matter. If the cash isn’t there to spend or be raised by taxes you can’t afford to invest in infrastructure so you can’t compare a wealthy western national with India’s relatively poor status. The pace of government will be slow due to the sheer scale of the country in both size and population along with communication. " Again, there are industries where both private and government owned businesses have competed against each other. Private businesses have kicked government owned ones out of the park in all major factors - Prices, quality and customer service. " You mention good internet in the cities. Yes that’s where cell phones started here in the U.K. as they could make money due to the concentration of people and wealth. The government has since forced them to offer full national coverage even if it means at a loss. India doesn’t have those rules regarding internet I would suggest. " There is internet in most regions in India except the Himalayas. Speed can be dodgy in certain places but only because most people who live there do not care for the internet. No one complains there. If there is a need and people ask for it, there will be faster internet. " Trains and tracks are very expensive to build so with limited funds and relatively poor customers of course it’s going to be shit. Buses are cheap and second hand imported buses even cheaper so to provide an good intercity service is easy. This is basic economics nothing to do with public private funding. Buses in this country make money on intercity but tell them to provide rural services and that’s a different matter, " You have thoroughly misunderstood basic economics. Lots of assumptions there. Indian government also runs buses. Most people would rather not travel at all, instead of travelling in government buses. Private buses range from simple seated cheaper ones to costly air conditioned sleeper ones made by Volvo. Indian trains do have expensive air conditioned coaches. Even those are poorly maintained. There is a good chance that you spend the night with bed bugs. " Yes our power generation is different across Europe but the basic needs are the same. Power, heating, hot water. The problem here is our very poor planning laws regarding integration with power consumption alongside home building. No thought is given to the fact extra houses need more power. This is 40 years of bad government planning not a public or private argument. Maybe fossil fuels can fill the gap while we build cleaner modern generational capacity. I don’t claim to know the solution but I can clearly see with power and our water services the experiment with the private sector is failing our nation. And remember I voted for it as I thought it’s as a good idea. It isn’t. " This I agree. Planning has been pretty poor. | |||
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"the conservative and unionist party tried public ownership run by private firms with trains, and all that happened was that we were locked into failing franchises for dsecades. as soon as private firms bailed out and handed back lines such as the east coast line, the nationalised line started and continued to turn a profit. when the line was re-franchised it instantly started to fail until the point came where it was handed back again and started to turn a profit. so the idealogues notion that private management is best has proven to be utterly false. "Indeed. There are some things (infrastructure, utilities) that run at tight margins. If you make those margins even tighter due to a need to pay out dividends, it can become unsustainable. Instead the “profits” should be wholly reinvested back into the service to make it better. | |||
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"I don’t think that the scale of the upcoming energy price increases has really hit home with a lot of people yet. When it does, I predict a huge clamour for energy to be re-nationalised. I think this will be the next nightmare for this Govt to deal (if they last that long). A Govt controlled energy supply could have protected our people from the upcoming price rises and instead U.K. based EDF customers will be bailing out the French energy company and U.K. citizens generally will really feel a huge cost of living squeeze. The arguments for Nationalised essential services will become louder and more insistent in the coming months." You do know that government protects people from price rises by paying for it through taxes right? Price rise indicates only one thing - Supply is lower than demand. If a government is going to get in and reduce the price, you are either paying for it indirectly through taxes or you are going to suffer from scarcity. In developed countries, it is usually the former where more tax is collected. In the developing countries, it's the latter and they suffer from shortage. | |||
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"I don’t think that the scale of the upcoming energy price increases has really hit home with a lot of people yet. When it does, I predict a huge clamour for energy to be re-nationalised. I think this will be the next nightmare for this Govt to deal (if they last that long). A Govt controlled energy supply could have protected our people from the upcoming price rises and instead U.K. based EDF customers will be bailing out the French energy company and U.K. citizens generally will really feel a huge cost of living squeeze. The arguments for Nationalised essential services will become louder and more insistent in the coming months. You do know that government protects people from price rises by paying for it through taxes right? Price rise indicates only one thing - Supply is lower than demand. If a government is going to get in and reduce the price, you are either paying for it indirectly through taxes or you are going to suffer from scarcity. In developed countries, it is usually the former where more tax is collected. In the developing countries, it's the latter and they suffer from shortage." Except they need to cover product cost, operating costs and reinvestment but do not need to also finance dividends so ultimately still cheaper. | |||
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"I don’t think that the scale of the upcoming energy price increases has really hit home with a lot of people yet. When it does, I predict a huge clamour for energy to be re-nationalised. I think this will be the next nightmare for this Govt to deal (if they last that long). A Govt controlled energy supply could have protected our people from the upcoming price rises and instead U.K. based EDF customers will be bailing out the French energy company and U.K. citizens generally will really feel a huge cost of living squeeze. The arguments for Nationalised essential services will become louder and more insistent in the coming months. You do know that government protects people from price rises by paying for it through taxes right? Price rise indicates only one thing - Supply is lower than demand. If a government is going to get in and reduce the price, you are either paying for it indirectly through taxes or you are going to suffer from scarcity. In developed countries, it is usually the former where more tax is collected. In the developing countries, it's the latter and they suffer from shortage. Except they need to cover product cost, operating costs and reinvestment but do not need to also finance dividends so ultimately still cheaper." No one is obligated to finance dividends. | |||
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"I don’t think that the scale of the upcoming energy price increases has really hit home with a lot of people yet. When it does, I predict a huge clamour for energy to be re-nationalised. I think this will be the next nightmare for this Govt to deal (if they last that long). A Govt controlled energy supply could have protected our people from the upcoming price rises and instead U.K. based EDF customers will be bailing out the French energy company and U.K. citizens generally will really feel a huge cost of living squeeze. The arguments for Nationalised essential services will become louder and more insistent in the coming months. You do know that government protects people from price rises by paying for it through taxes right? Price rise indicates only one thing - Supply is lower than demand. If a government is going to get in and reduce the price, you are either paying for it indirectly through taxes or you are going to suffer from scarcity. In developed countries, it is usually the former where more tax is collected. In the developing countries, it's the latter and they suffer from shortage. Except they need to cover product cost, operating costs and reinvestment but do not need to also finance dividends so ultimately still cheaper. No one is obligated to finance dividends." And yet they do and over re investment | |||
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" You’re missing the point as you are indoctrinated by how the state was run 30 plus years ago. Private sector works in other countries due to the ‘English Disease” being less prevalent. We need a much smarter approach. 30 years back? I am talking about how government runs services right now. Indian government even runs its own airlines. And that's the last option anyone picks. “ Utilities here were privatised in the 80s so you cannot compare todays services. The NHS is a basket case as medical need conflicts with economics. Social care is just totally underfunded. “ Again, there are industries where both private and government owned businesses have competed against each other. Private businesses have kicked government owned ones out of the park in all major factors - Prices, quality and customer service. “ Yes and if you introduce better accountable management as I stated originally above they the services would be on a par. “ There is internet in most regions in India except the Himalayas. Speed can be dodgy in certain places but only because most people who live there do not care for the internet. No one complains there. If there is a need and people ask for it, there will be faster internet. “ 50% of the population of India do not have access to the internet that’s a fact from 2020. “ You have thoroughly misunderstood basic economics. Lots of assumptions there. Indian government also runs buses. Most people would rather not travel at all, instead of travelling in government buses. Private buses range from simple seated cheaper ones to costly air conditioned sleeper ones made by Volvo. Indian trains do have expensive air conditioned coaches. Even those are poorly maintained. There is a good chance that you spend the night with bed bugs. “ Now you’re arguing with yourself . The fact is buses are cheaper to invest in and if the private services are good enough to cover the need why does the government bother ?? Because the private buses cost more and the public can’t afford them. Simple economics which you claim I don’t understand . Make the private buses provide an affordable service for all and see where the quality goes . “ Yes our power generation is different across Europe but the basic needs are the same. Power, heating, hot water. The problem here is our very poor planning laws regarding integration with power consumption alongside home building. No thought is given to the fact extra houses need more power. This is 40 years of bad government planning not a public or private argument. Maybe fossil fuels can fill the gap while we build cleaner modern generational capacity. I don’t claim to know the solution but I can clearly see with power and our water services the experiment with the private sector is failing our nation. And remember I voted for it as I thought it’s as a good idea. It isn’t. This I agree. Planning has been pretty poor." Glad we agree on the last one | |||
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"Easier to read " 30 years back? I am talking about how government runs services right now. Indian government even runs its own airlines. And that's the last option anyone picks. “ Utilities here were privatised in the 80s so you cannot compare todays services. The NHS is a basket case as medical need conflicts with economics. Social care is just totally underfunded. “ Again, there are industries where both private and government owned businesses have competed against each other. Private businesses have kicked government owned ones out of the park in all major factors - Prices, quality and customer service. “ Yes and if you introduce better accountable management as I stated originally above they the services would be on a par. “ There is internet in most regions in India except the Himalayas. Speed can be dodgy in certain places but only because most people who live there do not care for the internet. No one complains there. If there is a need and people ask for it, there will be faster internet. “ 50% of the population of India do not have access to the internet that’s a fact from 2020.. they have a “target” to supply 900m people by 2020 out of the 1.4Bilkuon population so still 75% if that’s achieved . This is access not usage as many do not have the money for the devices . “ You have thoroughly misunderstood basic economics. Lots of assumptions there. Indian government also runs buses. Most people would rather not travel at all, instead of travelling in government buses. Private buses range from simple seated cheaper ones to costly air conditioned sleeper ones made by Volvo. Indian trains do have expensive air conditioned coaches. Even those are poorly maintained. There is a good chance that you spend the night with bed bugs. “ Now you’re arguing with yourself . The fact is buses are cheaper to invest in and if the private services are good enough to cover the need why does the government bother ?? Because the private buses cost more and the public can’t afford them. Simple economics which you claim I don’t understand . Make the private buses provide an affordable service for all and see where the quality goes . Public transport is there to provide a need not a profit. “ Yes our power generation is different across Europe but the basic needs are the same. Power, heating, hot water. The problem here is our very poor planning laws regarding integration with power consumption alongside home building. No thought is given to the fact extra houses need more power. This is 40 years of bad government planning not a public or private argument. Maybe fossil fuels can fill the gap while we build cleaner modern generational capacity. I don’t claim to know the solution but I can clearly see with power and our water services the experiment with the private sector is failing our nation. And remember I voted for it as I thought it’s as a good idea. It isn’t. This I agree. Planning has been pretty poor." Glad we agree on the last one "We are back to square one on accountable management. Accountable management on government owned enterprise has never be achieved and never will be achieved because governments are evaluated only once every five years and there are plenty of other factors to consider than how they handled government owned companies. Private companies on the other hand have to compete with other companies neck to neck all the time. About buses, it's true that government run buses are relatively cheaper. But that's because government runs these buses at a loss and uses tax payer's money for it. Even then, people travelling during off peak times usually try to take private buses because low demand usually drives down prices in private buses. The only advantage a government run business has is that they can use tax money to make up for losses. Whether that's really an advantage is an entirely different question. If you look at the tax money being spent, they just spend the same amount of money for service of much poorer quality. On internet, 50% is the number of users who use the internet. Internet coverage by area is pretty good. The problem is lots of people do not use internet even when it's there. Of all the people from my parents' generation, only my mother knows how to make WhatsApp calls. She doesn't know anything else about internet. Even if we wanted to teach them, they always refuse with some or other excuse. If there is genuine need for internet anywhere, service providers fight one another to build one there. If you feel that tax payer's money must be used to subsidise electricity and provide it at cheaper cost for everyone, that's an argument which I can empathise with though I don't agree with. But when it comes to efficiency and quality, government run business can never get close to private businesses. It's a fact that has been proven time and again all over the world. | |||
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"@Jackal1 State governments run bus services in India. This is from my state. The current debt of the bus service is Indian Rupees 300,000,000,000 which is 3 billion pounds. This is the kind of efficiency we are talking about. https://www.newindianexpress.com/states/tamil-nadu/2021/aug/09/will-the-tamil-nadu-budget-resolve-the-transport-corporations-financial-crisis-234213" A as nd again you compare a country with £1.4b people and a lot of abject poverty . If the government stopped the private buses wound they be able to charge for different levels of service and make a profit?? How you both can compare India to the U.K. is beyond ridiculous. If we had the same income ratio our public services wound be dire . | |||
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"@Jackal1 State governments run bus services in India. This is from my state. The current debt of the bus service is Indian Rupees 300,000,000,000 which is 3 billion pounds. This is the kind of efficiency we are talking about. https://www.newindianexpress.com/states/tamil-nadu/2021/aug/09/will-the-tamil-nadu-budget-resolve-the-transport-corporations-financial-crisis-234213 A as nd again you compare a country with £1.4b people and a lot of abject poverty . If the government stopped the private buses wound they be able to charge for different levels of service and make a profit?? How you both can compare India to the U.K. is beyond ridiculous. If we had the same income ratio our public services wound be dire . " Again, I did not compare India and Uk. I am comparing services within India. It's not just India. Every country throughout the period of time has multiple examples to show how nationalised businesses are inefficient and people will only pay more through taxes for poor quality services. But still every once in awhile, someone comes up with the idea of nationalisation like it's suddenly going to work this time. Again, if your goal is to help the poor pay the bills with the tax paid by the rich, say so. But trying to make a government enterprise more efficient and keep it corruption free is impossible. The more accountability solution you mentioned above will not work because they don't have to be accountable to anyone. | |||
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"Easier to read " 30 years back? I am talking about how government runs services right now. Indian government even runs its own airlines. And that's the last option anyone picks. “ Utilities here were privatised in the 80s so you cannot compare todays services. The NHS is a basket case as medical need conflicts with economics. Social care is just totally underfunded. “ Again, there are industries where both private and government owned businesses have competed against each other. Private businesses have kicked government owned ones out of the park in all major factors - Prices, quality and customer service. “ Yes and if you introduce better accountable management as I stated originally above they the services would be on a par. “ There is internet in most regions in India except the Himalayas. Speed can be dodgy in certain places but only because most people who live there do not care for the internet. No one complains there. If there is a need and people ask for it, there will be faster internet. “ 50% of the population of India do not have access to the internet that’s a fact from 2020.. they have a “target” to supply 900m people by 2020 out of the 1.4Bilkuon population so still 75% if that’s achieved . This is access not usage as many do not have the money for the devices . “ You have thoroughly misunderstood basic economics. Lots of assumptions there. Indian government also runs buses. Most people would rather not travel at all, instead of travelling in government buses. Private buses range from simple seated cheaper ones to costly air conditioned sleeper ones made by Volvo. Indian trains do have expensive air conditioned coaches. Even those are poorly maintained. There is a good chance that you spend the night with bed bugs. “ Now you’re arguing with yourself . The fact is buses are cheaper to invest in and if the private services are good enough to cover the need why does the government bother ?? Because the private buses cost more and the public can’t afford them. Simple economics which you claim I don’t understand . Make the private buses provide an affordable service for all and see where the quality goes . Public transport is there to provide a need not a profit. “ Yes our power generation is different across Europe but the basic needs are the same. Power, heating, hot water. The problem here is our very poor planning laws regarding integration with power consumption alongside home building. No thought is given to the fact extra houses need more power. This is 40 years of bad government planning not a public or private argument. Maybe fossil fuels can fill the gap while we build cleaner modern generational capacity. I don’t claim to know the solution but I can clearly see with power and our water services the experiment with the private sector is failing our nation. And remember I voted for it as I thought it’s as a good idea. It isn’t. This I agree. Planning has been pretty poor." Glad we agree on the last one
We are back to square one on accountable management. Accountable management on government owned enterprise has never be achieved and never will be achieved because governments are evaluated only once every five years and there are plenty of other factors to consider than how they handled government owned companies. Private companies on the other hand have to compete with other companies neck to neck all the time.
About buses, it's true that government run buses are relatively cheaper. But that's because government runs these buses at a loss and uses tax payer's money for it. Even then, people travelling during off peak times usually try to take private buses because low demand usually drives down prices in private buses. The only advantage a government run business has is that they can use tax money to make up for losses. Whether that's really an advantage is an entirely different question. If you look at the tax money being spent, they just spend the same amount of money for service of much poorer quality.
On internet, 50% is the number of users who use the internet. Internet coverage by area is pretty good. The problem is lots of people do not use internet even when it's there. Of all the people from my parents' generation, only my mother knows how to make WhatsApp calls. She doesn't know anything else about internet. Even if we wanted to teach them, they always refuse with some or other excuse. If there is genuine need for internet anywhere, service providers fight one another to build one there.
If you feel that tax payer's money must be used to subsidise electricity and provide it at cheaper cost for everyone, that's an argument which I can empathise with though I don't agree with. But when it comes to efficiency and quality, government run business can never get close to private businesses. It's a fact that has been proven time and again all over the world."Never been efficient m??? and yet some European trains are nationalised and are years ahead of the U.K. in both service and cost. You are blinkered by your own political beliefs or nss maybe limited experience which is fine if it makes you happy but the reality is it is proven to work elsewhere. It’s about the management and long term investment . As for internet The demand is there and the internet companies would have it covered by now but the cost to earnings ratio makes it unviable to cover all of India’s demand what don’t you understand about the simple fact there is no profit in it. It’s an after thought once a return has been achievedconntgecorifitabke areas which have been given priority, Compare maybe to the NHS against private hospitals . If private was forced to lay on A&E along with all therapy and free at source services then add in services for all the residents in their catchment area, can you imagine how much those private insurance premiums would be? The reason they don’t offer that extra coverage is because it’s not profitable it’s that simple. They cherry pick. Where did I say the tax payer should subsidise the energy industry? You’re making that up. The industry being owned by the government would mean keeping the revenue in total rather than paying dividends to shareholders . Who do you thinks lending the energy companies money right now? It’s the tax payer and it’s then being paid back by the tax payer. If private us better why can’t they afford to ride it out?? They can but they will increase prices to the poor to keep profits up and dividends healthy. Water companies have handed out over £65 Billion in dividends. That’s a lot of infrastructure development lost to the taxpayer. Fundamental industries such as rail , utilities and healthcare are the basic underlying services that a government should always control. The tax payer is subsidising rail in this country and yet dividends are still paid out. Good private management indeed. I think not. When franchises lose money they just walk away. Leaving the tax payer to foot the bill. Network rail have been stopped from paying dividends as they were using subsidies to do so. The same business formally called railtrack borrowed money off the government to actually pay dividends. Again great private management. As there is poor government there is also poor private management . Private in the U.K. has not worked for the critical industries and needs to be changed. | |||
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"@Jackal1 State governments run bus services in India. This is from my state. The current debt of the bus service is Indian Rupees 300,000,000,000 which is 3 billion pounds. This is the kind of efficiency we are talking about. https://www.newindianexpress.com/states/tamil-nadu/2021/aug/09/will-the-tamil-nadu-budget-resolve-the-transport-corporations-financial-crisis-234213 A as nd again you compare a country with £1.4b people and a lot of abject poverty . If the government stopped the private buses wound they be able to charge for different levels of service and make a profit?? How you both can compare India to the U.K. is beyond ridiculous. If we had the same income ratio our public services wound be dire . Again, I did not compare India and Uk. I am comparing services within India. It's not just India. Every country throughout the period of time has multiple examples to show how nationalised businesses are inefficient and people will only pay more through taxes for poor quality services. But still every once in awhile, someone comes up with the idea of nationalisation like it's suddenly going to work this time. Again, if your goal is to help the poor pay the bills with the tax paid by the rich, say so. But trying to make a government enterprise more efficient and keep it corruption free is impossible. The more accountability solution you mentioned above will not work because they don't have to be accountable to anyone." The rich don’t pay their fair share of tax . Maybe if they did the country would be better off.. if you travel more in Europe you will see how well the nationalised trains work. Right wing politics claims it should be more liberalised but it works so much better than in the U.K. and it’s a lot cheaper. My view is to have the government holding stakes in industries and taking the lions share of profits to re invest. Dividends are banned but shares can be traded in say a quarter of the company, Cut the ridiculous overheads that see Network rail’s staff occupying half of the top ten wage earners for the state sector in the country., It’s all in dire need of change but our political class are not fit for the job sadly. That’s a whole new debate and perhaps the crux of the problem. | |||
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" Never been efficient m??? and yet some European trains are nationalised and are years ahead of the U.K. in both service and cost. You are blinkered by your own political beliefs or nss maybe limited experience which is fine if it makes you happy but the reality is it is proven to work elsewhere. It’s about the management and long term investment As for internet The demand is there and the internet companies would have it covered by now but the cost to earnings ratio makes it unviable to cover all of India’s demand what don’t you understand about the simple fact there is no profit in it. It’s an after thought once a return has been achievedconntgecorifitabke areas which have been given priority, Compare maybe to the NHS against private hospitals . If private was forced to lay on A&E along with all therapy and free at source services then add in services for all the residents in their catchment area, can you imagine how much those private insurance premiums would be? The reason they don’t offer that extra coverage is because it’s not profitable it’s that simple. They cherry pick. Where did I say the tax payer should subsidise the energy industry? You’re making that up. The industry being owned by the government would mean keeping the revenue in total rather than paying dividends to shareholders . Who do you thinks lending the energy companies money right now? It’s the tax payer and it’s then being paid back by the tax payer. If private us better why can’t they afford to ride it out?? They can but they will increase prices to the poor to keep profits up and dividends healthy. Water companies have handed out over £65 Billion in dividends. That’s a lot of infrastructure development lost to the taxpayer. Fundamental industries such as rail , utilities and healthcare are the basic underlying services that a government should always control. The tax payer is subsidising rail in this country and yet dividends are still paid out. Good private management indeed. I think not. When franchises lose money they just walk away. Leaving the tax payer to foot the bill. Network rail have been stopped from paying dividends as they were using subsidies to do so. The same business formally called railtrack borrowed money off the government to actually pay dividends. Again great private management. As there is poor government there is also poor private management . Private in the U.K. has not worked for the critical industries and needs to be changed. " Internet - Number of internet users increased rapidly in the past two years because covid and lockdown meant remote learning and people had to use it. Internet reached people who wanted it. European railways? French railways accounts for 3% of French national debt. You call that efficient? The debate is going in circles because you keep changing goal posts. Your original post was about making government services more efficient and making it accountable. But when I point out that government services have never been efficient or accountable, you go back to "But poor people need to have access". Government services make it accessible to poor people by collecting more taxes or by going into debt. That's charitable. But not efficient. Oh yes. German railways just received 2.1 billion Euros bailout. Amazing efficiency I must say. If you call this efficient, you are the one who is blinded by political beliefs maybe? Nationalisation makes it cheaper for poor people by using tax money. Efficiency and charity are two different things. | |||
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"@Jackal1 State governments run bus services in India. This is from my state. The current debt of the bus service is Indian Rupees 300,000,000,000 which is 3 billion pounds. This is the kind of efficiency we are talking about. https://www.newindianexpress.com/states/tamil-nadu/2021/aug/09/will-the-tamil-nadu-budget-resolve-the-transport-corporations-financial-crisis-234213 A as nd again you compare a country with £1.4b people and a lot of abject poverty . If the government stopped the private buses wound they be able to charge for different levels of service and make a profit?? How you both can compare India to the U.K. is beyond ridiculous. If we had the same income ratio our public services wound be dire . Again, I did not compare India and Uk. I am comparing services within India. It's not just India. Every country throughout the period of time has multiple examples to show how nationalised businesses are inefficient and people will only pay more through taxes for poor quality services. But still every once in awhile, someone comes up with the idea of nationalisation like it's suddenly going to work this time. Again, if your goal is to help the poor pay the bills with the tax paid by the rich, say so. But trying to make a government enterprise more efficient and keep it corruption free is impossible. The more accountability solution you mentioned above will not work because they don't have to be accountable to anyone. The rich don’t pay their fair share of tax . Maybe if they did the country would be better off.. if you travel more in Europe you will see how well the nationalised trains work. Right wing politics claims it should be more liberalised but it works so much better than in the U.K. and it’s a lot cheaper. My view is to have the government holding stakes in industries and taking the lions share of profits to re invest. Dividends are banned but shares can be traded in say a quarter of the company, Cut the ridiculous overheads that see Network rail’s staff occupying half of the top ten wage earners for the state sector in the country., It’s all in dire need of change but our political class are not fit for the job sadly. That’s a whole new debate and perhaps the crux of the problem. " At last, the rich don't pay "fair share" excuse. The only problem I have with current taxation structure is corporation tax which was designed before globalisation developed which helps them channel the money to low tax countries. I hope that gets fixed by recent efforts. I have travelled around Europe. I visited Finland and Sweden just two months back. I had booked a total if three train tickets. All the three were cancelled and I was made to take replacement buses. Paris trains and stations are as dirty as UK. If you use these services long enough, you will see as many faults as with UK's services. | |||
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" Never been efficient m??? and yet some European trains are nationalised and are years ahead of the U.K. in both service and cost. You are blinkered by your own political beliefs or nss maybe limited experience which is fine if it makes you happy but the reality is it is proven to work elsewhere. It’s about the management and long term investment As for internet The demand is there and the internet companies would have it covered by now but the cost to earnings ratio makes it unviable to cover all of India’s demand what don’t you understand about the simple fact there is no profit in it. It’s an after thought once a return has been achievedconntgecorifitabke areas which have been given priority, Compare maybe to the NHS against private hospitals . If private was forced to lay on A&E along with all therapy and free at source services then add in services for all the residents in their catchment area, can you imagine how much those private insurance premiums would be? The reason they don’t offer that extra coverage is because it’s not profitable it’s that simple. They cherry pick. Where did I say the tax payer should subsidise the energy industry? You’re making that up. The industry being owned by the government would mean keeping the revenue in total rather than paying dividends to shareholders . Who do you thinks lending the energy companies money right now? It’s the tax payer and it’s then being paid back by the tax payer. If private us better why can’t they afford to ride it out?? They can but they will increase prices to the poor to keep profits up and dividends healthy. Water companies have handed out over £65 Billion in dividends. That’s a lot of infrastructure development lost to the taxpayer. Fundamental industries such as rail , utilities and healthcare are the basic underlying services that a government should always control. The tax payer is subsidising rail in this country and yet dividends are still paid out. Good private management indeed. I think not. When franchises lose money they just walk away. Leaving the tax payer to foot the bill. Network rail have been stopped from paying dividends as they were using subsidies to do so. The same business formally called railtrack borrowed money off the government to actually pay dividends. Again great private management. As there is poor government there is also poor private management . Private in the U.K. has not worked for the critical industries and needs to be changed. Internet - Number of internet users increased rapidly in the past two years because covid and lockdown meant remote learning and people had to use it. Internet reached people who wanted it. European railways? French railways accounts for 3% of French national debt. You call that efficient? The debate is going in circles because you keep changing goal posts. Your original post was about making government services more efficient and making it accountable. But when I point out that government services have never been efficient or accountable, you go back to "But poor people need to have access". Government services make it accessible to poor people by collecting more taxes or by going into debt. That's charitable. But not efficient. Oh yes. German railways just received 2.1 billion Euros bailout. Amazing efficiency I must say. If you call this efficient, you are the one who is blinded by political beliefs maybe? Nationalisation makes it cheaper for poor people by using tax money. Efficiency and charity are two different things. " Simple question should the NHS make a profit?? | |||
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"@Jackal1 State governments run bus services in India. This is from my state. The current debt of the bus service is Indian Rupees 300,000,000,000 which is 3 billion pounds. This is the kind of efficiency we are talking about. https://www.newindianexpress.com/states/tamil-nadu/2021/aug/09/will-the-tamil-nadu-budget-resolve-the-transport-corporations-financial-crisis-234213 A as nd again you compare a country with £1.4b people and a lot of abject poverty . If the government stopped the private buses wound they be able to charge for different levels of service and make a profit?? How you both can compare India to the U.K. is beyond ridiculous. If we had the same income ratio our public services wound be dire . Again, I did not compare India and Uk. I am comparing services within India. It's not just India. Every country throughout the period of time has multiple examples to show how nationalised businesses are inefficient and people will only pay more through taxes for poor quality services. But still every once in awhile, someone comes up with the idea of nationalisation like it's suddenly going to work this time. Again, if your goal is to help the poor pay the bills with the tax paid by the rich, say so. But trying to make a government enterprise more efficient and keep it corruption free is impossible. The more accountability solution you mentioned above will not work because they don't have to be accountable to anyone. The rich don’t pay their fair share of tax . Maybe if they did the country would be better off.. if you travel more in Europe you will see how well the nationalised trains work. Right wing politics claims it should be more liberalised but it works so much better than in the U.K. and it’s a lot cheaper. My view is to have the government holding stakes in industries and taking the lions share of profits to re invest. Dividends are banned but shares can be traded in say a quarter of the company, Cut the ridiculous overheads that see Network rail’s staff occupying half of the top ten wage earners for the state sector in the country., It’s all in dire need of change but our political class are not fit for the job sadly. That’s a whole new debate and perhaps the crux of the problem. At last, the rich don't pay "fair share" excuse. The only problem I have with current taxation structure is corporation tax which was designed before globalisation developed which helps them channel the money to low tax countries. I hope that gets fixed by recent efforts. I have travelled around Europe. I visited Finland and Sweden just two months back. I had booked a total if three train tickets. All the three were cancelled and I was made to take replacement buses. Paris trains and stations are as dirty as UK. If you use these services long enough, you will see as many faults as with UK's services." Add non domicile status along with ceilings on dividend allowances and I’ll agree with the tax system changers. It’s immoral to not tax the rich at the same level as the highest earners in the U.K. As for your travel experience Your few bad experiences are just that. I’ve travelled throughout Europe and have had business operating in up to 17 countries there for the last 35 years so know very well how much better their trains are. Also how much cheaper. Paris is dirty full stop I won’t argue with the that . Beautiful city but in the summer the smell can be pungent. . | |||
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" Never been efficient m??? and yet some European trains are nationalised and are years ahead of the U.K. in both service and cost. You are blinkered by your own political beliefs or nss maybe limited experience which is fine if it makes you happy but the reality is it is proven to work elsewhere. It’s about the management and long term investment As for internet The demand is there and the internet companies would have it covered by now but the cost to earnings ratio makes it unviable to cover all of India’s demand what don’t you understand about the simple fact there is no profit in it. It’s an after thought once a return has been achievedconntgecorifitabke areas which have been given priority, Compare maybe to the NHS against private hospitals . If private was forced to lay on A&E along with all therapy and free at source services then add in services for all the residents in their catchment area, can you imagine how much those private insurance premiums would be? The reason they don’t offer that extra coverage is because it’s not profitable it’s that simple. They cherry pick. Where did I say the tax payer should subsidise the energy industry? You’re making that up. The industry being owned by the government would mean keeping the revenue in total rather than paying dividends to shareholders . Who do you thinks lending the energy companies money right now? It’s the tax payer and it’s then being paid back by the tax payer. If private us better why can’t they afford to ride it out?? They can but they will increase prices to the poor to keep profits up and dividends healthy. Water companies have handed out over £65 Billion in dividends. That’s a lot of infrastructure development lost to the taxpayer. Fundamental industries such as rail , utilities and healthcare are the basic underlying services that a government should always control. The tax payer is subsidising rail in this country and yet dividends are still paid out. Good private management indeed. I think not. When franchises lose money they just walk away. Leaving the tax payer to foot the bill. Network rail have been stopped from paying dividends as they were using subsidies to do so. The same business formally called railtrack borrowed money off the government to actually pay dividends. Again great private management. As there is poor government there is also poor private management . Private in the U.K. has not worked for the critical industries and needs to be changed. Internet - Number of internet users increased rapidly in the past two years because covid and lockdown meant remote learning and people had to use it. Internet reached people who wanted it. European railways? French railways accounts for 3% of French national debt. You call that efficient? The debate is going in circles because you keep changing goal posts. Your original post was about making government services more efficient and making it accountable. But when I point out that government services have never been efficient or accountable, you go back to "But poor people need to have access". Government services make it accessible to poor people by collecting more taxes or by going into debt. That's charitable. But not efficient. Oh yes. German railways just received 2.1 billion Euros bailout. Amazing efficiency I must say. If you call this efficient, you are the one who is blinded by political beliefs maybe? Nationalisation makes it cheaper for poor people by using tax money. Efficiency and charity are two different things. " Ok I’ll assume your answer is no on the question of the NHS as it’s for us all . . I’m not feeling sorry for worse off people so this isn’t a left wing rant. My point is you keep claiming private good, public bad. My point is it is not good for private companies to have a say or take money from our critical industries. Clearly on the measures of financial and future proofing it’s proving to be a failure. So private rail in the U.K. had been run by these wonderful private managers for 29 years The figures clearly show what a success it’s proving to be . Government direct subsidy of the railways is around £5 billion per year, an increase of over 200% since privatisation. In the five years to 2017/18, the government subsidy for the railways has been around £5.3 billion a year on average (in 2017/18 prices). This doesn’t include loans to Network Rail. The cost of rail tickets has a direct baring on economic growth . Commuters can take on greater options of work if transport costs are cheaper so no one should blind to possible benefits of subsidy. The ridiculous sight of tax payer subsidies supporting dividends is madness for a core infrastructure business. | |||
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"Perhaps the solution is government majority shareholder companies." Technically, DB Railways aren't a nationalised railway. Its just the German Goverment holds 100% of the shareholding. There was talk earlier this century, that they were going to offer 25% of the shares to private equity but these plans fell through. | |||
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"The cost of the upgrades needed for the utilities infrastructure is billions of pounds, the UK government could never afford it through taxation etc. The uk power network was installed when the average home had one television, no mobile phone needing charging plus now the move to electric cars. It has had some upgrades but needs much more investment The target to increase green energy has been somewhat effective but we still need to import electricity from France The UK made a real mess of dealing with the toxic waste from the first nuclear power stations, but it was producing electricity so cheaply it was considered not worth billing domestic customers Nuclear energy isn’t a popular option I agree but imagine no unsightly wind turbines and low cost electricity The public sector could be run far more efficiently the NHS I saw on tv has its own internal fraud investigation department I don’t know what is is more worrying, tax payers money lost to fraud or there is that much of it that the NHS needs a dedicated department to deal with it" That last point in fraud is interesting. I looked it up and 38% of companies in the uk are affected by internal fraud . That’s opposed to 19% on external fraud. The bigger the company the easier it is to hide from auditors so it makes sense to have a team if you’re a large organisation like the NHS. My worry with the NHS isn’t fraud it’s just the incredible waste. Too many staff and too much bad management. | |||
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"We definitely need some new clearer thinking . Privatisation isn’t working . Nationalisation of old won’t work. The £65B paid by water companies in dividends is an example of the money in that sector which should be re invested in the service. Would there be that much money if it was run as an old fashioned nationalised industry? Probably not . We must come up with better state control of such critical national interests. " That is nearly a £1000 for every person in the uk | |||
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"We definitely need some new clearer thinking . Privatisation isn’t working . Nationalisation of old won’t work. The £65B paid by water companies in dividends is an example of the money in that sector which should be re invested in the service. Would there be that much money if it was run as an old fashioned nationalised industry? Probably not . We must come up with better state control of such critical national interests. That is nearly a £1000 for every person in the uk" Those dividends are paid to investors who are 70% foreign based. Since privatisation your water bill has increased 40% in real terms. Isn’t privatisation supposed to save us money as CV it’s more efficient?? The facts are it is more efficient at making money but not investment or even passing savings on. | |||
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" Never been efficient m??? and yet some European trains are nationalised and are years ahead of the U.K. in both service and cost. You are blinkered by your own political beliefs or nss maybe limited experience which is fine if it makes you happy but the reality is it is proven to work elsewhere. It’s about the management and long term investment As for internet The demand is there and the internet companies would have it covered by now but the cost to earnings ratio makes it unviable to cover all of India’s demand what don’t you understand about the simple fact there is no profit in it. It’s an after thought once a return has been achievedconntgecorifitabke areas which have been given priority, Compare maybe to the NHS against private hospitals . If private was forced to lay on A&E along with all therapy and free at source services then add in services for all the residents in their catchment area, can you imagine how much those private insurance premiums would be? The reason they don’t offer that extra coverage is because it’s not profitable it’s that simple. They cherry pick. Where did I say the tax payer should subsidise the energy industry? You’re making that up. The industry being owned by the government would mean keeping the revenue in total rather than paying dividends to shareholders . Who do you thinks lending the energy companies money right now? It’s the tax payer and it’s then being paid back by the tax payer. If private us better why can’t they afford to ride it out?? They can but they will increase prices to the poor to keep profits up and dividends healthy. Water companies have handed out over £65 Billion in dividends. That’s a lot of infrastructure development lost to the taxpayer. Fundamental industries such as rail , utilities and healthcare are the basic underlying services that a government should always control. The tax payer is subsidising rail in this country and yet dividends are still paid out. Good private management indeed. I think not. When franchises lose money they just walk away. Leaving the tax payer to foot the bill. Network rail have been stopped from paying dividends as they were using subsidies to do so. The same business formally called railtrack borrowed money off the government to actually pay dividends. Again great private management. As there is poor government there is also poor private management . Private in the U.K. has not worked for the critical industries and needs to be changed. Internet - Number of internet users increased rapidly in the past two years because covid and lockdown meant remote learning and people had to use it. Internet reached people who wanted it. European railways? French railways accounts for 3% of French national debt. You call that efficient? The debate is going in circles because you keep changing goal posts. Your original post was about making government services more efficient and making it accountable. But when I point out that government services have never been efficient or accountable, you go back to "But poor people need to have access". Government services make it accessible to poor people by collecting more taxes or by going into debt. That's charitable. But not efficient. Oh yes. German railways just received 2.1 billion Euros bailout. Amazing efficiency I must say. If you call this efficient, you are the one who is blinded by political beliefs maybe? Nationalisation makes it cheaper for poor people by using tax money. Efficiency and charity are two different things. Simple question should the NHS make a profit?? " NHS need not. But healthcare is different from transport and electricity. With NHS, we agreed that we are going to be having an inefficient system that is going to be funded by high taxes. We are going to have queues, we are going to have big expenditure, we won't be able pay the workers properly. But we need to ensure that no one dies because they didn't have money to pay for a surgery or medical treatment. If you want to add electricity and transport to the same list as NHS, you should be willing to pay more taxes too. Are you fine with it? Or is your answer going to be "I won't pay more taxes. I want the rich to pay them"? | |||
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" Never been efficient m??? and yet some European trains are nationalised and are years ahead of the U.K. in both service and cost. You are blinkered by your own political beliefs or nss maybe limited experience which is fine if it makes you happy but the reality is it is proven to work elsewhere. It’s about the management and long term investment As for internet The demand is there and the internet companies would have it covered by now but the cost to earnings ratio makes it unviable to cover all of India’s demand what don’t you understand about the simple fact there is no profit in it. It’s an after thought once a return has been achievedconntgecorifitabke areas which have been given priority, Compare maybe to the NHS against private hospitals . If private was forced to lay on A&E along with all therapy and free at source services then add in services for all the residents in their catchment area, can you imagine how much those private insurance premiums would be? The reason they don’t offer that extra coverage is because it’s not profitable it’s that simple. They cherry pick. Where did I say the tax payer should subsidise the energy industry? You’re making that up. The industry being owned by the government would mean keeping the revenue in total rather than paying dividends to shareholders . Who do you thinks lending the energy companies money right now? It’s the tax payer and it’s then being paid back by the tax payer. If private us better why can’t they afford to ride it out?? They can but they will increase prices to the poor to keep profits up and dividends healthy. Water companies have handed out over £65 Billion in dividends. That’s a lot of infrastructure development lost to the taxpayer. Fundamental industries such as rail , utilities and healthcare are the basic underlying services that a government should always control. The tax payer is subsidising rail in this country and yet dividends are still paid out. Good private management indeed. I think not. When franchises lose money they just walk away. Leaving the tax payer to foot the bill. Network rail have been stopped from paying dividends as they were using subsidies to do so. The same business formally called railtrack borrowed money off the government to actually pay dividends. Again great private management. As there is poor government there is also poor private management . Private in the U.K. has not worked for the critical industries and needs to be changed. Internet - Number of internet users increased rapidly in the past two years because covid and lockdown meant remote learning and people had to use it. Internet reached people who wanted it. European railways? French railways accounts for 3% of French national debt. You call that efficient? The debate is going in circles because you keep changing goal posts. Your original post was about making government services more efficient and making it accountable. But when I point out that government services have never been efficient or accountable, you go back to "But poor people need to have access". Government services make it accessible to poor people by collecting more taxes or by going into debt. That's charitable. But not efficient. Oh yes. German railways just received 2.1 billion Euros bailout. Amazing efficiency I must say. If you call this efficient, you are the one who is blinded by political beliefs maybe? Nationalisation makes it cheaper for poor people by using tax money. Efficiency and charity are two different things. Ok I’ll assume your answer is no on the question of the NHS as it’s for us all . . I’m not feeling sorry for worse off people so this isn’t a left wing rant. My point is you keep claiming private good, public bad. My point is it is not good for private companies to have a say or take money from our critical industries. Clearly on the measures of financial and future proofing it’s proving to be a failure. So private rail in the U.K. had been run by these wonderful private managers for 29 years The figures clearly show what a success it’s proving to be . Government direct subsidy of the railways is around £5 billion per year, an increase of over 200% since privatisation. In the five years to 2017/18, the government subsidy for the railways has been around £5.3 billion a year on average (in 2017/18 prices). This doesn’t include loans to Network Rail. The cost of rail tickets has a direct baring on economic growth . Commuters can take on greater options of work if transport costs are cheaper so no one should blind to possible benefits of subsidy. The ridiculous sight of tax payer subsidies supporting dividends is madness for a core infrastructure business. " The problem is what do you consider a core infrastructure? Internet can be considered core infrastructure. Should that be also be added to the list of things which should be nationalised? As I mentioned above, everything you add to that list will result in an increase in tax. I am not a big fan of subsidies myself. But a better solution would be to build more tracks either through private or government investment and getting more operators to compete. As things stand, the situation is ripe for monopoly. | |||
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" Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. It's not that easy. Government and private companies have different kind of pressure. Private companies face pressure every quarter to deliver results and are forced to be efficient. Government offices on the other hand don't face that pressure. Many of the workers get unionised too. That makes it hard to fire them. In a private organisation, the pressure seeps from the top. Lack of results will result in the CEO getting fired. He puts the pressure on VPs who put pressure on directors and so on until the last employee. In a government organization, the top most part of the hierarchy is the government that gets elected every five years. It doesn't matter if they perform poorly in between. Private organisations are efficient but they have a tendency to cause external damage. One of the main type of damage they do is pollution. This is where the government must play its role and pass laws to protect the environment Each new party that gets in power changes a department’s name but keeps the same structure with the same heads in charge. They are not sacked for incompetence. The marketing paperwork looks new and that’s it. The governments being in charge you mention are MPs who in reality have no concept of how most of the major organisations work. I’ve experienced this first hand and it’s only when you see it first hand that you realise they just tinker with the ideas every five years and don’t get to the root of the problem . As you pollution you must be having a laugh . The state controlled utilities just poured everything down the rivers . Coal waste , sewage waste, public transport buses polluting our streets ( thank the euro ratings for making that a lot better) etc etc . Railways all used to empty their toilets onto the tracks . ( the last few only recently banned in 2020) We are following the USA with this government in areas such as the control of the legal process by politicians but also potentially allowing substandard practices by big companies such as food and chemicals . So vote Tory and you will get less in standards . In the USA you have to prove they are doing wrong they don’t have to prove they are being careful or safe. Hence the high food poisoning levels and poisoned water supplies scandals . Flint being one of the more famous. Certain states are better but not much . So now we can see these industries being run far more efficiently it’s time those profits were re invested for all our futures not just shareholders. Why do we allow billions in dividends to be paid and yet 400k raw sewage incidents last year alone. I can accept violent storms on rare occasions but that number is infrastructure not storms. As for the structure of management, my point is that the MPs do not have a motivation to change anything. Private organisations have to change and adapt. If not, they will fail. An MP in power will stay in power for 5 years. Why would he care about efficiency of the organisation? Why sack people for incompetence and face head aches like labour strikes when you can let the system just be? As for pollution, I said the government must double down on it. Not that the government is already doing it well. I agree with your comments here totally
We must however come up with a way to hold the top level management in state industries accountable and stop the huge amounts of money moving to shareholders rather than a better infrastructure. I don’t have the answers I just can see it’s not working for the Great majority of the U.K. "Unfortunately, the government doesn't have a workable plan for levelling up. It is, to all intents and purposes, still wanting the fallacy of trickle down economics, to be viewed as the golden fleece, as the trickling 'down' is upwards and to overseas, as excess profits escape scrutiny. The reformation of society, into a free for all, for corporations and the wealthy, whilst the majority of the population are let loose, with ever fewer protections, continues apace. | |||
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" Never been efficient m??? and yet some European trains are nationalised and are years ahead of the U.K. in both service and cost. You are blinkered by your own political beliefs or nss maybe limited experience which is fine if it makes you happy but the reality is it is proven to work elsewhere. It’s about the management and long term investment As for internet The demand is there and the internet companies would have it covered by now but the cost to earnings ratio makes it unviable to cover all of India’s demand what don’t you understand about the simple fact there is no profit in it. It’s an after thought once a return has been achievedconntgecorifitabke areas which have been given priority, Compare maybe to the NHS against private hospitals . If private was forced to lay on A&E along with all therapy and free at source services then add in services for all the residents in their catchment area, can you imagine how much those private insurance premiums would be? The reason they don’t offer that extra coverage is because it’s not profitable it’s that simple. They cherry pick. Where did I say the tax payer should subsidise the energy industry? You’re making that up. The industry being owned by the government would mean keeping the revenue in total rather than paying dividends to shareholders . Who do you thinks lending the energy companies money right now? It’s the tax payer and it’s then being paid back by the tax payer. If private us better why can’t they afford to ride it out?? They can but they will increase prices to the poor to keep profits up and dividends healthy. Water companies have handed out over £65 Billion in dividends. That’s a lot of infrastructure development lost to the taxpayer. Fundamental industries such as rail , utilities and healthcare are the basic underlying services that a government should always control. The tax payer is subsidising rail in this country and yet dividends are still paid out. Good private management indeed. I think not. When franchises lose money they just walk away. Leaving the tax payer to foot the bill. Network rail have been stopped from paying dividends as they were using subsidies to do so. The same business formally called railtrack borrowed money off the government to actually pay dividends. Again great private management. As there is poor government there is also poor private management . Private in the U.K. has not worked for the critical industries and needs to be changed. Internet - Number of internet users increased rapidly in the past two years because covid and lockdown meant remote learning and people had to use it. Internet reached people who wanted it. European railways? French railways accounts for 3% of French national debt. You call that efficient? The debate is going in circles because you keep changing goal posts. Your original post was about making government services more efficient and making it accountable. But when I point out that government services have never been efficient or accountable, you go back to "But poor people need to have access". Government services make it accessible to poor people by collecting more taxes or by going into debt. That's charitable. But not efficient. Oh yes. German railways just received 2.1 billion Euros bailout. Amazing efficiency I must say. If you call this efficient, you are the one who is blinded by political beliefs maybe? Nationalisation makes it cheaper for poor people by using tax money. Efficiency and charity are two different things. Ok I’ll assume your answer is no on the question of the NHS as it’s for us all . . I’m not feeling sorry for worse off people so this isn’t a left wing rant. My point is you keep claiming private good, public bad. My point is it is not good for private companies to have a say or take money from our critical industries. Clearly on the measures of financial and future proofing it’s proving to be a failure. So private rail in the U.K. had been run by these wonderful private managers for 29 years The figures clearly show what a success it’s proving to be . Government direct subsidy of the railways is around £5 billion per year, an increase of over 200% since privatisation. In the five years to 2017/18, the government subsidy for the railways has been around £5.3 billion a year on average (in 2017/18 prices). This doesn’t include loans to Network Rail. The cost of rail tickets has a direct baring on economic growth . Commuters can take on greater options of work if transport costs are cheaper so no one should blind to possible benefits of subsidy. The ridiculous sight of tax payer subsidies supporting dividends is madness for a core infrastructure business. The problem is what do you consider a core infrastructure? Internet can be considered core infrastructure. Should that be also be added to the list of things which should be nationalised? As I mentioned above, everything you add to that list will result in an increase in tax. I am not a big fan of subsidies myself. But a better solution would be to build more tracks either through private or government investment and getting more operators to compete. As things stand, the situation is ripe for monopoly. " I mentioned above Energy, Public transport , water, healthcare as the major core. Defence is a given. With telecoms I think that could be considered defence so maybe the government holds the key interest. ( controls the key infrastructure not the businesses) Steel is not a huge business as it once was but I do agree with subsidy here to enable it to survive ( subject to limits on dividends and always with a valid case ). We’ve now lost the protection of the EU so it is more vulnerable than ever. The government subsidies and loans to network rail are paying for the track. The competing rail companies keep going bust despite subsidy and party due to profits being given as dividends. The government has had to step in consistently with rail and is always the fall back so why not cut out the middle man. Franchises are given for years on the west and east coast main lines. That’s a monopoly whilst I admit over a limited period. The fact they can’t survive is a reflection of their business plan and their incompetent management. When the trains were privatised you don’t think all the management were new do you? It was the same people but the senior boards sent orders and said get rid of the waste. The profit made then along with further subsidy generated income for some more modern trains. It’s the culture that needed changing. The ability is there but it’s not managed. Without engaging the leaders ie middle management and getting them to buy into the culture you end up with staff who are just not motivated and become uninterested and perhaps lazy. That culture change is what government should have been doing. They failed miserably. I’m not a nationalise everything type of person but key industry should have government and ultimately the people as it’s main consideration not foreign investors. | |||
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" Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. It's not that easy. Government and private companies have different kind of pressure. Private companies face pressure every quarter to deliver results and are forced to be efficient. Government offices on the other hand don't face that pressure. Many of the workers get unionised too. That makes it hard to fire them. In a private organisation, the pressure seeps from the top. Lack of results will result in the CEO getting fired. He puts the pressure on VPs who put pressure on directors and so on until the last employee. In a government organization, the top most part of the hierarchy is the government that gets elected every five years. It doesn't matter if they perform poorly in between. Private organisations are efficient but they have a tendency to cause external damage. One of the main type of damage they do is pollution. This is where the government must play its role and pass laws to protect the environment Each new party that gets in power changes a department’s name but keeps the same structure with the same heads in charge. They are not sacked for incompetence. The marketing paperwork looks new and that’s it. The governments being in charge you mention are MPs who in reality have no concept of how most of the major organisations work. I’ve experienced this first hand and it’s only when you see it first hand that you realise they just tinker with the ideas every five years and don’t get to the root of the problem . As you pollution you must be having a laugh . The state controlled utilities just poured everything down the rivers . Coal waste , sewage waste, public transport buses polluting our streets ( thank the euro ratings for making that a lot better) etc etc . Railways all used to empty their toilets onto the tracks . ( the last few only recently banned in 2020) We are following the USA with this government in areas such as the control of the legal process by politicians but also potentially allowing substandard practices by big companies such as food and chemicals . So vote Tory and you will get less in standards . In the USA you have to prove they are doing wrong they don’t have to prove they are being careful or safe. Hence the high food poisoning levels and poisoned water supplies scandals . Flint being one of the more famous. Certain states are better but not much . So now we can see these industries being run far more efficiently it’s time those profits were re invested for all our futures not just shareholders. Why do we allow billions in dividends to be paid and yet 400k raw sewage incidents last year alone. I can accept violent storms on rare occasions but that number is infrastructure not storms. As for the structure of management, my point is that the MPs do not have a motivation to change anything. Private organisations have to change and adapt. If not, they will fail. An MP in power will stay in power for 5 years. Why would he care about efficiency of the organisation? Why sack people for incompetence and face head aches like labour strikes when you can let the system just be? As for pollution, I said the government must double down on it. Not that the government is already doing it well. I agree with your comments here totally
We must however come up with a way to hold the top level management in state industries accountable and stop the huge amounts of money moving to shareholders rather than a better infrastructure. I don’t have the answers I just can see it’s not working for the Great majority of the U.K.
Unfortunately, the government doesn't have a workable plan for levelling up. It is, to all intents and purposes, still wanting the fallacy of trickle down economics, to be viewed as the golden fleece, as the trickling 'down' is upwards and to overseas, as excess profits escape scrutiny.
The reformation of society, into a free for all, for corporations and the wealthy, whilst the majority of the population are let loose, with ever fewer protections, continues apace. "Trickle down doesn’t work. The economy after joining the EEC had doubled in size over 40 years and yet there is still no benefit for the country. The money is not trickled down it’s kept by the ever growing major corporations and their ultimate shareholders. Trickle down theory has not worked to give a better quality of life for the vast majority of people in this country. It has however bought an awful lot more mega yachts though. | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now When you look at the breakdown of gas and electric bills the profit is only 2% not many companies would run with that little profit. UK’s 6 biggest energy firms made more than £1 billion in profit before the price increase , gas , electric and water are basic Human requirements, " You need to see past the left wing, socialist spin here... There are businesses with vast sums invested in them. A billion from an investment of a million would be disgusting but a billion profit from an investment of 100bn would be a pitiful return for shareholders... companies are owned by shareholders. Corporation tax applies to company profits but for UK residents company profits get taxed again in the form of tax on dividend. Shell’s “disgusting” profits only gives share holders a pre tax dividend yield of 3%. Hardly disgusting | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now When you look at the breakdown of gas and electric bills the profit is only 2% not many companies would run with that little profit. UK’s 6 biggest energy firms made more than £1 billion in profit before the price increase , gas , electric and water are basic Human requirements, You need to see past the left wing, socialist spin here... There are businesses with vast sums invested in them. A billion from an investment of a million would be disgusting but a billion profit from an investment of 100bn would be a pitiful return for shareholders... companies are owned by shareholders. Corporation tax applies to company profits but for UK residents company profits get taxed again in the form of tax on dividend. Shell’s “disgusting” profits only gives share holders a pre tax dividend yield of 3%. Hardly disgusting" Erm. You also buy shares for what you can sell them for . Shell’s share price has increased 20% year to date. That’s a very good return don’t you think even after tax? 
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" Never been efficient m??? and yet some European trains are nationalised and are years ahead of the U.K. in both service and cost. You are blinkered by your own political beliefs or nss maybe limited experience which is fine if it makes you happy but the reality is it is proven to work elsewhere. It’s about the management and long term investment As for internet The demand is there and the internet companies would have it covered by now but the cost to earnings ratio makes it unviable to cover all of India’s demand what don’t you understand about the simple fact there is no profit in it. It’s an after thought once a return has been achievedconntgecorifitabke areas which have been given priority, Compare maybe to the NHS against private hospitals . If private was forced to lay on A&E along with all therapy and free at source services then add in services for all the residents in their catchment area, can you imagine how much those private insurance premiums would be? The reason they don’t offer that extra coverage is because it’s not profitable it’s that simple. They cherry pick. Where did I say the tax payer should subsidise the energy industry? You’re making that up. The industry being owned by the government would mean keeping the revenue in total rather than paying dividends to shareholders . Who do you thinks lending the energy companies money right now? It’s the tax payer and it’s then being paid back by the tax payer. If private us better why can’t they afford to ride it out?? They can but they will increase prices to the poor to keep profits up and dividends healthy. Water companies have handed out over £65 Billion in dividends. That’s a lot of infrastructure development lost to the taxpayer. Fundamental industries such as rail , utilities and healthcare are the basic underlying services that a government should always control. The tax payer is subsidising rail in this country and yet dividends are still paid out. Good private management indeed. I think not. When franchises lose money they just walk away. Leaving the tax payer to foot the bill. Network rail have been stopped from paying dividends as they were using subsidies to do so. The same business formally called railtrack borrowed money off the government to actually pay dividends. Again great private management. As there is poor government there is also poor private management . Private in the U.K. has not worked for the critical industries and needs to be changed. Internet - Number of internet users increased rapidly in the past two years because covid and lockdown meant remote learning and people had to use it. Internet reached people who wanted it. European railways? French railways accounts for 3% of French national debt. You call that efficient? The debate is going in circles because you keep changing goal posts. Your original post was about making government services more efficient and making it accountable. But when I point out that government services have never been efficient or accountable, you go back to "But poor people need to have access". Government services make it accessible to poor people by collecting more taxes or by going into debt. That's charitable. But not efficient. Oh yes. German railways just received 2.1 billion Euros bailout. Amazing efficiency I must say. If you call this efficient, you are the one who is blinded by political beliefs maybe? Nationalisation makes it cheaper for poor people by using tax money. Efficiency and charity are two different things. Simple question should the NHS make a profit?? NHS need not. But healthcare is different from transport and electricity. With NHS, we agreed that we are going to be having an inefficient system that is going to be funded by high taxes. We are going to have queues, we are going to have big expenditure, we won't be able pay the workers properly. But we need to ensure that no one dies because they didn't have money to pay for a surgery or medical treatment. If you want to add electricity and transport to the same list as NHS, you should be willing to pay more taxes too. Are you fine with it? Or is your answer going to be "I won't pay more taxes. I want the rich to pay them"?" It is Middle class socialism syndrome. Nobody should be wealthier than me but I should remain wealthier than those less fortunate than I... | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now When you look at the breakdown of gas and electric bills the profit is only 2% not many companies would run with that little profit. UK’s 6 biggest energy firms made more than £1 billion in profit before the price increase , gas , electric and water are basic Human requirements, You need to see past the left wing, socialist spin here... There are businesses with vast sums invested in them. A billion from an investment of a million would be disgusting but a billion profit from an investment of 100bn would be a pitiful return for shareholders... companies are owned by shareholders. Corporation tax applies to company profits but for UK residents company profits get taxed again in the form of tax on dividend. Shell’s “disgusting” profits only gives share holders a pre tax dividend yield of 3%. Hardly disgusting Erm. You also buy shares for what you can sell them for . Shell’s share price has increased 20% year to date. That’s a very good return don’t you think even after tax?
"Yes but it not so good when share price goes the other direction... | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now When you look at the breakdown of gas and electric bills the profit is only 2% not many companies would run with that little profit. UK’s 6 biggest energy firms made more than £1 billion in profit before the price increase , gas , electric and water are basic Human requirements, You need to see past the left wing, socialist spin here... There are businesses with vast sums invested in them. A billion from an investment of a million would be disgusting but a billion profit from an investment of 100bn would be a pitiful return for shareholders... companies are owned by shareholders. Corporation tax applies to company profits but for UK residents company profits get taxed again in the form of tax on dividend. Shell’s “disgusting” profits only gives share holders a pre tax dividend yield of 3%. Hardly disgusting Erm. You also buy shares for what you can sell them for . Shell’s share price has increased 20% year to date. That’s a very good return don’t you think even after tax?
Yes but it not so good when share price goes the other direction... "Interesting I’ve just read . If you invested £10k in just the FTSE 100 thirty five years ago and took the dividends each year you would end up with an original investment worth just over £50k today. That’s 4.5-5 % compound average per annum I’m lead to believe . (accounts feel free to cut my legs off ) So dividends and five times your money back. Not bad.
If however you reinvested the dividends each time back into the FTSE 100 only, your investment would have grown to £195k
The dividends certainly seem to work either way.
The individual share trading you’re referring to is something that if you can’t afford to lose the money you don’t play in that market. Big players can afford spread bets.
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"I don’t think that the scale of the upcoming energy price increases has really hit home with a lot of people yet. When it does, I predict a huge clamour for energy to be re-nationalised. I think this will be the next nightmare for this Govt to deal (if they last that long). A Govt controlled energy supply could have protected our people from the upcoming price rises and instead U.K. based EDF customers will be bailing out the French energy company and U.K. citizens generally will really feel a huge cost of living squeeze. The arguments for Nationalised essential services will become louder and more insistent in the coming months. You do know that government protects people from price rises by paying for it through taxes right? Price rise indicates only one thing - Supply is lower than demand. If a government is going to get in and reduce the price, you are either paying for it indirectly through taxes or you are going to suffer from scarcity. In developed countries, it is usually the former where more tax is collected. In the developing countries, it's the latter and they suffer from shortage. Except they need to cover product cost, operating costs and reinvestment but do not need to also finance dividends so ultimately still cheaper. No one is obligated to finance dividends." Well that won’t do your share price (or the Director’s share options) much good if they don’t! | |||
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"I don’t think that the scale of the upcoming energy price increases has really hit home with a lot of people yet. When it does, I predict a huge clamour for energy to be re-nationalised. I think this will be the next nightmare for this Govt to deal (if they last that long). A Govt controlled energy supply could have protected our people from the upcoming price rises and instead U.K. based EDF customers will be bailing out the French energy company and U.K. citizens generally will really feel a huge cost of living squeeze. The arguments for Nationalised essential services will become louder and more insistent in the coming months. You do know that government protects people from price rises by paying for it through taxes right? Price rise indicates only one thing - Supply is lower than demand. If a government is going to get in and reduce the price, you are either paying for it indirectly through taxes or you are going to suffer from scarcity. In developed countries, it is usually the former where more tax is collected. In the developing countries, it's the latter and they suffer from shortage. Except they need to cover product cost, operating costs and reinvestment but do not need to also finance dividends so ultimately still cheaper. No one is obligated to finance dividends. Well that won’t do your share price (or the Director’s share options) much good if they don’t!" You don’t get dividend payments on an option you only get them if you take the option. It’s no longer an option after that. And maybe concentrating on making the company profitable will indeed help the share price on his options . The option is often discounted to the actual price so any price increase is a benefit . The dividend is a bonus not a need. | |||
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" Never been efficient m??? and yet some European trains are nationalised and are years ahead of the U.K. in both service and cost. You are blinkered by your own political beliefs or nss maybe limited experience which is fine if it makes you happy but the reality is it is proven to work elsewhere. It’s about the management and long term investment As for internet The demand is there and the internet companies would have it covered by now but the cost to earnings ratio makes it unviable to cover all of India’s demand what don’t you understand about the simple fact there is no profit in it. It’s an after thought once a return has been achievedconntgecorifitabke areas which have been given priority, Compare maybe to the NHS against private hospitals . If private was forced to lay on A&E along with all therapy and free at source services then add in services for all the residents in their catchment area, can you imagine how much those private insurance premiums would be? The reason they don’t offer that extra coverage is because it’s not profitable it’s that simple. They cherry pick. Where did I say the tax payer should subsidise the energy industry? You’re making that up. The industry being owned by the government would mean keeping the revenue in total rather than paying dividends to shareholders . Who do you thinks lending the energy companies money right now? It’s the tax payer and it’s then being paid back by the tax payer. If private us better why can’t they afford to ride it out?? They can but they will increase prices to the poor to keep profits up and dividends healthy. Water companies have handed out over £65 Billion in dividends. That’s a lot of infrastructure development lost to the taxpayer. Fundamental industries such as rail , utilities and healthcare are the basic underlying services that a government should always control. The tax payer is subsidising rail in this country and yet dividends are still paid out. Good private management indeed. I think not. When franchises lose money they just walk away. Leaving the tax payer to foot the bill. Network rail have been stopped from paying dividends as they were using subsidies to do so. The same business formally called railtrack borrowed money off the government to actually pay dividends. Again great private management. As there is poor government there is also poor private management . Private in the U.K. has not worked for the critical industries and needs to be changed. Internet - Number of internet users increased rapidly in the past two years because covid and lockdown meant remote learning and people had to use it. Internet reached people who wanted it. European railways? French railways accounts for 3% of French national debt. You call that efficient? The debate is going in circles because you keep changing goal posts. Your original post was about making government services more efficient and making it accountable. But when I point out that government services have never been efficient or accountable, you go back to "But poor people need to have access". Government services make it accessible to poor people by collecting more taxes or by going into debt. That's charitable. But not efficient. Oh yes. German railways just received 2.1 billion Euros bailout. Amazing efficiency I must say. If you call this efficient, you are the one who is blinded by political beliefs maybe? Nationalisation makes it cheaper for poor people by using tax money. Efficiency and charity are two different things. Simple question should the NHS make a profit?? NHS need not. But healthcare is different from transport and electricity. With NHS, we agreed that we are going to be having an inefficient system that is going to be funded by high taxes. We are going to have queues, we are going to have big expenditure, we won't be able pay the workers properly. But we need to ensure that no one dies because they didn't have money to pay for a surgery or medical treatment. If you want to add electricity and transport to the same list as NHS, you should be willing to pay more taxes too. Are you fine with it? Or is your answer going to be "I won't pay more taxes. I want the rich to pay them"?" Sorry missed this Firstly I wouldn’t give the NHS a penny more for at least three years . I would protect front line jobs along with drugs purchase operations and cancer treatment etc etc but tell them to sort the managements head count out. The black hole needs stopping and only forcing them to act will do it. Also how can staff leave and then return a few weeks later on twice the rate or three times if you add the agency fee. Ridiculous . Just ban them from working in the NHS for two years when they leave and see how that pans out. Add flexible working and part of the saving and a pay rise . It will all help. A friend of mine has made millions from the NHS supplying kit nationally and seeing how they operate is madness. It needs sorting but governments won’t do it even though they know it is desperately needed because they are scared of losing votes by being viewed as trying just to cut services not the ridiculous costs. Why do you keep mentioning me wanting to have a go at the rich? You’re so wrong it’s amusing . I’ve done very well with a number of businesses so don’t for one moment think you can judge my financial status. I want a fair tax system where we all pay our dues. I have no vendetta with the rich as you infer. A worker on £150k will pay PAYE at 45% so why do we have the owner of JCB or the. owner of Daily Mail allowed to siphon hundreds of millions out of the country without paying due or fair tax? Could it be that they are allowed by this and previous governments? Guess which media supports Boris and the tax avoidance? Boris is given free holidays and free private jet flight by these people. Why is that ? He doesn’t pay tax on any of these very valuable regular gifts. They’re his friends everyone will say. Yes of course they are . Just like the 34 Tory MPs funded by the Russians who must be best buddies on a night out and don’t forget the labour MPs funded by the Chinese who, I don’t know, must be camping buddies or something . Fair tax is what is needed not punitive. | |||
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" NHS need not. But healthcare is different from transport and electricity. With NHS, we agreed that we are going to be having an inefficient system that is going to be funded by high taxes. We are going to have queues, we are going to have big expenditure, we won't be able pay the workers properly. But we need to ensure that no one dies because they didn't have money to pay for a surgery or medical treatment. If you want to add electricity and transport to the same list as NHS, you should be willing to pay more taxes too. Are you fine with it? Or is your answer going to be "I won't pay more taxes. I want the rich to pay them"? Sorry missed this Firstly I wouldn’t give the NHS a penny more for at least three years . I would protect front line jobs along with drugs purchase operations and cancer treatment etc etc but tell them to sort the managements head count out. The black hole needs stopping and only forcing them to act will do it. Also how can staff leave and then return a few weeks later on twice the rate or three times if you add the agency fee. Ridiculous . Just ban them from working in the NHS for two years when they leave and see how that pans out. Add flexible working and part of the saving and a pay rise . It will all help. A friend of mine has made millions from the NHS supplying kit nationally and seeing how they operate is madness. It needs sorting but governments won’t do it even though they know it is desperately needed because they are scared of losing votes by being viewed as trying just to cut services not the ridiculous costs. Why do you keep mentioning me wanting to have a go at the rich? You’re so wrong it’s amusing . I’ve done very well with a number of businesses so don’t for one moment think you can judge my financial status. I want a fair tax system where we all pay our dues. I have no vendetta with the rich as you infer. A worker on £150k will pay PAYE at 45% so why do we have the owner of JCB or the. owner of Daily Mail allowed to siphon hundreds of millions out of the country without paying due or fair tax? Could it be that they are allowed by this and previous governments? Guess which media supports Boris and the tax avoidance? Boris is given free holidays and free private jet flight by these people. Why is that ? He doesn’t pay tax on any of these very valuable regular gifts. They’re his friends everyone will say. Yes of course they are . Just like the 34 Tory MPs funded by the Russians who must be best buddies on a night out and don’t forget the labour MPs funded by the Chinese who, I don’t know, must be camping buddies or something . Fair tax is what is needed not punitive. " You say you wouldn't give NHS a penny more. But you can't just stop, can you? That's the problem when something is run by government. You pointed out yourself that government won't do it. One can come up with a million ideal ways to run the business through government. The question has always been whether it can be done practically. The government doesn't have motives to do it. A private company has pressure from competition all the time. Governments face pressure only once in 5 years and NHS is only a part of what affects election results. As for fair taxation, I already mentioned corporation tax system has to he reformed to ensure that profits are not redirected to low tax countries. But that alone is not going to help you pay for such a huge infrastructure. Check the tax rate in France and Sweden. They have higher taxes even for lower middle class. | |||
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" You say you wouldn't give NHS a penny more. But you can't just stop, can you? That's the problem when something is run by government. You pointed out yourself that government won't do it. One can come up with a million ideal ways to run the business through government. The question has always been whether it can be done practically. The government doesn't have motives to do it. A private company has pressure from competition all the time. Governments face pressure only once in 5 years and NHS is only a part of what affects election results. As for fair taxation, I already mentioned corporation tax system has to he reformed to ensure that profits are not redirected to low tax countries. But that alone is not going to help you pay for such a huge infrastructure. Check the tax rate in France and Sweden. They have higher taxes even for lower middle class." It’s needs to use the money it has, so yes it can be stopped. The governments of both colours have always been too scared or incapable of grabbing the snake by the head but unless they do, the drain on tax revenues will forever increase. As I mentioned it’s culture from the top .Start cutting a few high earners and jobs such as admin managers for PA’s and the ridiculous amount of directors in different sectors of the country. . Having family involved I can vouch for the obscene waste in paying some of those directors who wouldn’t know a days work if it fell on them. The ones I am aware of had diaries showing repeatedly they are at meeting elsewhere but when checked there was no one at the destination. They go home and are not held responsible. One senior director used to go shopping with her daughters who worked in the same unit. No days off just popping out for most of the day . Again who’s checking and who’s holding them to account . Tax avoidance stopping along with the retention of subsidies given to private industry would save many billions each year. You mention other countries tax . If we had imposed the same tax regime as Norway for north sea oil a huge amount of money would have been raised . It went in dividends instead. To recover that money won’t be a quick win as losing wasn’t a quick loss. As for no difference the following is the lowest estimate of avoidance as the highest is over £465billion. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) In the global league ( I’ve chosen the lowest estimate account here below as the highest estimate is over £465billion) This is what we control from both our and other countries known avoidance. The fact we are responsible for hiding 26% of known avoidance is a national disgrace. Of global avoidance 65% goes through London, also a disgrace. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) It is estimated by closing avoidance routes there will be at least the same again stuck in the evasion routes so it will also be found and recovered. Avoiding proposed new tax rules the EU is definitely a Brexit win if you’re rich like Reece Mogg, Lord Bamford, non domicile Russians etc. Those rules would have stopped money being moved out of any country to avoid tax in the country of generation. So Amazon, Starbucks , JCB etc would have to pay their due tax. It was resisted by Ireland and the U.K. Ireland because they get the revenue as a low tax destination. The UK because we manage the avoidance for everyone. Banking lobby and rich backers step forward to claim your applause . Sunak’s family hide wealth in Madagascar to avoid tax in India. Remember the shit services in India ! True altruism at work. | |||
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" It’s needs to use the money it has, so yes it can be stopped. The governments of both colours have always been too scared or incapable of grabbing the snake by the head but unless they do, the drain on tax revenues will forever increase. As I mentioned it’s culture from the top .Start cutting a few high earners and jobs such as admin managers for PA’s and the ridiculous amount of directors in different sectors of the country. . Having family involved I can vouch for the obscene waste in paying some of those directors who wouldn’t know a days work if it fell on them. The ones I am aware of had diaries showing repeatedly they are at meeting elsewhere but when checked there was no one at the destination. They go home and are not held responsible. One senior director used to go shopping with her daughters who worked in the same unit. No days off just popping out for most of the day . Again who’s checking and who’s holding them to account . Tax avoidance stopping along with the retention of subsidies given to private industry would save many billions each year. You mention other countries tax . If we had imposed the same tax regime as Norway for north sea oil a huge amount of money would have been raised . It went in dividends instead. To recover that money won’t be a quick win as losing wasn’t a quick loss. As for no difference the following is the lowest estimate of avoidance as the highest is over £465billion. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) In the global league ( I’ve chosen the lowest estimate account here below as the highest estimate is over £465billion) This is what we control from both our and other countries known avoidance. The fact we are responsible for hiding 26% of known avoidance is a national disgrace. Of global avoidance 65% goes through London, also a disgrace. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) It is estimated by closing avoidance routes there will be at least the same again stuck in the evasion routes so it will also be found and recovered. Avoiding proposed new tax rules the EU is definitely a Brexit win if you’re rich like Reece Mogg, Lord Bamford, non domicile Russians etc. Those rules would have stopped money being moved out of any country to avoid tax in the country of generation. So Amazon, Starbucks , JCB etc would have to pay their due tax. It was resisted by Ireland and the U.K. Ireland because they get the revenue as a low tax destination. The UK because we manage the avoidance for everyone. Banking lobby and rich backers step forward to claim your applause . Sunak’s family hide wealth in Madagascar to avoid tax in India. Remember the shit services in India ! True altruism at work. " You keep saying it has to start from the top. But the truth is it never has and it never will. You should ask the question "Why will they?" Politicians' goal is to grab power. They do the bare minimum necessary for that. Even for the big corporates under so much pressure, sometimes struggle to have a good culture all around. For government organisation to do that is impossible. Can you show where you got the estimates from? For the current debate, we just need to know how much does the UK lose per year due to tax avoidance and what level of contribution does it have to budget? | |||
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"I don’t think that the scale of the upcoming energy price increases has really hit home with a lot of people yet. When it does, I predict a huge clamour for energy to be re-nationalised. I think this will be the next nightmare for this Govt to deal (if they last that long). A Govt controlled energy supply could have protected our people from the upcoming price rises and instead U.K. based EDF customers will be bailing out the French energy company and U.K. citizens generally will really feel a huge cost of living squeeze. The arguments for Nationalised essential services will become louder and more insistent in the coming months. You do know that government protects people from price rises by paying for it through taxes right? Price rise indicates only one thing - Supply is lower than demand. If a government is going to get in and reduce the price, you are either paying for it indirectly through taxes or you are going to suffer from scarcity. In developed countries, it is usually the former where more tax is collected. In the developing countries, it's the latter and they suffer from shortage. Except they need to cover product cost, operating costs and reinvestment but do not need to also finance dividends so ultimately still cheaper. No one is obligated to finance dividends. Well that won’t do your share price (or the Director’s share options) much good if they don’t! You don’t get dividend payments on an option you only get them if you take the option. It’s no longer an option after that. And maybe concentrating on making the company profitable will indeed help the share price on his options . The option is often discounted to the actual price so any price increase is a benefit . The dividend is a bonus not a need. "Oooh thanks for explaining to me how share options work, I would never have known!!!!  | |||
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" It’s needs to use the money it has, so yes it can be stopped. The governments of both colours have always been too scared or incapable of grabbing the snake by the head but unless they do, the drain on tax revenues will forever increase. As I mentioned it’s culture from the top .Start cutting a few high earners and jobs such as admin managers for PA’s and the ridiculous amount of directors in different sectors of the country. . Having family involved I can vouch for the obscene waste in paying some of those directors who wouldn’t know a days work if it fell on them. The ones I am aware of had diaries showing repeatedly they are at meeting elsewhere but when checked there was no one at the destination. They go home and are not held responsible. One senior director used to go shopping with her daughters who worked in the same unit. No days off just popping out for most of the day . Again who’s checking and who’s holding them to account . Tax avoidance stopping along with the retention of subsidies given to private industry would save many billions each year. You mention other countries tax . If we had imposed the same tax regime as Norway for north sea oil a huge amount of money would have been raised . It went in dividends instead. To recover that money won’t be a quick win as losing wasn’t a quick loss. As for no difference the following is the lowest estimate of avoidance as the highest is over £465billion. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) In the global league ( I’ve chosen the lowest estimate account here below as the highest estimate is over £465billion) This is what we control from both our and other countries known avoidance. The fact we are responsible for hiding 26% of known avoidance is a national disgrace. Of global avoidance 65% goes through London, also a disgrace. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) It is estimated by closing avoidance routes there will be at least the same again stuck in the evasion routes so it will also be found and recovered. Avoiding proposed new tax rules the EU is definitely a Brexit win if you’re rich like Reece Mogg, Lord Bamford, non domicile Russians etc. Those rules would have stopped money being moved out of any country to avoid tax in the country of generation. So Amazon, Starbucks , JCB etc would have to pay their due tax. It was resisted by Ireland and the U.K. Ireland because they get the revenue as a low tax destination. The UK because we manage the avoidance for everyone. Banking lobby and rich backers step forward to claim your applause . Sunak’s family hide wealth in Madagascar to avoid tax in India. Remember the shit services in India ! True altruism at work. You keep saying it has to start from the top. But the truth is it never has and it never will. You should ask the question "Why will they?" Politicians' goal is to grab power. They do the bare minimum necessary for that. Even for the big corporates under so much pressure, sometimes struggle to have a good culture all around. For government organisation to do that is impossible. Can you show where you got the estimates from? For the current debate, we just need to know how much does the UK lose per year due to tax avoidance and what level of contribution does it have to budget?" So you will just resign yourself to accepting failure ? Interesting stand point. If people don’t vote to change the system then I agree it won’t. On the other hand if enough people say actually this needs to stop and we need better government the just maybe. We need to improve education as that’s the key to stop people believing the nonsense spouted by the media and politicians. The £465B was published by the world bank along with the 65% through London which I posted a link to on here a few months ago but don’t have now. Which is why I went for the lower estimate this time. Feel free to Google your own numbers . The U.K. government are saying it’s no longer an issue. There’s a surprise. Here is a link for you to map it out a bit clearer. Feel free to look up who controls the islands mentioned. https://www.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-biggest-private-tax-havens/ This article mentions an agreement reached in 2021 to clamp down. After pressure from Rishi Sunak it was agreed to exclude financial institutions from this clamp down. Who do they think is handling this cash? The plumbers? Or perhaps you’d prefer the IMF link https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2019/09/tackling-global-tax-havens-shaxon.htm The tax justice network has some interesting reading too. You see, just by saying well it’s only £2b or £4b this year misses the point. A lot of the money over and above any estimates exits or slushes through the uk unseen. Much more importantly think about the compound effect of all the money over the years that’s again avoided tax on interest year after year. That sum Is enormous. Trillions are now hidden away by both corporations and individuals. I worked with a major shipping group in the U.K. . As soon as they realised they were again making excess profits in the U.K. management bills started to arrive from abroad. The company had low industry specific rates in their registered country as opposed to the corporation rate in the U.K. They moved tens of millions out of the reach of HMRC and it wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow at HMRC . The EU wants to stop this. Lord Bamford JCB moved £300m through Luxembourg in one year. The avoidance by corporations on top of stopping subsidies coupled with the retention of dividends is a considerable number in anyones estimation so not sure why you’re arguing against it as a positive. If it’s billions it’s billions more for the population in the U.K. isn’t it!! The figure of £65b in dividends paid by the water companies is enormous . That would build a lot of hospitals . If even half was realised. It would build better sewage works. If as you claim it will be poorly managed and spent then at least it will be poorly spent in the U.K. not sent abroad as dividends so yet again another benefit for the U.K. economy. Why are you so against looking into the possibility of change?? As I’ve mentioned I don’t have the answers but I think it’s not beyond the realms of possibility to make it better. | |||
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"I don’t think that the scale of the upcoming energy price increases has really hit home with a lot of people yet. When it does, I predict a huge clamour for energy to be re-nationalised. I think this will be the next nightmare for this Govt to deal (if they last that long). A Govt controlled energy supply could have protected our people from the upcoming price rises and instead U.K. based EDF customers will be bailing out the French energy company and U.K. citizens generally will really feel a huge cost of living squeeze. The arguments for Nationalised essential services will become louder and more insistent in the coming months. You do know that government protects people from price rises by paying for it through taxes right? Price rise indicates only one thing - Supply is lower than demand. If a government is going to get in and reduce the price, you are either paying for it indirectly through taxes or you are going to suffer from scarcity. In developed countries, it is usually the former where more tax is collected. In the developing countries, it's the latter and they suffer from shortage. Except they need to cover product cost, operating costs and reinvestment but do not need to also finance dividends so ultimately still cheaper. No one is obligated to finance dividends. Well that won’t do your share price (or the Director’s share options) much good if they don’t! You don’t get dividend payments on an option you only get them if you take the option. It’s no longer an option after that. And maybe concentrating on making the company profitable will indeed help the share price on his options . The option is often discounted to the actual price so any price increase is a benefit . The dividend is a bonus not a need.
Oooh thanks for explaining to me how share options work, I would never have known!!!! " | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now When you look at the breakdown of gas and electric bills the profit is only 2% not many companies would run with that little profit. UK’s 6 biggest energy firms made more than £1 billion in profit before the price increase , gas , electric and water are basic Human requirements, You need to see past the left wing, socialist spin here... There are businesses with vast sums invested in them. A billion from an investment of a million would be disgusting but a billion profit from an investment of 100bn would be a pitiful return for shareholders... companies are owned by shareholders. Corporation tax applies to company profits but for UK residents company profits get taxed again in the form of tax on dividend. Shell’s “disgusting” profits only gives share holders a pre tax dividend yield of 3%. Hardly disgusting Erm. You also buy shares for what you can sell them for . Shell’s share price has increased 20% year to date. That’s a very good return don’t you think even after tax?
". It is difficult to see what possible relevance a short term movement in the share price of Shell has . Over the past five years the average share price of Shell was 1976.45 with a low of 904 and a high of 2804 . To night the share price Is 1918.4 . These returns are very different to what is claimed by you. | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now When you look at the breakdown of gas and electric bills the profit is only 2% not many companies would run with that little profit. UK’s 6 biggest energy firms made more than £1 billion in profit before the price increase , gas , electric and water are basic Human requirements, You need to see past the left wing, socialist spin here... There are businesses with vast sums invested in them. A billion from an investment of a million would be disgusting but a billion profit from an investment of 100bn would be a pitiful return for shareholders... companies are owned by shareholders. Corporation tax applies to company profits but for UK residents company profits get taxed again in the form of tax on dividend. Shell’s “disgusting” profits only gives share holders a pre tax dividend yield of 3%. Hardly disgusting Erm. You also buy shares for what you can sell them for . Shell’s share price has increased 20% year to date. That’s a very good return don’t you think even after tax?
. It is difficult to see what possible relevance a short term movement in the share price of Shell has . Over the past five years the average share price of Shell was 1976.45 with a low of 904 and a high of 2804 . To night the share price Is 1918.4 . These returns are very different to what is claimed by you."Prices quoted from shell website so feel free to argue with them. Read my other post on the FRSE 100 to argue your point on returns. . However are you saying if I bought a year ago and I sold today I won’t make 20% because I will and that’s fact . To help you 2,043.30 GBX +342.50 (20.14%)year to date | |||
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" It’s needs to use the money it has, so yes it can be stopped. The governments of both colours have always been too scared or incapable of grabbing the snake by the head but unless they do, the drain on tax revenues will forever increase. As I mentioned it’s culture from the top .Start cutting a few high earners and jobs such as admin managers for PA’s and the ridiculous amount of directors in different sectors of the country. . Having family involved I can vouch for the obscene waste in paying some of those directors who wouldn’t know a days work if it fell on them. The ones I am aware of had diaries showing repeatedly they are at meeting elsewhere but when checked there was no one at the destination. They go home and are not held responsible. One senior director used to go shopping with her daughters who worked in the same unit. No days off just popping out for most of the day . Again who’s checking and who’s holding them to account . Tax avoidance stopping along with the retention of subsidies given to private industry would save many billions each year. You mention other countries tax . If we had imposed the same tax regime as Norway for north sea oil a huge amount of money would have been raised . It went in dividends instead. To recover that money won’t be a quick win as losing wasn’t a quick loss. As for no difference the following is the lowest estimate of avoidance as the highest is over £465billion. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) In the global league ( I’ve chosen the lowest estimate account here below as the highest estimate is over £465billion) This is what we control from both our and other countries known avoidance. The fact we are responsible for hiding 26% of known avoidance is a national disgrace. Of global avoidance 65% goes through London, also a disgrace. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) It is estimated by closing avoidance routes there will be at least the same again stuck in the evasion routes so it will also be found and recovered. Avoiding proposed new tax rules the EU is definitely a Brexit win if you’re rich like Reece Mogg, Lord Bamford, non domicile Russians etc. Those rules would have stopped money being moved out of any country to avoid tax in the country of generation. So Amazon, Starbucks , JCB etc would have to pay their due tax. It was resisted by Ireland and the U.K. Ireland because they get the revenue as a low tax destination. The UK because we manage the avoidance for everyone. Banking lobby and rich backers step forward to claim your applause . Sunak’s family hide wealth in Madagascar to avoid tax in India. Remember the shit services in India ! True altruism at work. You keep saying it has to start from the top. But the truth is it never has and it never will. You should ask the question "Why will they?" Politicians' goal is to grab power. They do the bare minimum necessary for that. Even for the big corporates under so much pressure, sometimes struggle to have a good culture all around. For government organisation to do that is impossible. Can you show where you got the estimates from? For the current debate, we just need to know how much does the UK lose per year due to tax avoidance and what level of contribution does it have to budget? So you will just resign yourself to accepting failure ? Interesting stand point. If people don’t vote to change the system then I agree it won’t. On the other hand if enough people say actually this needs to stop and we need better government the just maybe. We need to improve education as that’s the key to stop people believing the nonsense spouted by the media and politicians. The £465B was published by the world bank along with the 65% through London which I posted a link to on here a few months ago but don’t have now. Which is why I went for the lower estimate this time. Feel free to Google your own numbers . The U.K. government are saying it’s no longer an issue. There’s a surprise. Here is a link for you to map it out a bit clearer. Feel free to look up who controls the islands mentioned. https://www.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-biggest-private-tax-havens/ This article mentions an agreement reached in 2021 to clamp down. After pressure from Rishi Sunak it was agreed to exclude financial institutions from this clamp down. Who do they think is handling this cash? The plumbers? Or perhaps you’d prefer the IMF link https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2019/09/tackling-global-tax-havens-shaxon.htm The tax justice network has some interesting reading too. You see, just by saying well it’s only £2b or £4b this year misses the point. A lot of the money over and above any estimates exits or slushes through the uk unseen. Much more importantly think about the compound effect of all the money over the years that’s again avoided tax on interest year after year. That sum Is enormous. Trillions are now hidden away by both corporations and individuals. I worked with a major shipping group in the U.K. . As soon as they realised they were again making excess profits in the U.K. management bills started to arrive from abroad. The company had low industry specific rates in their registered country as opposed to the corporation rate in the U.K. They moved tens of millions out of the reach of HMRC and it wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow at HMRC . The EU wants to stop this. Lord Bamford JCB moved £300m through Luxembourg in one year. The avoidance by corporations on top of stopping subsidies coupled with the retention of dividends is a considerable number in anyones estimation so not sure why you’re arguing against it as a positive. If it’s billions it’s billions more for the population in the U.K. isn’t it!! The figure of £65b in dividends paid by the water companies is enormous . That would build a lot of hospitals . If even half was realised. It would build better sewage works. If as you claim it will be poorly managed and spent then at least it will be poorly spent in the U.K. not sent abroad as dividends so yet again another benefit for the U.K. economy. Why are you so against looking into the possibility of change?? As I’ve mentioned I don’t have the answers but I think it’s not beyond the realms of possibility to make it better. " Vote to change the system? Who will they vote for? Who will change the system? Labour? | |||
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" It’s needs to use the money it has, so yes it can be stopped. The governments of both colours have always been too scared or incapable of grabbing the snake by the head but unless they do, the drain on tax revenues will forever increase. As I mentioned it’s culture from the top .Start cutting a few high earners and jobs such as admin managers for PA’s and the ridiculous amount of directors in different sectors of the country. . Having family involved I can vouch for the obscene waste in paying some of those directors who wouldn’t know a days work if it fell on them. The ones I am aware of had diaries showing repeatedly they are at meeting elsewhere but when checked there was no one at the destination. They go home and are not held responsible. One senior director used to go shopping with her daughters who worked in the same unit. No days off just popping out for most of the day . Again who’s checking and who’s holding them to account . Tax avoidance stopping along with the retention of subsidies given to private industry would save many billions each year. You mention other countries tax . If we had imposed the same tax regime as Norway for north sea oil a huge amount of money would have been raised . It went in dividends instead. To recover that money won’t be a quick win as losing wasn’t a quick loss. As for no difference the following is the lowest estimate of avoidance as the highest is over £465billion. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) In the global league ( I’ve chosen the lowest estimate account here below as the highest estimate is over £465billion) This is what we control from both our and other countries known avoidance. The fact we are responsible for hiding 26% of known avoidance is a national disgrace. Of global avoidance 65% goes through London, also a disgrace. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) It is estimated by closing avoidance routes there will be at least the same again stuck in the evasion routes so it will also be found and recovered. Avoiding proposed new tax rules the EU is definitely a Brexit win if you’re rich like Reece Mogg, Lord Bamford, non domicile Russians etc. Those rules would have stopped money being moved out of any country to avoid tax in the country of generation. So Amazon, Starbucks , JCB etc would have to pay their due tax. It was resisted by Ireland and the U.K. Ireland because they get the revenue as a low tax destination. The UK because we manage the avoidance for everyone. Banking lobby and rich backers step forward to claim your applause . Sunak’s family hide wealth in Madagascar to avoid tax in India. Remember the shit services in India ! True altruism at work. You keep saying it has to start from the top. But the truth is it never has and it never will. You should ask the question "Why will they?" Politicians' goal is to grab power. They do the bare minimum necessary for that. Even for the big corporates under so much pressure, sometimes struggle to have a good culture all around. For government organisation to do that is impossible. Can you show where you got the estimates from? For the current debate, we just need to know how much does the UK lose per year due to tax avoidance and what level of contribution does it have to budget? So you will just resign yourself to accepting failure ? Interesting stand point. If people don’t vote to change the system then I agree it won’t. On the other hand if enough people say actually this needs to stop and we need better government the just maybe. We need to improve education as that’s the key to stop people believing the nonsense spouted by the media and politicians. The £465B was published by the world bank along with the 65% through London which I posted a link to on here a few months ago but don’t have now. Which is why I went for the lower estimate this time. Feel free to Google your own numbers . The U.K. government are saying it’s no longer an issue. There’s a surprise. Here is a link for you to map it out a bit clearer. Feel free to look up who controls the islands mentioned. https://www.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-biggest-private-tax-havens/ This article mentions an agreement reached in 2021 to clamp down. After pressure from Rishi Sunak it was agreed to exclude financial institutions from this clamp down. Who do they think is handling this cash? The plumbers? Or perhaps you’d prefer the IMF link https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2019/09/tackling-global-tax-havens-shaxon.htm The tax justice network has some interesting reading too. You see, just by saying well it’s only £2b or £4b this year misses the point. A lot of the money over and above any estimates exits or slushes through the uk unseen. Much more importantly think about the compound effect of all the money over the years that’s again avoided tax on interest year after year. That sum Is enormous. Trillions are now hidden away by both corporations and individuals. I worked with a major shipping group in the U.K. . As soon as they realised they were again making excess profits in the U.K. management bills started to arrive from abroad. The company had low industry specific rates in their registered country as opposed to the corporation rate in the U.K. They moved tens of millions out of the reach of HMRC and it wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow at HMRC . The EU wants to stop this. Lord Bamford JCB moved £300m through Luxembourg in one year. The avoidance by corporations on top of stopping subsidies coupled with the retention of dividends is a considerable number in anyones estimation so not sure why you’re arguing against it as a positive. If it’s billions it’s billions more for the population in the U.K. isn’t it!! The figure of £65b in dividends paid by the water companies is enormous . That would build a lot of hospitals . If even half was realised. It would build better sewage works. If as you claim it will be poorly managed and spent then at least it will be poorly spent in the U.K. not sent abroad as dividends so yet again another benefit for the U.K. economy. Why are you so against looking into the possibility of change?? As I’ve mentioned I don’t have the answers but I think it’s not beyond the realms of possibility to make it better. Vote to change the system? Who will they vote for? Who will change the system? Labour?" First you need to stop the rot so certainly not the present Tory party. (This form a former Tory voter) The privatisation cheapest bid wins is not the answer blatantly. It won’t take much to move away from the influence of shareholders now the managers have a private accountable mentality. Also Billions of taxpayers money has been exported by this government awarding government contracts to foreign entities at the expense of U.K. industry so that needs addressing now. Wasn’t that supposed to be a Brexit benefit? Although we did have choice in reality. We are plagued by bad government with our extreme first past the post results. If we can vote for privatisation with Thatcher then we can vote against it with Starmer. He’s not going to be all communist on us. As I’ve posted on here before I believe in PPR to give a consensus on such issues. What works best for us all. I reiterate it’s not working today . Goodnight | |||
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"Good luck finding the money to buy the companies out to bring them back into the public domain." Yes difficult but watch the price drop of government moots the idea of a forced staged takeover | |||
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" It’s needs to use the money it has, so yes it can be stopped. The governments of both colours have always been too scared or incapable of grabbing the snake by the head but unless they do, the drain on tax revenues will forever increase. As I mentioned it’s culture from the top .Start cutting a few high earners and jobs such as admin managers for PA’s and the ridiculous amount of directors in different sectors of the country. . Having family involved I can vouch for the obscene waste in paying some of those directors who wouldn’t know a days work if it fell on them. The ones I am aware of had diaries showing repeatedly they are at meeting elsewhere but when checked there was no one at the destination. They go home and are not held responsible. One senior director used to go shopping with her daughters who worked in the same unit. No days off just popping out for most of the day . Again who’s checking and who’s holding them to account . Tax avoidance stopping along with the retention of subsidies given to private industry would save many billions each year. You mention other countries tax . If we had imposed the same tax regime as Norway for north sea oil a huge amount of money would have been raised . It went in dividends instead. To recover that money won’t be a quick win as losing wasn’t a quick loss. As for no difference the following is the lowest estimate of avoidance as the highest is over £465billion. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) In the global league ( I’ve chosen the lowest estimate account here below as the highest estimate is over £465billion) This is what we control from both our and other countries known avoidance. The fact we are responsible for hiding 26% of known avoidance is a national disgrace. Of global avoidance 65% goes through London, also a disgrace. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) It is estimated by closing avoidance routes there will be at least the same again stuck in the evasion routes so it will also be found and recovered. Avoiding proposed new tax rules the EU is definitely a Brexit win if you’re rich like Reece Mogg, Lord Bamford, non domicile Russians etc. Those rules would have stopped money being moved out of any country to avoid tax in the country of generation. So Amazon, Starbucks , JCB etc would have to pay their due tax. It was resisted by Ireland and the U.K. Ireland because they get the revenue as a low tax destination. The UK because we manage the avoidance for everyone. Banking lobby and rich backers step forward to claim your applause . Sunak’s family hide wealth in Madagascar to avoid tax in India. Remember the shit services in India ! True altruism at work. You keep saying it has to start from the top. But the truth is it never has and it never will. You should ask the question "Why will they?" Politicians' goal is to grab power. They do the bare minimum necessary for that. Even for the big corporates under so much pressure, sometimes struggle to have a good culture all around. For government organisation to do that is impossible. Can you show where you got the estimates from? For the current debate, we just need to know how much does the UK lose per year due to tax avoidance and what level of contribution does it have to budget? So you will just resign yourself to accepting failure ? Interesting stand point. If people don’t vote to change the system then I agree it won’t. On the other hand if enough people say actually this needs to stop and we need better government the just maybe. We need to improve education as that’s the key to stop people believing the nonsense spouted by the media and politicians. The £465B was published by the world bank along with the 65% through London which I posted a link to on here a few months ago but don’t have now. Which is why I went for the lower estimate this time. Feel free to Google your own numbers . The U.K. government are saying it’s no longer an issue. There’s a surprise. Here is a link for you to map it out a bit clearer. Feel free to look up who controls the islands mentioned. https://www.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-biggest-private-tax-havens/ This article mentions an agreement reached in 2021 to clamp down. After pressure from Rishi Sunak it was agreed to exclude financial institutions from this clamp down. Who do they think is handling this cash? The plumbers? Or perhaps you’d prefer the IMF link https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2019/09/tackling-global-tax-havens-shaxon.htm The tax justice network has some interesting reading too. You see, just by saying well it’s only £2b or £4b this year misses the point. A lot of the money over and above any estimates exits or slushes through the uk unseen. Much more importantly think about the compound effect of all the money over the years that’s again avoided tax on interest year after year. That sum Is enormous. Trillions are now hidden away by both corporations and individuals. I worked with a major shipping group in the U.K. . As soon as they realised they were again making excess profits in the U.K. management bills started to arrive from abroad. The company had low industry specific rates in their registered country as opposed to the corporation rate in the U.K. They moved tens of millions out of the reach of HMRC and it wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow at HMRC . The EU wants to stop this. Lord Bamford JCB moved £300m through Luxembourg in one year. The avoidance by corporations on top of stopping subsidies coupled with the retention of dividends is a considerable number in anyones estimation so not sure why you’re arguing against it as a positive. If it’s billions it’s billions more for the population in the U.K. isn’t it!! The figure of £65b in dividends paid by the water companies is enormous . That would build a lot of hospitals . If even half was realised. It would build better sewage works. If as you claim it will be poorly managed and spent then at least it will be poorly spent in the U.K. not sent abroad as dividends so yet again another benefit for the U.K. economy. Why are you so against looking into the possibility of change?? As I’ve mentioned I don’t have the answers but I think it’s not beyond the realms of possibility to make it better. Vote to change the system? Who will they vote for? Who will change the system? Labour? First you need to stop the rot so certainly not the present Tory party. (This form a former Tory voter) The privatisation cheapest bid wins is not the answer blatantly. It won’t take much to move away from the influence of shareholders now the managers have a private accountable mentality. Also Billions of taxpayers money has been exported by this government awarding government contracts to foreign entities at the expense of U.K. industry so that needs addressing now. Wasn’t that supposed to be a Brexit benefit? Although we did have choice in reality. We are plagued by bad government with our extreme first past the post results. If we can vote for privatisation with Thatcher then we can vote against it with Starmer. He’s not going to be all communist on us. As I’ve posted on here before I believe in PPR to give a consensus on such issues. What works best for us all. I reiterate it’s not working today . Goodnight " So all this debate is a propaganda for labour party
Your idea won't work just for the reason why socialism or communism work. Labour party have been in power for years and no one did anything about it. Instead of daydreaming about how we can fix a government owned business and make it efficient, we should be looking at a solution that is at least a little bit practical. A government business suddenly making everyone accountable is just a pipe dream which arm chair socialists have. It will never be reality. Even if you elect left wing parties. | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now When you look at the breakdown of gas and electric bills the profit is only 2% not many companies would run with that little profit. UK’s 6 biggest energy firms made more than £1 billion in profit before the price increase , gas , electric and water are basic Human requirements, You need to see past the left wing, socialist spin here... There are businesses with vast sums invested in them. A billion from an investment of a million would be disgusting but a billion profit from an investment of 100bn would be a pitiful return for shareholders... companies are owned by shareholders. Corporation tax applies to company profits but for UK residents company profits get taxed again in the form of tax on dividend. Shell’s “disgusting” profits only gives share holders a pre tax dividend yield of 3%. Hardly disgusting Erm. You also buy shares for what you can sell them for . Shell’s share price has increased 20% year to date. That’s a very good return don’t you think even after tax?
. It is difficult to see what possible relevance a short term movement in the share price of Shell has . Over the past five years the average share price of Shell was 1976.45 with a low of 904 and a high of 2804 . To night the share price Is 1918.4 . These returns are very different to what is claimed by you.
Prices quoted from shell website so feel free to argue with them.
Read my other post on the FRSE 100 to argue your point on returns. . However are you saying if I bought a year ago and I sold today I won’t make 20% because I will and that’s fact .
To help you
2,043.30 GBX +342.50 (20.14%)year to date
". However you can hardly assess performance over a one year period. You would have to look for a period of at least five years and over that time the share has hardly moved. Most people view shares as a long term investment and will be unlikely to have either bought at a low point or sold at a high point. | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now When you look at the breakdown of gas and electric bills the profit is only 2% not many companies would run with that little profit. UK’s 6 biggest energy firms made more than £1 billion in profit before the price increase , gas , electric and water are basic Human requirements, You need to see past the left wing, socialist spin here... There are businesses with vast sums invested in them. A billion from an investment of a million would be disgusting but a billion profit from an investment of 100bn would be a pitiful return for shareholders... companies are owned by shareholders. Corporation tax applies to company profits but for UK residents company profits get taxed again in the form of tax on dividend. Shell’s “disgusting” profits only gives share holders a pre tax dividend yield of 3%. Hardly disgusting Erm. You also buy shares for what you can sell them for . Shell’s share price has increased 20% year to date. That’s a very good return don’t you think even after tax?
Yes but it not so good when share price goes the other direction...
Interesting I’ve just read .
If you invested £10k in just the FTSE 100 thirty five years ago and took the dividends each year you would end up with an original investment worth just over £50k today. That’s 4.5-5 % compound average per annum I’m lead to believe . (accounts feel free to cut my legs off ) So dividends and five times your money back. Not bad.
If however you reinvested the dividends each time back into the FTSE 100 only, your investment would have grown to £195k
The dividends certainly seem to work either way.
The individual share trading you’re referring to is something that if you can’t afford to lose the money you don’t play in that market. Big players can afford spread bets.
". It is good news then for ordinary working people, pensioners and pension funds . Assuming your calculations are correct ( they might need adjustment for inflation ) ,I cannot see too many people being upset about those who take responsibility for their future and save into pension funds. However the returns to which you refer are a lot less if you adjust them for inflation. . | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now When you look at the breakdown of gas and electric bills the profit is only 2% not many companies would run with that little profit. UK’s 6 biggest energy firms made more than £1 billion in profit before the price increase , gas , electric and water are basic Human requirements, You need to see past the left wing, socialist spin here... There are businesses with vast sums invested in them. A billion from an investment of a million would be disgusting but a billion profit from an investment of 100bn would be a pitiful return for shareholders... companies are owned by shareholders. Corporation tax applies to company profits but for UK residents company profits get taxed again in the form of tax on dividend. Shell’s “disgusting” profits only gives share holders a pre tax dividend yield of 3%. Hardly disgusting Erm. You also buy shares for what you can sell them for . Shell’s share price has increased 20% year to date. That’s a very good return don’t you think even after tax?
. It is difficult to see what possible relevance a short term movement in the share price of Shell has . Over the past five years the average share price of Shell was 1976.45 with a low of 904 and a high of 2804 . To night the share price Is 1918.4 . These returns are very different to what is claimed by you.
Prices quoted from shell website so feel free to argue with them.
Read my other post on the FRSE 100 to argue your point on returns. . However are you saying if I bought a year ago and I sold today I won’t make 20% because I will and that’s fact .
To help you
2,043.30 GBX +342.50 (20.14%)year to date
. However you can hardly assess performance over a one year period. You would have to look for a period of at least five years and over that time the share has hardly moved. Most people view shares as a long term investment and will be unlikely to have either bought at a low point or sold at a high point. "Traders can buy and sell the same stock daily so it depends on the aim is. Some shares I agree are a long term hold that majors such as Blackrock hold for years as anchor shares. The dividend is a bonus . Warren Buffet has huge utility interests with Berkshire Hathaway. Only 0.1 % of shell shres are traded daily so it’s not a high flyers risk taking choice. For the record Black rock took a bath with another oil company last year which was also a long term hold so not always a safe bet. This argument is veering off as I’m not against dividends at all . I own shares so like getting regular payments . I’m against the basic utilities we all need giving dividends especially when those companies are failing to provide the services required at a reasonable price. . | |||
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" It’s needs to use the money it has, so yes it can be stopped. The governments of both colours have always been too scared or incapable of grabbing the snake by the head but unless they do, the drain on tax revenues will forever increase. As I mentioned it’s culture from the top .Start cutting a few high earners and jobs such as admin managers for PA’s and the ridiculous amount of directors in different sectors of the country. . Having family involved I can vouch for the obscene waste in paying some of those directors who wouldn’t know a days work if it fell on them. The ones I am aware of had diaries showing repeatedly they are at meeting elsewhere but when checked there was no one at the destination. They go home and are not held responsible. One senior director used to go shopping with her daughters who worked in the same unit. No days off just popping out for most of the day . Again who’s checking and who’s holding them to account . Tax avoidance stopping along with the retention of subsidies given to private industry would save many billions each year. You mention other countries tax . If we had imposed the same tax regime as Norway for north sea oil a huge amount of money would have been raised . It went in dividends instead. To recover that money won’t be a quick win as losing wasn’t a quick loss. As for no difference the following is the lowest estimate of avoidance as the highest is over £465billion. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) In the global league ( I’ve chosen the lowest estimate account here below as the highest estimate is over £465billion) This is what we control from both our and other countries known avoidance. The fact we are responsible for hiding 26% of known avoidance is a national disgrace. Of global avoidance 65% goes through London, also a disgrace. The five jurisdictions most responsible for countries’ tax losses are British Territory Cayman (responsible for 16.5 per cent of global tax losses, equal to over $70 billion), the UK (10 per cent; over $42 billion), the Netherlands (8.5 per cent; over $36 billion), Luxembourg (6.5 per cent; over $27 billion) and the US (5.53 per cent; over $23 billion) It is estimated by closing avoidance routes there will be at least the same again stuck in the evasion routes so it will also be found and recovered. Avoiding proposed new tax rules the EU is definitely a Brexit win if you’re rich like Reece Mogg, Lord Bamford, non domicile Russians etc. Those rules would have stopped money being moved out of any country to avoid tax in the country of generation. So Amazon, Starbucks , JCB etc would have to pay their due tax. It was resisted by Ireland and the U.K. Ireland because they get the revenue as a low tax destination. The UK because we manage the avoidance for everyone. Banking lobby and rich backers step forward to claim your applause . Sunak’s family hide wealth in Madagascar to avoid tax in India. Remember the shit services in India ! True altruism at work. You keep saying it has to start from the top. But the truth is it never has and it never will. You should ask the question "Why will they?" Politicians' goal is to grab power. They do the bare minimum necessary for that. Even for the big corporates under so much pressure, sometimes struggle to have a good culture all around. For government organisation to do that is impossible. Can you show where you got the estimates from? For the current debate, we just need to know how much does the UK lose per year due to tax avoidance and what level of contribution does it have to budget? So you will just resign yourself to accepting failure ? Interesting stand point. If people don’t vote to change the system then I agree it won’t. On the other hand if enough people say actually this needs to stop and we need better government the just maybe. We need to improve education as that’s the key to stop people believing the nonsense spouted by the media and politicians. The £465B was published by the world bank along with the 65% through London which I posted a link to on here a few months ago but don’t have now. Which is why I went for the lower estimate this time. Feel free to Google your own numbers . The U.K. government are saying it’s no longer an issue. There’s a surprise. Here is a link for you to map it out a bit clearer. Feel free to look up who controls the islands mentioned. https://www.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-biggest-private-tax-havens/ This article mentions an agreement reached in 2021 to clamp down. After pressure from Rishi Sunak it was agreed to exclude financial institutions from this clamp down. Who do they think is handling this cash? The plumbers? Or perhaps you’d prefer the IMF link https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2019/09/tackling-global-tax-havens-shaxon.htm The tax justice network has some interesting reading too. You see, just by saying well it’s only £2b or £4b this year misses the point. A lot of the money over and above any estimates exits or slushes through the uk unseen. Much more importantly think about the compound effect of all the money over the years that’s again avoided tax on interest year after year. That sum Is enormous. Trillions are now hidden away by both corporations and individuals. I worked with a major shipping group in the U.K. . As soon as they realised they were again making excess profits in the U.K. management bills started to arrive from abroad. The company had low industry specific rates in their registered country as opposed to the corporation rate in the U.K. They moved tens of millions out of the reach of HMRC and it wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow at HMRC . The EU wants to stop this. Lord Bamford JCB moved £300m through Luxembourg in one year. The avoidance by corporations on top of stopping subsidies coupled with the retention of dividends is a considerable number in anyones estimation so not sure why you’re arguing against it as a positive. If it’s billions it’s billions more for the population in the U.K. isn’t it!! The figure of £65b in dividends paid by the water companies is enormous . That would build a lot of hospitals . If even half was realised. It would build better sewage works. If as you claim it will be poorly managed and spent then at least it will be poorly spent in the U.K. not sent abroad as dividends so yet again another benefit for the U.K. economy. Why are you so against looking into the possibility of change?? As I’ve mentioned I don’t have the answers but I think it’s not beyond the realms of possibility to make it better. Vote to change the system? Who will they vote for? Who will change the system? Labour? First you need to stop the rot so certainly not the present Tory party. (This form a former Tory voter) The privatisation cheapest bid wins is not the answer blatantly. It won’t take much to move away from the influence of shareholders now the managers have a private accountable mentality. Also Billions of taxpayers money has been exported by this government awarding government contracts to foreign entities at the expense of U.K. industry so that needs addressing now. Wasn’t that supposed to be a Brexit benefit? Although we did have choice in reality. We are plagued by bad government with our extreme first past the post results. If we can vote for privatisation with Thatcher then we can vote against it with Starmer. He’s not going to be all communist on us. As I’ve posted on here before I believe in PPR to give a consensus on such issues. What works best for us all. I reiterate it’s not working today . Goodnight So all this debate is a propaganda for labour party
Your idea won't work just for the reason why socialism or communism work. Labour party have been in power for years and no one did anything about it. Instead of daydreaming about how we can fix a government owned business and make it efficient, we should be looking at a solution that is at least a little bit practical. A government business suddenly making everyone accountable is just a pipe dream which arm chair socialists have. It will never be reality. Even if you elect left wing parties."You obviously have a blinkered belief that a fee market is the best way forward . Well we’ve had that for 40 years and then country has never been in so much debt (excluding Covid) Also if it’s so great why are we subsidising car manufacturers and soon the steel works and of course the £5B a year for rail? No I’m not backing labour for the record . I’m looking for an alternative and you are resistant to even open your mind to the possibility. It’s a shame. I repeat I don’t have the answers and will happily listen to anyone who maybe has. What I can definitely see is the utilities being privatised has failed . There is no argument against that given the situation we are in . | |||
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"I used to be all for privatisation as I thought private industry is better run than the government ever is. I think that is still true today. Being part of the sell offs from the likes of Amersham one of the first ( my shares went up 20 fold in 1 day ) all I’ve seen is more efficient business but with a focus on share price and dividend not investing in the future or the well being of customers. Water companies paying tens of billions in dividends and yet sewage discharged hundreds of times a day into our rivers . Trains run better now on inter-city but bloody hell at what price for the consumer . The chaos caused by the energy firms going bust just shows there has been no real plan on critical infrastructure. I blame labour and Tory for this but also myself for thinking it was a good idea and voting for it. Government agencies needed private management styles and that’s all they needed. You fail you get sacked. it’s easy really. No jobs for life and all accountable at all levels top to bottom. Btw private industry is also laden with a lot of incompetent management but they mostly get the boot. The profits made by some of these energy companies is disgusting , especially now When you look at the breakdown of gas and electric bills the profit is only 2% not many companies would run with that little profit. UK’s 6 biggest energy firms made more than £1 billion in profit before the price increase , gas , electric and water are basic Human requirements, You need to see past the left wing, socialist spin here... There are businesses with vast sums invested in them. A billion from an investment of a million would be disgusting but a billion profit from an investment of 100bn would be a pitiful return for shareholders... companies are owned by shareholders. Corporation tax applies to company profits but for UK residents company profits get taxed again in the form of tax on dividend. Shell’s “disgusting” profits only gives share holders a pre tax dividend yield of 3%. Hardly disgusting Erm. You also buy shares for what you can sell them for . Shell’s share price has increased 20% year to date. That’s a very good return don’t you think even after tax?
Yes but it not so good when share price goes the other direction...
Interesting I’ve just read .
If you invested £10k in just the FTSE 100 thirty five years ago and took the dividends each year you would end up with an original investment worth just over £50k today. That’s 4.5-5 % compound average per annum I’m lead to believe . (accounts feel free to cut my legs off ) So dividends and five times your money back. Not bad.
If however you reinvested the dividends each time back into the FTSE 100 only, your investment would have grown to £195k
The dividends certainly seem to work either way.
The individual share trading you’re referring to is something that if you can’t afford to lose the money you don’t play in that market. Big players can afford spread bets.
. It is good news then for ordinary working people, pensioners and pension funds . Assuming your calculations are correct ( they might need adjustment for inflation ) ,I cannot see too many people being upset about those who take responsibility for their future and save into pension funds. However the returns to which you refer are a lot less if you adjust them for inflation. ."Yes good point and agree it would affect the numbers . I think ratio in favour of dividends is the same though | |||
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" You keep saying it has to start from the top. But the truth is it never has and it never will. You should ask the question "Why will they?" Politicians' goal is to grab power. They do the bare minimum necessary for that. Even for the big corporates under so much pressure, sometimes struggle to have a good culture all around. For government organisation to do that is impossible. Can you show where you got the estimates from? For the current debate, we just need to know how much does the UK lose per year due to tax avoidance and what level of contribution does it have to budget? So you will just resign yourself to accepting failure ? Interesting stand point. If people don’t vote to change the system then I agree it won’t. On the other hand if enough people say actually this needs to stop and we need better government the just maybe. We need to improve education as that’s the key to stop people believing the nonsense spouted by the media and politicians. The £465B was published by the world bank along with the 65% through London which I posted a link to on here a few months ago but don’t have now. Which is why I went for the lower estimate this time. Feel free to Google your own numbers . The U.K. government are saying it’s no longer an issue. There’s a surprise. Here is a link for you to map it out a bit clearer. Feel free to look up who controls the islands mentioned. https://www.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-biggest-private-tax-havens/ This article mentions an agreement reached in 2021 to clamp down. After pressure from Rishi Sunak it was agreed to exclude financial institutions from this clamp down. Who do they think is handling this cash? The plumbers? Or perhaps you’d prefer the IMF link https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2019/09/tackling-global-tax-havens-shaxon.htm The tax justice network has some interesting reading too. You see, just by saying well it’s only £2b or £4b this year misses the point. A lot of the money over and above any estimates exits or slushes through the uk unseen. Much more importantly think about the compound effect of all the money over the years that’s again avoided tax on interest year after year. That sum Is enormous. Trillions are now hidden away by both corporations and individuals. I worked with a major shipping group in the U.K. . As soon as they realised they were again making excess profits in the U.K. management bills started to arrive from abroad. The company had low industry specific rates in their registered country as opposed to the corporation rate in the U.K. They moved tens of millions out of the reach of HMRC and it wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow at HMRC . The EU wants to stop this. Lord Bamford JCB moved £300m through Luxembourg in one year. The avoidance by corporations on top of stopping subsidies coupled with the retention of dividends is a considerable number in anyones estimation so not sure why you’re arguing against it as a positive. If it’s billions it’s billions more for the population in the U.K. isn’t it!! The figure of £65b in dividends paid by the water companies is enormous . That would build a lot of hospitals . If even half was realised. It would build better sewage works. If as you claim it will be poorly managed and spent then at least it will be poorly spent in the U.K. not sent abroad as dividends so yet again another benefit for the U.K. economy. Why are you so against looking into the possibility of change?? As I’ve mentioned I don’t have the answers but I think it’s not beyond the realms of possibility to make it better. Vote to change the system? Who will they vote for? Who will change the system? Labour? First you need to stop the rot so certainly not the present Tory party. (This form a former Tory voter) The privatisation cheapest bid wins is not the answer blatantly. It won’t take much to move away from the influence of shareholders now the managers have a private accountable mentality. Also Billions of taxpayers money has been exported by this government awarding government contracts to foreign entities at the expense of U.K. industry so that needs addressing now. Wasn’t that supposed to be a Brexit benefit? Although we did have choice in reality. We are plagued by bad government with our extreme first past the post results. If we can vote for privatisation with Thatcher then we can vote against it with Starmer. He’s not going to be all communist on us. As I’ve posted on here before I believe in PPR to give a consensus on such issues. What works best for us all. I reiterate it’s not working today . Goodnight So all this debate is a propaganda for labour party
Your idea won't work just for the reason why socialism or communism work. Labour party have been in power for years and no one did anything about it. Instead of daydreaming about how we can fix a government owned business and make it efficient, we should be looking at a solution that is at least a little bit practical. A government business suddenly making everyone accountable is just a pipe dream which arm chair socialists have. It will never be reality. Even if you elect left wing parties.
You obviously have a blinkered belief that a fee market is the best way forward . Well we’ve had that for 40 years and then country has never been in so much debt (excluding Covid) Also if it’s so great why are we subsidising car manufacturers and soon the steel works and of course the £5B a year for rail?
No I’m not backing labour for the record . I’m looking for an alternative and you are resistant to even open your mind to the possibility. It’s a shame.
I repeat I don’t have the answers and will happily listen to anyone who maybe has. What I can definitely see is the utilities being privatised has failed . There is no argument against that given the situation we are in . "Because free markets have worked well across the world and in UK too? There was a time when the prediction was that world will suffer from grave hunger because of population explosion. Right now the problem in most developed countries is obesity. Even worldwide, people living below poverty line has drastically reduced. All thanks to capitalism. Is capitalism perfect? No. But time and again, government ownership has failed and results are usually worse than free market solution. Still people regularly come up with this idea because it's a lazy solution to a problem, that does nothing to solve the root cause but ends up making it worse due to inefficiency. Why is free market efficient? If something like gas is low on supply and high on demand, its prices rises. It implicitly conveys message to the people that this resource is scarce. It forces people to use it judiciously. You nationalise it and impose price control and what happens? The supply problem is not solved magically. It's still there. The price rise is compensated by tax money. End user knows nothing about it and keeps using it as though it is available in abundance. The result is an inevitable tax rise. Then there are other inefficiencies simply because of lack of accountability within the organisation built by government. Of course, I will be told that socialism was never implemented properly and you have a magic potion that stalwarts of socialism do not possess. Good luck with that anyway | |||
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" You keep saying it has to start from the top. But the truth is it never has and it never will. You should ask the question "Why will they?" Politicians' goal is to grab power. They do the bare minimum necessary for that. Even for the big corporates under so much pressure, sometimes struggle to have a good culture all around. For government organisation to do that is impossible. Can you show where you got the estimates from? For the current debate, we just need to know how much does the UK lose per year due to tax avoidance and what level of contribution does it have to budget? So you will just resign yourself to accepting failure ? Interesting stand point. If people don’t vote to change the system then I agree it won’t. On the other hand if enough people say actually this needs to stop and we need better government the just maybe. We need to improve education as that’s the key to stop people believing the nonsense spouted by the media and politicians. The £465B was published by the world bank along with the 65% through London which I posted a link to on here a few months ago but don’t have now. Which is why I went for the lower estimate this time. Feel free to Google your own numbers . The U.K. government are saying it’s no longer an issue. There’s a surprise. Here is a link for you to map it out a bit clearer. Feel free to look up who controls the islands mentioned. https://www.visualcapitalist.com/worlds-biggest-private-tax-havens/ This article mentions an agreement reached in 2021 to clamp down. After pressure from Rishi Sunak it was agreed to exclude financial institutions from this clamp down. Who do they think is handling this cash? The plumbers? Or perhaps you’d prefer the IMF link https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2019/09/tackling-global-tax-havens-shaxon.htm The tax justice network has some interesting reading too. You see, just by saying well it’s only £2b or £4b this year misses the point. A lot of the money over and above any estimates exits or slushes through the uk unseen. Much more importantly think about the compound effect of all the money over the years that’s again avoided tax on interest year after year. That sum Is enormous. Trillions are now hidden away by both corporations and individuals. I worked with a major shipping group in the U.K. . As soon as they realised they were again making excess profits in the U.K. management bills started to arrive from abroad. The company had low industry specific rates in their registered country as opposed to the corporation rate in the U.K. They moved tens of millions out of the reach of HMRC and it wouldn’t have raised an eyebrow at HMRC . The EU wants to stop this. Lord Bamford JCB moved £300m through Luxembourg in one year. The avoidance by corporations on top of stopping subsidies coupled with the retention of dividends is a considerable number in anyones estimation so not sure why you’re arguing against it as a positive. If it’s billions it’s billions more for the population in the U.K. isn’t it!! The figure of £65b in dividends paid by the water companies is enormous . That would build a lot of hospitals . If even half was realised. It would build better sewage works. If as you claim it will be poorly managed and spent then at least it will be poorly spent in the U.K. not sent abroad as dividends so yet again another benefit for the U.K. economy. Why are you so against looking into the possibility of change?? As I’ve mentioned I don’t have the answers but I think it’s not beyond the realms of possibility to make it better. Vote to change the system? Who will they vote for? Who will change the system? Labour? First you need to stop the rot so certainly not the present Tory party. (This form a former Tory voter) The privatisation cheapest bid wins is not the answer blatantly. It won’t take much to move away from the influence of shareholders now the managers have a private accountable mentality. Also Billions of taxpayers money has been exported by this government awarding government contracts to foreign entities at the expense of U.K. industry so that needs addressing now. Wasn’t that supposed to be a Brexit benefit? Although we did have choice in reality. We are plagued by bad government with our extreme first past the post results. If we can vote for privatisation with Thatcher then we can vote against it with Starmer. He’s not going to be all communist on us. As I’ve posted on here before I believe in PPR to give a consensus on such issues. What works best for us all. I reiterate it’s not working today . Goodnight So all this debate is a propaganda for labour party
Your idea won't work just for the reason why socialism or communism work. Labour party have been in power for years and no one did anything about it. Instead of daydreaming about how we can fix a government owned business and make it efficient, we should be looking at a solution that is at least a little bit practical. A government business suddenly making everyone accountable is just a pipe dream which arm chair socialists have. It will never be reality. Even if you elect left wing parties.
You obviously have a blinkered belief that a fee market is the best way forward . Well we’ve had that for 40 years and then country has never been in so much debt (excluding Covid) Also if it’s so great why are we subsidising car manufacturers and soon the steel works and of course the £5B a year for rail?
No I’m not backing labour for the record . I’m looking for an alternative and you are resistant to even open your mind to the possibility. It’s a shame.
I repeat I don’t have the answers and will happily listen to anyone who maybe has. What I can definitely see is the utilities being privatised has failed . There is no argument against that given the situation we are in .
Because free markets have worked well across the world and in UK too? There was a time when the prediction was that world will suffer from grave hunger because of population explosion. Right now the problem in most developed countries is obesity. Even worldwide, people living below poverty line has drastically reduced. All thanks to capitalism.
Is capitalism perfect? No. But time and again, government ownership has failed and results are usually worse than free market solution. Still people regularly come up with this idea because it's a lazy solution to a problem, that does nothing to solve the root cause but ends up making it worse due to inefficiency.
Why is free market efficient? If something like gas is low on supply and high on demand, its prices rises. It implicitly conveys message to the people that this resource is scarce. It forces people to use it judiciously. You nationalise it and impose price control and what happens? The supply problem is not solved magically. It's still there. The price rise is compensated by tax money. End user knows nothing about it and keeps using it as though it is available in abundance. The result is an inevitable tax rise. Then there are other inefficiencies simply because of lack of accountability within the organisation built by government.
Of course, I will be told that socialism was never implemented properly and you have a magic potion that stalwarts of socialism do not possess. Good luck with that anyway "You say socialism as if it’s a swear word with a cynicism not worthy if your debate. Magic potion. Really?? Do you think Sweden or Norway are failed countries? Sweden has embraced the best of both left and right wing policies and the Parliament is made up equally of left and right. They moved hard left in the sixties but have also encouraged capitalist to develop. They look to be living well enough in their compromised state. You are forgetting that we are a society that in theory cares about each other. Free for all without a thought for the less well off is not a society I would think many will be comfortable with. As for the options what is to say a complimentary system won’t work? It’s easy to say oh that will never work and yet, here we are after 40 years of an absolute free for all and the nation ( society ) is in huge debt. That has not been a success for all it has been a success for a few including myself. Before you dismiss a complimentary system the absolute extreme of communism in China was adapted to accept sone market force but with the country and hard left at its core. China has built more motorways in the last 10 years than the whole of Europe in the last 40 and is on track to be the richest country in the world. This from what was a relatively poor country forty years ago. They opened to capitalism up to a point in 1978 but no free for all. Note the recent slap downs of those rich owners who believe they are better than the state. I’m no fan of China with its repression and aggression and definitely not advocating it. The point I’m making is the same old status quo can always be updated. To exclude any view but your own is Luddite in the extreme. | |||
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" First you need to stop the rot so certainly not the present Tory party. (This form a former Tory voter) The privatisation cheapest bid wins is not the answer blatantly. It won’t take much to move away from the influence of shareholders now the managers have a private accountable mentality. Also Billions of taxpayers money has been exported by this government awarding government contracts to foreign entities at the expense of U.K. industry so that needs addressing now. Wasn’t that supposed to be a Brexit benefit? Although we did have choice in reality. We are plagued by bad government with our extreme first past the post results. If we can vote for privatisation with Thatcher then we can vote against it with Starmer. He’s not going to be all communist on us. As I’ve posted on here before I believe in PPR to give a consensus on such issues. What works best for us all. I reiterate it’s not working today . Goodnight So all this debate is a propaganda for labour party
Your idea won't work just for the reason why socialism or communism work. Labour party have been in power for years and no one did anything about it. Instead of daydreaming about how we can fix a government owned business and make it efficient, we should be looking at a solution that is at least a little bit practical. A government business suddenly making everyone accountable is just a pipe dream which arm chair socialists have. It will never be reality. Even if you elect left wing parties.
You obviously have a blinkered belief that a fee market is the best way forward . Well we’ve had that for 40 years and then country has never been in so much debt (excluding Covid) Also if it’s so great why are we subsidising car manufacturers and soon the steel works and of course the £5B a year for rail?
No I’m not backing labour for the record . I’m looking for an alternative and you are resistant to even open your mind to the possibility. It’s a shame.
I repeat I don’t have the answers and will happily listen to anyone who maybe has. What I can definitely see is the utilities being privatised has failed . There is no argument against that given the situation we are in .
Because free markets have worked well across the world and in UK too? There was a time when the prediction was that world will suffer from grave hunger because of population explosion. Right now the problem in most developed countries is obesity. Even worldwide, people living below poverty line has drastically reduced. All thanks to capitalism.
Is capitalism perfect? No. But time and again, government ownership has failed and results are usually worse than free market solution. Still people regularly come up with this idea because it's a lazy solution to a problem, that does nothing to solve the root cause but ends up making it worse due to inefficiency.
Why is free market efficient? If something like gas is low on supply and high on demand, its prices rises. It implicitly conveys message to the people that this resource is scarce. It forces people to use it judiciously. You nationalise it and impose price control and what happens? The supply problem is not solved magically. It's still there. The price rise is compensated by tax money. End user knows nothing about it and keeps using it as though it is available in abundance. The result is an inevitable tax rise. Then there are other inefficiencies simply because of lack of accountability within the organisation built by government.
Of course, I will be told that socialism was never implemented properly and you have a magic potion that stalwarts of socialism do not possess. Good luck with that anyway
You say socialism as if it’s a swear word with a cynicism not worthy if your debate. Magic potion. Really??
Do you think Sweden or Norway are failed countries?
Sweden has embraced the best of both left and right wing policies and the Parliament is made up equally of left and right. They moved hard left in the sixties but have also encouraged capitalist to develop. They look to be living well enough in their compromised state.
You are forgetting that we are a society that in theory cares about each other. Free for all without a thought for the less well off is not a society I would think many will be comfortable with.
As for the options what is to say a complimentary system won’t work? It’s easy to say oh that will never work and yet, here we are after 40 years of an absolute free for all and the nation ( society ) is in huge debt. That has not been a success for all it has been a success for a few including myself.
Before you dismiss a complimentary system the absolute extreme of communism in China was adapted to accept sone market force but with the country and hard left at its core. China has built more motorways in the last 10 years than the whole of Europe in the last 40 and is on track to be the richest country in the world. This from what was a relatively poor country forty years ago. They opened to capitalism up to a point in 1978 but no free for all. Note the recent slap downs of those rich owners who believe they are better than the state. I’m no fan of China with its repression and aggression and definitely not advocating it. The point I’m making is the same old status quo can always be updated.
To exclude any view but your own is Luddite in the extreme. "Expected this usual Scandinavian dream as a response. Norway is an exception because they have oil money. If you look at other Scandinavian countries with similar system, Sweden has a tax rate that goes over 50% even for the money you earn over an equivalent of around 30,000£. Their unemployment rate is 8.2%, almost double the UK unemployment rate. Same with Finland. Higher taxes and unemployment rate of 7.83%. The fact that China was on its way to tragedy with communism and population explosion and they had to shift to free markets to save their countries will tell a lot. Why do you compare motorways built in Europe in last 40 vs China? Europe had most of its motorway needs covered long back. China was massively underdeveloped thanks to Mao/communism and they had to build from bottom. Both China and India had one thing in common. They had to ditch socialism and embrace capitalism. And both had a path toward success the moment they embraced capitalism. Anyway, I know that the moment you put up a logical argument, armchair socialists will turn to moral sentiments - "We need to look after other people". We are already looking after other people in the form of healthcare and education. Wanting people to pay for other people's electricity when the resources it depends on are scarce, is neither morally expected nor practically clever choice. | |||
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"Just a point in the casual dismissal or Norway “because they have oil”. The Norwegian Sovereign Wealth Fund... “The aim of the oil fund is to ensure responsible and long-term management of revenue from Norway’s oil and gas resources, so that this wealth benefits both current and future generations.” Hmmm just imagine what the UK Sovereign Wealth Fund would be worth right now if we hadn’t instead followed a free market ideology. What a shocking missed opportunity!" Grrr typos, clearly meant to be... Just a point on the casual dismissal of Norway “because they have oil”. | |||
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" First you need to stop the rot so certainly not the present Tory party. (This form a former Tory voter) The privatisation cheapest bid wins is not the answer blatantly. It won’t take much to move away from the influence of shareholders now the managers have a private accountable mentality. Also Billions of taxpayers money has been exported by this government awarding government contracts to foreign entities at the expense of U.K. industry so that needs addressing now. Wasn’t that supposed to be a Brexit benefit? Although we did have choice in reality. We are plagued by bad government with our extreme first past the post results. If we can vote for privatisation with Thatcher then we can vote against it with Starmer. He’s not going to be all communist on us. As I’ve posted on here before I believe in PPR to give a consensus on such issues. What works best for us all. I reiterate it’s not working today . Goodnight So all this debate is a propaganda for labour party
Your idea won't work just for the reason why socialism or communism work. Labour party have been in power for years and no one did anything about it. Instead of daydreaming about how we can fix a government owned business and make it efficient, we should be looking at a solution that is at least a little bit practical. A government business suddenly making everyone accountable is just a pipe dream which arm chair socialists have. It will never be reality. Even if you elect left wing parties.
You obviously have a blinkered belief that a fee market is the best way forward . Well we’ve had that for 40 years and then country has never been in so much debt (excluding Covid) Also if it’s so great why are we subsidising car manufacturers and soon the steel works and of course the £5B a year for rail?
No I’m not backing labour for the record . I’m looking for an alternative and you are resistant to even open your mind to the possibility. It’s a shame.
I repeat I don’t have the answers and will happily listen to anyone who maybe has. What I can definitely see is the utilities being privatised has failed . There is no argument against that given the situation we are in .
Because free markets have worked well across the world and in UK too? There was a time when the prediction was that world will suffer from grave hunger because of population explosion. Right now the problem in most developed countries is obesity. Even worldwide, people living below poverty line has drastically reduced. All thanks to capitalism.
Is capitalism perfect? No. But time and again, government ownership has failed and results are usually worse than free market solution. Still people regularly come up with this idea because it's a lazy solution to a problem, that does nothing to solve the root cause but ends up making it worse due to inefficiency.
Why is free market efficient? If something like gas is low on supply and high on demand, its prices rises. It implicitly conveys message to the people that this resource is scarce. It forces people to use it judiciously. You nationalise it and impose price control and what happens? The supply problem is not solved magically. It's still there. The price rise is compensated by tax money. End user knows nothing about it and keeps using it as though it is available in abundance. The result is an inevitable tax rise. Then there are other inefficiencies simply because of lack of accountability within the organisation built by government.
Of course, I will be told that socialism was never implemented properly and you have a magic potion that stalwarts of socialism do not possess. Good luck with that anyway
You say socialism as if it’s a swear word with a cynicism not worthy if your debate. Magic potion. Really??
Do you think Sweden or Norway are failed countries?
Sweden has embraced the best of both left and right wing policies and the Parliament is made up equally of left and right. They moved hard left in the sixties but have also encouraged capitalist to develop. They look to be living well enough in their compromised state.
You are forgetting that we are a society that in theory cares about each other. Free for all without a thought for the less well off is not a society I would think many will be comfortable with.
As for the options what is to say a complimentary system won’t work? It’s easy to say oh that will never work and yet, here we are after 40 years of an absolute free for all and the nation ( society ) is in huge debt. That has not been a success for all it has been a success for a few including myself.
Before you dismiss a complimentary system the absolute extreme of communism in China was adapted to accept sone market force but with the country and hard left at its core. China has built more motorways in the last 10 years than the whole of Europe in the last 40 and is on track to be the richest country in the world. This from what was a relatively poor country forty years ago. They opened to capitalism up to a point in 1978 but no free for all. Note the recent slap downs of those rich owners who believe they are better than the state. I’m no fan of China with its repression and aggression and definitely not advocating it. The point I’m making is the same old status quo can always be updated.
To exclude any view but your own is Luddite in the extreme.
Expected this usual Scandinavian dream as a response.
Norway is an exception because they have oil money. If you look at other Scandinavian countries with similar system, Sweden has a tax rate that goes over 50% even for the money you earn over an equivalent of around 30,000£. Their unemployment rate is 8.2%, almost double the UK unemployment rate.
Same with Finland. Higher taxes and unemployment rate of 7.83%.
The fact that China was on its way to tragedy with communism and population explosion and they had to shift to free markets to save their countries will tell a lot. Why do you compare motorways built in Europe in last 40 vs China? Europe had most of its motorway needs covered long back. China was massively underdeveloped thanks to Mao/communism and they had to build from bottom. Both China and India had one thing in common. They had to ditch socialism and embrace capitalism. And both had a path toward success the moment they embraced capitalism.
Anyway, I know that the moment you put up a logical argument, armchair socialists will turn to moral sentiments - "We need to look after other people". We are already looking after other people in the form of healthcare and education. Wanting people to pay for other people's electricity when the resources it depends on are scarce, is neither morally expected nor practically clever choice."The social care in Sweden is better than the U.K. and more generous . Their hospital performance is erratic to be honest in different areas so some excellent and some average. Our NHS had massive problems before Covid and still does so that provision isn’t very good is it but we both agree that is somethings government are too scared off. General social provision is excellent with people working far less hours than we do and getting much better things such paternity support for families . The education services are amongst the best in the world. Compare that to our shambolic set up with private schools claiming the best opportunities for their pupils again and again. We are falling down the world tables in education too. Another reason to raise money to improve if we are to be going hi tech as Boris says. The Norwegians have the second largest wealth fund in the world behind Saudi so can well afford to pay for their unemployed and sick . Shame we didn’t charge the same tax on oil they did. No we wanted the shareholder to make more. Both countries public transport and roads put ours to shame . Also when they count unemployed they count those on schemes like the French do, so not quite apples with apples there. We exclude those in schemes and part time training . Even though they are unemployed. Look up ratio of unemployed between France and U.K. which explains that much better than I can. Or feel free to check with the OECD who also realises we fudge our figures so only include those claiming job seekers. To be fair Gordon Brown did the same so it’s all U.K. governments . Both country’s public transport shames ours and I can personally vouch for that. With the exception of the far north where the population is so sparse services are less frequent. I do not advocate anyone buying anyone else energy and please show me wher I have said this? I believe the energy should be controlled by the state and each and everyone pay for their own. I don’t think the profits should be given to shareholders and taken out of the country. The profits should be re invested to create better infrastructure which is desperately lacking but also to keep costs down for the end user. Not rocket science. Regarding the road comment do you really want to state that the U.K. has built enough motorway in the last forty years ? You must be having a laugh! Our economy creaks under the lack of motorway miles . The millions lost on man hours every day is ridiculous . So yes China is catching but it’s catching up faster because we are standing still in this wonderful era of the extreme capitalist. The state gives so much away it can’t afford new motorways . Smart motorways to use the hard shoulder rather than actually build capacity. That’s going well isn’t it! As for China and India adopting capitalism I will repeat yet again as you don’t seem to hear that.bit. I’m all for capitalism in general and all should take responsibility to better themselves and not rely on state handouts . Benefits should not be a lifestyle choice . I’m not for capitalism when it comes to critical infrastructure we all rely on . We have an energy production crisis brought on by lack of investment along with chronic lack of government planning . The water companies pump raw sewage into our rivers at the rate of 400k times a year and yet they have given away £65B in dividends. That is a huge loss to our utility provision. You are missing the point completely on the China comment . Btw it was and still is in effect communist dictatorship not socialist at all. Chinese “state backed”companies are scooping up utilities and infrastructure across the world . Why is that ?? India has a crisis regarding employment and those fortunate enough to get a good education leave . The government from what I read is looking hard at education as the levels of poverty are still around 30% that’s pushing 350m people . India’s population is its biggest drain but if they get it right they could indeed follow chinas growth although hopefully without using sl4ve and forced labour as the Chinese do. For the record chinas economic growth rate is slowing as a lot of major multinationals are nervous of having too many eggs in the manufacturing basket of a dictatorship as aggressive as China. So they will be happy to sell there but more likely to manufacture nearby. We in this country now have the ridiculous situation whereby a French government owned company and a Chinese state owned company will own our latest nuclear power plant. Just ludicrous . Where are the so called patriotic Brexiteers in all this? The point I keep trying to make is you are denying any thought that another possible way could be implemented to control our core national industries. They are failing this country and you cannot argue that point at all as the evidence is overwhelming. I’m suggesting a different structure is possible and all you do is rant on about a free for all is the best way. I’m not a left wing socialist as you seem to keep inferring . I’ve made a lot of money from shares and Mrs thatcher policies made me my fist big chunk of cash so I’ve done very well from capitalism . This discussion is about our key infrastructure and you react as if I’m attacking business in general . Take a step back and indeed try to be logical and think about the country’s security if you can’t accept the scary theory of it being at least partly state owned for economic reasons . We need ideas not dogma! | |||
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"@Jackal1 great post. "Thank you I’m sure I’ll soon be accused of being a Corbyn supporter or communist or something similar very soon.
I really don’t have any concrete answers just hoping we can find some common ideas to fix the mess we’re in.
It’s only debate on a swingers site so don’t think the government will be paying too much attention.. but being tories you never know.. Orange anyone?? | |||
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" The social care in Sweden is better than the U.K. and more generous . Their hospital performance is erratic to be honest in different areas so some excellent and some average. Our NHS had massive problems before Covid and still does so that provision isn’t very good is it but we both agree that is somethings government are too scared off. General social provision is excellent with people working far less hours than we do and getting much better things such paternity support for families . The education services are amongst the best in the world. Compare that to our shambolic set up with private schools claiming the best opportunities for their pupils again and again. We are falling down the world tables in education too. Another reason to raise money to improve if we are to be going hi tech as Boris says. The Norwegians have the second largest wealth fund in the world behind Saudi so can well afford to pay for their unemployed and sick . Shame we didn’t charge the same tax on oil they did. No we wanted the shareholder to make more. Both countries public transport and roads put ours to shame . Also when they count unemployed they count those on schemes like the French do, so not quite apples with apples there. We exclude those in schemes and part time training . Even though they are unemployed. Look up ratio of unemployed between France and U.K. which explains that much better than I can. Or feel free to check with the OECD who also realises we fudge our figures so only include those claiming job seekers. To be fair Gordon Brown did the same so it’s all U.K. governments . Both country’s public transport shames ours and I can personally vouch for that. With the exception of the far north where the population is so sparse services are less frequent. I do not advocate anyone buying anyone else energy and please show me wher I have said this? I believe the energy should be controlled by the state and each and everyone pay for their own. I don’t think the profits should be given to shareholders and taken out of the country. The profits should be re invested to create better infrastructure which is desperately lacking but also to keep costs down for the end user. Not rocket science. Regarding the road comment do you really want to state that the U.K. has built enough motorway in the last forty years ? You must be having a laugh! Our economy creaks under the lack of motorway miles . The millions lost on man hours every day is ridiculous . So yes China is catching but it’s catching up faster because we are standing still in this wonderful era of the extreme capitalist. The state gives so much away it can’t afford new motorways . Smart motorways to use the hard shoulder rather than actually build capacity. That’s going well isn’t it! As for China and India adopting capitalism I will repeat yet again as you don’t seem to hear that.bit. I’m all for capitalism in general and all should take responsibility to better themselves and not rely on state handouts . Benefits should not be a lifestyle choice . I’m not for capitalism when it comes to critical infrastructure we all rely on . We have an energy production crisis brought on by lack of investment along with chronic lack of government planning . The water companies pump raw sewage into our rivers at the rate of 400k times a year and yet they have given away £65B in dividends. That is a huge loss to our utility provision. You are missing the point completely on the China comment . Btw it was and still is in effect communist dictatorship not socialist at all. Chinese “state backed”companies are scooping up utilities and infrastructure across the world . Why is that ?? India has a crisis regarding employment and those fortunate enough to get a good education leave . The government from what I read is looking hard at education as the levels of poverty are still around 30% that’s pushing 350m people . India’s population is its biggest drain but if they get it right they could indeed follow chinas growth although hopefully without using sl4ve and forced labour as the Chinese do. For the record chinas economic growth rate is slowing as a lot of major multinationals are nervous of having too many eggs in the manufacturing basket of a dictatorship as aggressive as China. So they will be happy to sell there but more likely to manufacture nearby. We in this country now have the ridiculous situation whereby a French government owned company and a Chinese state owned company will own our latest nuclear power plant. Just ludicrous . Where are the so called patriotic Brexiteers in all this? The point I keep trying to make is you are denying any thought that another possible way could be implemented to control our core national industries. They are failing this country and you cannot argue that point at all as the evidence is overwhelming. I’m suggesting a different structure is possible and all you do is rant on about a free for all is the best way. I’m not a left wing socialist as you seem to keep inferring . I’ve made a lot of money from shares and Mrs thatcher policies made me my fist big chunk of cash so I’ve done very well from capitalism . This discussion is about our key infrastructure and you react as if I’m attacking business in general . Take a step back and indeed try to be logical and think about the country’s security if you can’t accept the scary theory of it being at least partly state owned for economic reasons . We need ideas not dogma! " Of course, social care in Sweden is better. The question is are you willing to pay the same amount of tax as them? 52% for anyone earning over 30,000£ and 30% for anything less? Agree that Norway has handled its oil resources much better than UK. As for rail transport, on what basis are you claiming that theirs put UK's transport in shame? Claims that UK tickets are most expensive is a myth. It breaks down completely when you look at details like time of booking and distance of travel. Service wise, UK does as good as Norway/Sweden if not better. I have travelled in all these countries. On investing in energy infrastructure, do you think those greedy capitalists didn't think about it? Do you think they are that stupid? For example, Amazon took over a decade to make profit. And even now, they reinvest a lot of money. If there is a chance to make more profits later, capitalists always reinvest. They make money by getting people to consume more. If they can produce more electricity by investing in infrastructure, they will do it. The problem is with the supply problems with fossil fuels and reliability in renewable energy sources. When it comes to India, you need to see how bad it was, before the economy was liberalised. Indian GDP growth per year was at 1.25% per year before liberalisation. It went up to 7.5% after liberalisation. The interesting part is it is the same political party that enforced socialist model in most industries that realised how wrong it turned out to be and took a U turn to liberalise the market. If they hadn't done that, the country would be screwed by now. Recent trends are changing. Indian salaries especially for IT professionals have gone higher than most European countries except UK when you consider cost of living and taxes. So most software professionals consider rest of Europe only as a temporary place to enjoy new culture. European rules have made it so hard for companies to set up offices and give a competitive salary for IT professionals. And if you think Indians going out to other countries is a bad thing, you can say the same about China too. If you think British motorways are a mess, you definitely have to do some research about Chinese traffic jams. Even after those massive infrastructure development they built, they manage to pull off record traffic jams regularly. You may have made money through shares yourself. But most of the ideas you proposed and arguments you made are pretty much what socialists tell without doing due research. I personally consider free markets to be most efficient way of running an economy. But I do believe healthcare and education should be run by state. Even though the practice is inefficient, education and healthcare are both basic needs for a society and I happy for my tax money to be spent on that. | |||
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"@Jackal1 great post.
Thank you
I’m sure I’ll soon be accused of being a Corbyn supporter or communist or something similar very soon.
I really don’t have any concrete answers just hoping we can find some common ideas to fix the mess we’re in.
It’s only debate on a swingers site so don’t think the government will be paying too much attention.. but being tories you never know.. Orange anyone?? "You always act like you are a centrist. But every argument is make is an indirect push for labour party. I remember you created a thread claiming that you are going to have an unbiased debate on a political issue. I found it interesting and posted a message without talking about any political party. Your reply to that was a full fledged Tory bashing. I don't mind you bashing them. They are not saints. But don't try to pull it off under the cover that you are a moderate. You are far from it. | |||
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"@Jackal1 great post.
Thank you
I’m sure I’ll soon be accused of being a Corbyn supporter or communist or something similar very soon.
I really don’t have any concrete answers just hoping we can find some common ideas to fix the mess we’re in.
It’s only debate on a swingers site so don’t think the government will be paying too much attention.. but being tories you never know.. Orange anyone??
You always act like you are a centrist. But every argument is make is an indirect push for labour party. I remember you created a thread claiming that you are going to have an unbiased debate on a political issue. I found it interesting and posted a message without talking about any political party. Your reply to that was a full fledged Tory bashing.
I don't mind you bashing them. They are not saints. But don't try to pull it off under the cover that you are a moderate. You are far from it."For the record I am bashing this government as it is atrocious and not fit for office. If it was labour acting in the same manner I would do the equally critical. It is sinister in its secrecy on new laws against press freedoms and it is consistently lying over anything it is challenged over. Boris is not fit for office and surrounded himself with those who agree with him rather than creating a government that is able to see the damage it is doing. Brexit is all he has and that is proving to be a mess. | |||
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" The social care in Sweden is better than the U.K. and more generous . Their hospital performance is erratic to be honest in different areas so some excellent and some average. Our NHS had massive problems before Covid and still does so that provision isn’t very good is it but we both agree that is somethings government are too scared off. General social provision is excellent with people working far less hours than we do and getting much better things such paternity support for families . The education services are amongst the best in the world. Compare that to our shambolic set up with private schools claiming the best opportunities for their pupils again and again. We are falling down the world tables in education too. Another reason to raise money to improve if we are to be going hi tech as Boris says. The Norwegians have the second largest wealth fund in the world behind Saudi so can well afford to pay for their unemployed and sick . Shame we didn’t charge the same tax on oil they did. No we wanted the shareholder to make more. Both countries public transport and roads put ours to shame . Also when they count unemployed they count those on schemes like the French do, so not quite apples with apples there. We exclude those in schemes and part time training . Even though they are unemployed. Look up ratio of unemployed between France and U.K. which explains that much better than I can. Or feel free to check with the OECD who also realises we fudge our figures so only include those claiming job seekers. To be fair Gordon Brown did the same so it’s all U.K. governments . You are missing the point completely on the China comment . Btw it was and still is in effect communist dictatorship not socialist at all. Chinese “state backed”companies are scooping up utilities and infrastructure across the world . Why is that ?? India has a crisis regarding employment and those fortunate enough to get a good education leave . The government from what I read is looking hard at education as the levels of poverty are still around 30% that’s pushing 350m people . India’s population is its biggest drain but if they get it right they could indeed follow chinas growth although hopefully without using sl4ve and forced labour as the Chinese do. For the record chinas economic growth rate is slowing as a lot of major multinationals are nervous of having too many eggs in the manufacturing basket of a dictatorship as aggressive as China. So they will be happy to sell there but more likely to manufacture nearby. We in this country now have the ridiculous situation whereby a French government owned company and a Chinese state owned company will own our latest nuclear power plant. Just ludicrous . Where are the so called patriotic Brexiteers in all this? The point I keep trying to make is you are denying any thought that another possible way could be implemented to control our core national industries. They are failing this country and you cannot argue that point at all as the evidence is overwhelming. I’m suggesting a different structure is possible and all you do is rant on about a free for all is the best way. I’m not a left wing socialist as you seem to keep inferring . I’ve made a lot of money from shares and Mrs thatcher policies made me my fist big chunk of cash so I’ve done very well from capitalism . This discussion is about our key infrastructure and you react as if I’m attacking business in general . Take a step back and indeed try to be logical and think about the country’s security if you can’t accept the scary theory of it being at least partly state owned for economic reasons . We need ideas not dogma! Of course, social care in Sweden is better. The question is are you willing to pay the same amount of tax as them? 52% for anyone earning over 30,000£ and 30% for anything less? Agree that Norway has handled its oil resources much better than UK. As for rail transport, on what basis are you claiming that theirs put UK's transport in shame? Claims that UK tickets are most expensive is a myth. It breaks down completely when you look at details like time of booking and distance of travel. Service wise, UK does as good as Norway/Sweden if not better. I have travelled in all these countries. On investing in energy infrastructure, do you think those greedy capitalists didn't think about it? Do you think they are that stupid? For example, Amazon took over a decade to make profit. And even now, they reinvest a lot of money. If there is a chance to make more profits later, capitalists always reinvest. They make money by getting people to consume more. If they can produce more electricity by investing in infrastructure, they will do it. The problem is with the supply problems with fossil fuels and reliability in renewable energy sources. When it comes to India, you need to see how bad it was, before the economy was liberalised. Indian GDP growth per year was at 1.25% per year before liberalisation. It went up to 7.5% after liberalisation. The interesting part is it is the same political party that enforced socialist model in most industries that realised how wrong it turned out to be and took a U turn to liberalise the market. If they hadn't done that, the country would be screwed by now. Recent trends are changing. Indian salaries especially for IT professionals have gone higher than most European countries except UK when you consider cost of living and taxes. So most software professionals consider rest of Europe only as a temporary place to enjoy new culture. European rules have made it so hard for companies to set up offices and give a competitive salary for IT professionals. And if you think Indians going out to other countries is a bad thing, you can say the same about China too. If you think British motorways are a mess, you definitely have to do some research about Chinese traffic jams. Even after those massive infrastructure development they built, they manage to pull off record traffic jams regularly. You may have made money through shares yourself. But most of the ideas you proposed and arguments you made are pretty much what socialists tell without doing due research. I personally consider free markets to be most efficient way of running an economy. But I do believe healthcare and education should be run by state. Even though the practice is inefficient, education and healthcare are both basic needs for a society and I happy for my tax money to be spent on that." You didn’t comment on our fudged unemployment figures? The due research comment is a bit rude.. if I’m doing a masters here I would of course produce evidence of my argument. As it’s a swingers site I’m not sure that’s appropriate!
Ok let’s start with taxes . In Sweden they have to work five weeks longer to reach their tax freedom day. (SE June 22- U.K. May 9th. 2016) you then add the fact they work at least three hours a week less than us that reduces the gap to one and a half weeks. Now add the recent tax increases in the U.K. and then gap may be nearly closed. To be be generous to you, let’s leave it at the older figure. So in effect for an seven/eight days earnings they get state support and society benefits that are far in excess of ours. If you take into account the very highest rates in Sweden then the gap for most is even smaller.
Tax isn’t just a simple rate as you well know. So ask a Swedish resident if they are happy with their tax and generally they are. Well my staff in Stockholm are and one is an American .
You can find hundred who aren’t yes I know.
You maybe need to travel on more U.K. trains to realise the difference.
The failure to re invest in energy production. As I said previously is the fault of both the companies as they know there is a lack of capacity by having to import energy and the chronic lack of planning by this and previous governments. Where is the plan? They both know the problem is getting worse. I’m not sure I believe the extreme scare stories on capacity but if they are half right we need to start building now.
With the population of China I expect they will have lots of issues with moving people, more people buying cars, population concentration etc. Not sure what your point is in regards to investment? Please tell me what our capitalist approach is doing to alleviate our own chronic under capacity? Do we have a list of new builds anywhere? Also what’s happened to the high speed train plans?? The freight capacity in the U.K. is virtually exhausted so the new lines would free up that urgently needed capacity. (Seeing as we’re not building roads) £5b a year and we still are forty years behind on high speed trains.
On the point of opening offices in Europe. I’m interested to know why you say it’s harder to open an office?
I think India losing its intellectual potential is a bad thing for India and it’s a shame there aren’t the vacancies in India. The plus side is the availability of cheap engineers for the rest of the world which is keeping costs and wages down so in places like Dubai wages are dropping for ex pats. How you view that I suppose will be based on where you work. Also on the plus side the Indians are better educated so when they move to the U.K. they will take a lot of the better paid vacancies ( probably on lower rates) but they will avoid the lower stuff like cleaners and carers which the Eastern European used to do.
So shortage of carers wages should go up. Too many engineers wages go down. Factory owner win. Shares go up.
Again not so good if you’re a U.K. based engineer.
Of course if we reach the Sunny uplands level then we will need all these engineers so that’s good.
Now back to capitalist verses my alleged left wing politics. China is growing dramatically and we can all see that even with the recent slow down it’s still booming .
Their economy is the second biggest in the world and as you say they have embraced capitalism. Sone of it with a steel glove still around its throat.
If privatisation is the way forward why are the top five energy companies still controlled by the state and why are the few independents which are allowed to operate still controlled by the state on their pricing? Is that embracing capitalism?
In addition China has a energy crises so they are building capacity and trying to improve their own coal production. The national coal production is being chased because they had a trade war with Australia over remarks made by the Australian PM. The Chinese stopped importing coal from China then eventually realised they didn’t have enough home production. To late to avert the crisis. They are in a mess. What are they doing? They are increasing state capacity urgently to stop them being reliant on the market for energy. Is that embracing capitalism?
What are we doing??
We have lost the protection of the EUs trade restrictions with the worlds cheaper countries but are quietly imposing our own along with secret state support of key manufacturing industries. That’s not free for all is it? So even this bunch of tossers realise to stop the exodus of firms they have to dish out cash. That is state intervention and handing hundreds of millions directly to shareholders. So much for free markets. The tories are claiming great trade deals but hey know full well it’s small farmers who will disappear so not a vote loser. They are out of sight. They aren’t too keen on a free for all with steel and cars. To many headlines.
Again I repeat capitalism is fine. But energy and key infrastructure needs ultimate state control. Whether that’s a majority shareholding or something other I don’t know. Hence the original question. .
| |||
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" You didn’t comment on our fudged unemployment figures? The due research comment is a bit rude.. if I’m doing a masters here I would of course produce evidence of my argument. As it’s a swingers site I’m not sure that’s appropriate!
Ok let’s start with taxes . In Sweden they have to work five weeks longer to reach their tax freedom day. (SE June 22- U.K. May 9th. 2016) you then add the fact they work at least three hours a week less than us that reduces the gap to one and a half weeks. Now add the recent tax increases in the U.K. and then gap may be nearly closed. To be be generous to you, let’s leave it at the older figure. So in effect for an seven/eight days earnings they get state support and society benefits that are far in excess of ours. If you take into account the very highest rates in Sweden then the gap for most is even smaller.
Tax isn’t just a simple rate as you well know. So ask a Swedish resident if they are happy with their tax and generally they are. Well my staff in Stockholm are and one is an American .
You can find hundred who aren’t yes I know.
You maybe need to travel on more U.K. trains to realise the difference.
The failure to re invest in energy production. As I said previously is the fault of both the companies as they know there is a lack of capacity by having to import energy and the chronic lack of planning by this and previous governments. Where is the plan? They both know the problem is getting worse. I’m not sure I believe the extreme scare stories on capacity but if they are half right we need to start building now.
With the population of China I expect they will have lots of issues with moving people, more people buying cars, population concentration etc. Not sure what your point is in regards to investment? Please tell me what our capitalist approach is doing to alleviate our own chronic under capacity? Do we have a list of new builds anywhere? Also what’s happened to the high speed train plans?? The freight capacity in the U.K. is virtually exhausted so the new lines would free up that urgently needed capacity. (Seeing as we’re not building roads) £5b a year and we still are forty years behind on high speed trains.
On the point of opening offices in Europe. I’m interested to know why you say it’s harder to open an office?
I think India losing its intellectual potential is a bad thing for India and it’s a shame there aren’t the vacancies in India. The plus side is the availability of cheap engineers for the rest of the world which is keeping costs and wages down so in places like Dubai wages are dropping for ex pats. How you view that I suppose will be based on where you work. Also on the plus side the Indians are better educated so when they move to the U.K. they will take a lot of the better paid vacancies ( probably on lower rates) but they will avoid the lower stuff like cleaners and carers which the Eastern European used to do.
So shortage of carers wages should go up. Too many engineers wages go down. Factory owner win. Shares go up.
Again not so good if you’re a U.K. based engineer.
Of course if we reach the Sunny uplands level then we will need all these engineers so that’s good.
Now back to capitalist verses my alleged left wing politics. China is growing dramatically and we can all see that even with the recent slow down it’s still booming .
Their economy is the second biggest in the world and as you say they have embraced capitalism. Sone of it with a steel glove still around its throat.
If privatisation is the way forward why are the top five energy companies still controlled by the state and why are the few independents which are allowed to operate still controlled by the state on their pricing? Is that embracing capitalism?
In addition China has a energy crises so they are building capacity and trying to improve their own coal production. The national coal production is being chased because they had a trade war with Australia over remarks made by the Australian PM. The Chinese stopped importing coal from China then eventually realised they didn’t have enough home production. To late to avert the crisis. They are in a mess. What are they doing? They are increasing state capacity urgently to stop them being reliant on the market for energy. Is that embracing capitalism?
What are we doing??
We have lost the protection of the EUs trade restrictions with the worlds cheaper countries but are quietly imposing our own along with secret state support of key manufacturing industries. That’s not free for all is it? So even this bunch of tossers realise to stop the exodus of firms they have to dish out cash. That is state intervention and handing hundreds of millions directly to shareholders. So much for free markets. The tories are claiming great trade deals but hey know full well it’s small farmers who will disappear so not a vote loser. They are out of sight. They aren’t too keen on a free for all with steel and cars. To many headlines.
Again I repeat capitalism is fine. But energy and key infrastructure needs ultimate state control. Whether that’s a majority shareholding or something other I don’t know. Hence the original question. .
"I thought I had answered the unemployment figures question. The problems with the way unemployment rate is calculated is not specific to UK. That's how most countries calculate it and most economists know it overlooks certain sections of the society. So Sweden also does it the same way. On Swedish taxes, I don't see how less working hours make a big difference. If I want to make more money and work longer, I still end up paying those high taxes. About recent tax increases in UK, it should be temporary to compensate for covid losses and should be reverted soon. If not, I will be out in the front rioting. If a government is spending money on a program that will give long term benefits, it can use debts/bonds to do it and hope that it collects more amount in tax in future to pay for it. On the other hand, things like covid expenses are temporary issues and money is spent purely to protect current generation. So current generation must pay it off. But it shouldn't stick forever. For every one American who is happy living in Sweden, I have seen plenty of Americans running back after living in Sweden and even France for a year or two. Most of the ones who prefer to stay in Sweden from America are the ones who already have achieved their financial goals. On railways, I have travelled around often. Even statistics tell the same: https://www.bcg.com/publications/2017/transportation-travel-tourism-2017-european-railway-performance-index UK does better than Norway. Sweden does a bit better than UK. UK is the best when it comes to safety. Switzerland is the best and they have a mix of public owned and private owned. The way forward for power generation is to build nuclear power plants. I haven't done enough research on where we are at building nuclear plants though. On China, my point was that China invested a lot on motorways compared to Europe in the last 40 years because they were way behind Europe. They built all that still suffer a lot from traffic problems. On high speed rail, isn't it a government project? About opening offices in Europe, one can open office. But the cost they need to pay in the form of taxes when they hire labour is high. Add to it, the fact that it's close to impossible to fire anyone even if they don't do any work at all, makes it a bad choice to set up offices there. Check out where most tech companies set up their offices. You will see a inverse correlation between taxation and number of tech companies. When Indian engineers are hired elsewhere in the world, they are not cheap anymore. An Indian working in UK or US is not getting lower salaries than someone else working in the same company and at the same level. It's only cheaper to outsource the work to an engineer living in India. But from that engineer's perspective, it's still good because low cost of living and taxes means he can live like a king in India. Seeing number of Indian techies relocating will make it look like India is losing all its talent. That's not the case though. India has way too many engineers graduating every year. The ones who relocate to other countries are only a fraction. There is even a joke that we tell ourselves - An Indian becomes an engineer first. Then he thinks about what to do with his life. India has a thriving startup culture and many MNCs hiring plenty of people there. Software engineering wages are still as high as ever. In fact it's getting higher. UK simply doesn't produce that many people interested in tech jobs. Same with US. The demand for software engineers is only rising year by year. Chinese situation is indeed a weird one. They have an oppressive government. They have a powerful body that chooses the president based on qualifications and track record in lower levels. All it takes is for corruption to seep into that body(I forgot its name) to take down the country. Though it hasn't happened yet, I expect it to happen anytime soon. As for their power sector, they are in a far worse situation compared to UK. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58733193 Investing alone is not going to be enough. You need to see results. I don't expect them to solve the energy crisis as quickly. I was on the fence with brexit. Brexit's outcome was always going to be about how the post brexit trade deals were set up. Though getting out if EU's protectionism is good for long term growth, the government has to be in good hands. I don't think the Tories did a particularly good job there. And the voters were cheated. While the advantage of brexit lies in getting out of protectionism, they sold the idea to voters that we will become more protectionist but only to British businesses. I would like to see someone with a better economic vision lead the country. I don't see a suitable candidate yet though. | |||
| Reply privately | Reply in forum | Reply +quote |
" You didn’t comment on our fudged unemployment figures? The due research comment is a bit rude.. if I’m doing a masters here I would of course produce evidence of my argument. As it’s a swingers site I’m not sure that’s appropriate!
Ok let’s start with taxes . In Sweden they have to work five weeks longer to reach their tax freedom day. (SE June 22- U.K. May 9th. 2016) you then add the fact they work at least three hours a week less than us that reduces the gap to one and a half weeks. Now add the recent tax increases in the U.K. and then gap may be nearly closed. To be be generous to you, let’s leave it at the older figure. So in effect for an seven/eight days earnings they get state support and society benefits that are far in excess of ours. If you take into account the very highest rates in Sweden then the gap for most is even smaller.
Tax isn’t just a simple rate as you well know. So ask a Swedish resident if they are happy with their tax and generally they are. Well my staff in Stockholm are and one is an American .
You can find hundred who aren’t yes I know.
You maybe need to travel on more U.K. trains to realise the difference.
The failure to re invest in energy production. As I said previously is the fault of both the companies as they know there is a lack of capacity by having to import energy and the chronic lack of planning by this and previous governments. Where is the plan? They both know the problem is getting worse. I’m not sure I believe the extreme scare stories on capacity but if they are half right we need to start building now.
With the population of China I expect they will have lots of issues with moving people, more people buying cars, population concentration etc. Not sure what your point is in regards to investment? Please tell me what our capitalist approach is doing to alleviate our own chronic under capacity? Do we have a list of new builds anywhere? Also what’s happened to the high speed train plans?? The freight capacity in the U.K. is virtually exhausted so the new lines would free up that urgently needed capacity. (Seeing as we’re not building roads) £5b a year and we still are forty years behind on high speed trains.
On the point of opening offices in Europe. I’m interested to know why you say it’s harder to open an office?
I think India losing its intellectual potential is a bad thing for India and it’s a shame there aren’t the vacancies in India. The plus side is the availability of cheap engineers for the rest of the world which is keeping costs and wages down so in places like Dubai wages are dropping for ex pats. How you view that I suppose will be based on where you work. Also on the plus side the Indians are better educated so when they move to the U.K. they will take a lot of the better paid vacancies ( probably on lower rates) but they will avoid the lower stuff like cleaners and carers which the Eastern European used to do.
So shortage of carers wages should go up. Too many engineers wages go down. Factory owner win. Shares go up.
Again not so good if you’re a U.K. based engineer.
Of course if we reach the Sunny uplands level then we will need all these engineers so that’s good.
Now back to capitalist verses my alleged left wing politics. China is growing dramatically and we can all see that even with the recent slow down it’s still booming .
Their economy is the second biggest in the world and as you say they have embraced capitalism. Sone of it with a steel glove still around its throat.
If privatisation is the way forward why are the top five energy companies still controlled by the state and why are the few independents which are allowed to operate still controlled by the state on their pricing? Is that embracing capitalism?
In addition China has a energy crises so they are building capacity and trying to improve their own coal production. The national coal production is being chased because they had a trade war with Australia over remarks made by the Australian PM. The Chinese stopped importing coal from China then eventually realised they didn’t have enough home production. To late to avert the crisis. They are in a mess. What are they doing? They are increasing state capacity urgently to stop them being reliant on the market for energy. Is that embracing capitalism?
What are we doing??
We have lost the protection of the EUs trade restrictions with the worlds cheaper countries but are quietly imposing our own along with secret state support of key manufacturing industries. That’s not free for all is it? So even this bunch of tossers realise to stop the exodus of firms they have to dish out cash. That is state intervention and handing hundreds of millions directly to shareholders. So much for free markets. The tories are claiming great trade deals but hey know full well it’s small farmers who will disappear so not a vote loser. They are out of sight. They aren’t too keen on a free for all with steel and cars. To many headlines.
Again I repeat capitalism is fine. But energy and key infrastructure needs ultimate state control. Whether that’s a majority shareholding or something other I don’t know. Hence the original question. .
I thought I had answered the unemployment figures question. The problems with the way unemployment rate is calculated is not specific to UK. That's how most countries calculate it and most economists know it overlooks certain sections of the society. So Sweden also does it the same way.
On Swedish taxes, I don't see how less working hours make a big difference. If I want to make more money and work longer, I still end up paying those high taxes. About recent tax increases in UK, it should be temporary to compensate for covid losses and should be reverted soon. If not, I will be out in the front rioting. If a government is spending money on a program that will give long term benefits, it can use debts/bonds to do it and hope that it collects more amount in tax in future to pay for it. On the other hand, things like covid expenses are temporary issues and money is spent purely to protect current generation. So current generation must pay it off. But it shouldn't stick forever.
For every one American who is happy living in Sweden, I have seen plenty of Americans running back after living in Sweden and even France for a year or two. Most of the ones who prefer to stay in Sweden from America are the ones who already have achieved their financial goals.
On railways, I have travelled around often. Even statistics tell the same:
https://www.bcg.com/publications/2017/transportation-travel-tourism-2017-european-railway-performance-index
UK does better than Norway. Sweden does a bit better than UK. UK is the best when it comes to safety. Switzerland is the best and they have a mix of public owned and private owned.
The way forward for power generation is to build nuclear power plants. I haven't done enough research on where we are at building nuclear plants though.
On China, my point was that China invested a lot on motorways compared to Europe in the last 40 years because they were way behind Europe. They built all that still suffer a lot from traffic problems. On high speed rail, isn't it a government project?
About opening offices in Europe, one can open office. But the cost they need to pay in the form of taxes when they hire labour is high. Add to it, the fact that it's close to impossible to fire anyone even if they don't do any work at all, makes it a bad choice to set up offices there. Check out where most tech companies set up their offices. You will see a inverse correlation between taxation and number of tech companies.
When Indian engineers are hired elsewhere in the world, they are not cheap anymore. An Indian working in UK or US is not getting lower salaries than someone else working in the same company and at the same level. It's only cheaper to outsource the work to an engineer living in India. But from that engineer's perspective, it's still good because low cost of living and taxes means he can live like a king in India.
Seeing number of Indian techies relocating will make it look like India is losing all its talent. That's not the case though. India has way too many engineers graduating every year. The ones who relocate to other countries are only a fraction. There is even a joke that we tell ourselves - An Indian becomes an engineer first. Then he thinks about what to do with his life. India has a thriving startup culture and many MNCs hiring plenty of people there.
Software engineering wages are still as high as ever. In fact it's getting higher. UK simply doesn't produce that many people interested in tech jobs. Same with US. The demand for software engineers is only rising year by year.
Chinese situation is indeed a weird one. They have an oppressive government. They have a powerful body that chooses the president based on qualifications and track record in lower levels. All it takes is for corruption to seep into that body(I forgot its name) to take down the country. Though it hasn't happened yet, I expect it to happen anytime soon. As for their power sector, they are in a far worse situation compared to UK.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58733193
Investing alone is not going to be enough. You need to see results. I don't expect them to solve the energy crisis as quickly.
I was on the fence with brexit. Brexit's outcome was always going to be about how the post brexit trade deals were set up. Though getting out if EU's protectionism is good for long term growth, the government has to be in good hands. I don't think the Tories did a particularly good job there. And the voters were cheated. While the advantage of brexit lies in getting out of protectionism, they sold the idea to voters that we will become more protectionist but only to British businesses. I would like to see someone with a better economic vision lead the country. I don't see a suitable candidate yet though.
"This is getting a bit boring for everyone else so I’ll try to answer without raising another argument. Unemployment calculations were set internationally in the 70s which as you can imagine didn’t involve much training or gig economy stats. Whilst the western world adopts those measures the OECD accuses the U.K. of sharp practice in our inputs, so if someone works one hour a week that is classed as a job. We have a lot of those types of job so our measure is skewered. If they are on universal credit they are not classed as unemployed, there are various reasons for this. An example is we put someone on a training course while they are looking for a job. Their benefit name changes so they are off the unemployed list. I don’t know how it works so can’t show the method. We basically stretch the rules more than others. ( both labour and Tory.) On Swedish taxes they work as many weeks as we do before the money they have left is their disposable income. Seeing as they are paid more, they have more money at the end of the day, even with a higher income tax rate. The national insurance rate is nearly half that of the U.K. so taken into account the tax rates are similar. Strange but true. Like I said headlines aren’t always the truth. I must accept and agree your point on the Americans as in reality 50% of Americans don’t believe in free healthcare so you are right most of them won’t like the tax. I still believe after using the Swedish and Norwegian trains that they are a much more pleasant experience so it depends if you want a scruffy dirty local train or a clean pleasant train really. Interestingly the Swedish government are replicating my idea of part deregulation. They believe this will benefit rail users but still retain some state control. So they think that will be an improvement on their already better service. Who knew I had a good idea? . So we both win on this argument to a certain extent.
I agree tech and labour is more attractive in low wage low regulation countries but they also low protection for employees such as Dubai or Singapore.
If a company wants to invest in Europe whilst employment law is a consideration it’s well down the list. You don’t build a business based on how easy it is to sack someone. Given that France has tough laws to get past before you can sack someone their economy is on a par with the U.K. so it’s hasn't held investment back has it?
As for cheaper engineers I tend to disagree with you from experience. The engineers may well earn similar wages as other countries ex pats but what they tend not to get is free housing, private education for the children or multiple flights home. By excluding those costs the Indian engineers are definitely cheaper.
The point in chinas history is irrelevant to the lack of investment in the U.K., we are not investing in roads that’s a sad fact. £40b paid in £24b spent.
China I agree with you does have an energy crisis partly self inflicted on the coal front but also they are desperately trying to keep up with their growth. The U.K. hasn’t grown at anywhere near the same rate and we are struggling even more if the predictions come true. I think nuclear is the only quick option. But not great long term. ( maybe clean coal) Shame we have to import our engineering skills for this by not investing years ago and keeping those skills in house.
On Brexit everyone on here knows I was and am totally against it. Personally it’s cost my businesses a fortune. Our economy isn’t dynamic or cheap laboured or structured enough for manufacturing, to allow free market forces. As a result it’s likely that subsidy along with protectionism is the only way open to us now. Subsidy is nationalisation by another name. Cheap imported food will just undermine home grown far more than the EU ever did as the EU members had similar standard rules,
Anyway it’s been fun and whilst I’m probably right of centre I think you may be right of right so let’s agree we have different viewpoints and come at this from different angles. I’m sure we’ve bored enough people to death on a swinging site for far to long now.
Hope the above is an acceptable end? I know we won’t agree on strategies but I’ve tried to be even with this post. | |||
| Reply privately | Reply in forum | Reply +quote |
| Reply privately | Reply in forum | Reply +quote |
" I thought I had answered the unemployment figures question. The problems with the way unemployment rate is calculated is not specific to UK. That's how most countries calculate it and most economists know it overlooks certain sections of the society. So Sweden also does it the same way. On Swedish taxes, I don't see how less working hours make a big difference. If I want to make more money and work longer, I still end up paying those high taxes. About recent tax increases in UK, it should be temporary to compensate for covid losses and should be reverted soon. If not, I will be out in the front rioting. If a government is spending money on a program that will give long term benefits, it can use debts/bonds to do it and hope that it collects more amount in tax in future to pay for it. On the other hand, things like covid expenses are temporary issues and money is spent purely to protect current generation. So current generation must pay it off. But it shouldn't stick forever. For every one American who is happy living in Sweden, I have seen plenty of Americans running back after living in Sweden and even France for a year or two. Most of the ones who prefer to stay in Sweden from America are the ones who already have achieved their financial goals. On railways, I have travelled around often. Even statistics tell the same: https://www.bcg.com/publications/2017/transportation-travel-tourism-2017-european-railway-performance-index UK does better than Norway. Sweden does a bit better than UK. UK is the best when it comes to safety. Switzerland is the best and they have a mix of public owned and private owned. The way forward for power generation is to build nuclear power plants. I haven't done enough research on where we are at building nuclear plants though. On China, my point was that China invested a lot on motorways compared to Europe in the last 40 years because they were way behind Europe. They built all that still suffer a lot from traffic problems. On high speed rail, isn't it a government project? About opening offices in Europe, one can open office. But the cost they need to pay in the form of taxes when they hire labour is high. Add to it, the fact that it's close to impossible to fire anyone even if they don't do any work at all, makes it a bad choice to set up offices there. Check out where most tech companies set up their offices. You will see a inverse correlation between taxation and number of tech companies. When Indian engineers are hired elsewhere in the world, they are not cheap anymore. An Indian working in UK or US is not getting lower salaries than someone else working in the same company and at the same level. It's only cheaper to outsource the work to an engineer living in India. But from that engineer's perspective, it's still good because low cost of living and taxes means he can live like a king in India. Seeing number of Indian techies relocating will make it look like India is losing all its talent. That's not the case though. India has way too many engineers graduating every year. The ones who relocate to other countries are only a fraction. There is even a joke that we tell ourselves - An Indian becomes an engineer first. Then he thinks about what to do with his life. India has a thriving startup culture and many MNCs hiring plenty of people there. Software engineering wages are still as high as ever. In fact it's getting higher. UK simply doesn't produce that many people interested in tech jobs. Same with US. The demand for software engineers is only rising year by year. Chinese situation is indeed a weird one. They have an oppressive government. They have a powerful body that chooses the president based on qualifications and track record in lower levels. All it takes is for corruption to seep into that body(I forgot its name) to take down the country. Though it hasn't happened yet, I expect it to happen anytime soon. As for their power sector, they are in a far worse situation compared to UK. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58733193 Investing alone is not going to be enough. You need to see results. I don't expect them to solve the energy crisis as quickly. I was on the fence with brexit. Brexit's outcome was always going to be about how the post brexit trade deals were set up. Though getting out if EU's protectionism is good for long term growth, the government has to be in good hands. I don't think the Tories did a particularly good job there. And the voters were cheated. While the advantage of brexit lies in getting out of protectionism, they sold the idea to voters that we will become more protectionist but only to British businesses. I would like to see someone with a better economic vision lead the country. I don't see a suitable candidate yet though. This is getting a bit boring for everyone else so I’ll try to answer without raising another argument. Unemployment calculations were set internationally in the 70s which as you can imagine didn’t involve much training or gig economy stats. Whilst the western world adopts those measures the OECD accuses the U.K. of sharp practice in our inputs, so if someone works one hour a week that is classed as a job. We have a lot of those types of job so our measure is skewered. If they are on universal credit they are not classed as unemployed, there are various reasons for this. An example is we put someone on a training course while they are looking for a job. Their benefit name changes so they are off the unemployed list. I don’t know how it works so can’t show the method. We basically stretch the rules more than others. ( both labour and Tory.) On Swedish taxes they work as many weeks as we do before the money they have left is their disposable income. Seeing as they are paid more, they have more money at the end of the day, even with a higher income tax rate. The national insurance rate is nearly half that of the U.K. so taken into account the tax rates are similar. Strange but true. Like I said headlines aren’t always the truth. I must accept and agree your point on the Americans as in reality 50% of Americans don’t believe in free healthcare so you are right most of them won’t like the tax. I still believe after using the Swedish and Norwegian trains that they are a much more pleasant experience so it depends if you want a scruffy dirty local train or a clean pleasant train really. Interestingly the Swedish government are replicating my idea of part deregulation. They believe this will benefit rail users but still retain some state control. So they think that will be an improvement on their already better service. Who knew I had a good idea? . So we both win on this argument to a certain extent.
I agree tech and labour is more attractive in low wage low regulation countries but they also low protection for employees such as Dubai or Singapore.
If a company wants to invest in Europe whilst employment law is a consideration it’s well down the list. You don’t build a business based on how easy it is to sack someone. Given that France has tough laws to get past before you can sack someone their economy is on a par with the U.K. so it’s hasn't held investment back has it?
As for cheaper engineers I tend to disagree with you from experience. The engineers may well earn similar wages as other countries ex pats but what they tend not to get is free housing, private education for the children or multiple flights home. By excluding those costs the Indian engineers are definitely cheaper.
The point in chinas history is irrelevant to the lack of investment in the U.K., we are not investing in roads that’s a sad fact. £40b paid in £24b spent.
China I agree with you does have an energy crisis partly self inflicted on the coal front but also they are desperately trying to keep up with their growth. The U.K. hasn’t grown at anywhere near the same rate and we are struggling even more if the predictions come true. I think nuclear is the only quick option. But not great long term. ( maybe clean coal) Shame we have to import our engineering skills for this by not investing years ago and keeping those skills in house.
On Brexit everyone on here knows I was and am totally against it. Personally it’s cost my businesses a fortune. Our economy isn’t dynamic or cheap laboured or structured enough for manufacturing, to allow free market forces. As a result it’s likely that subsidy along with protectionism is the only way open to us now. Subsidy is nationalisation by another name. Cheap imported food will just undermine home grown far more than the EU ever did as the EU members had similar standard rules,
Anyway it’s been fun and whilst I’m probably right of centre I think you may be right of right so let’s agree we have different viewpoints and come at this from different angles. I’m sure we’ve bored enough people to death on a swinging site for far to long now.
Hope the above is an acceptable end? I know we won’t agree on strategies but I’ve tried to be even with this post. "True. Let's agree to disagree. Just 2 points I can't accept. On building business based on high easy it is to sack someone, it depends a lot on how much you pay for the employee. Tech industries already pay a huge salary because of high demand. They can't afford to have a bunch of highly paid employees who are coasting through. So ability to sack is important for them when they hire employees on that salary. I believe I am right of center myself because I still believe healthcare and education should be run by government. There should be also public funded universities for skills which are in demand in the economy. Anyway, it was a great debate | |||
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" I thought I had answered the unemployment figures question. The problems with the way unemployment rate is calculated is not specific to UK. That's how most countries calculate it and most economists know it overlooks certain sections of the society. So Sweden also does it the same way. On Swedish taxes, I don't see how less working hours make a big difference. If I want to make more money and work longer, I still end up paying those high taxes. About recent tax increases in UK, it should be temporary to compensate for covid losses and should be reverted soon. If not, I will be out in the front rioting. If a government is spending money on a program that will give long term benefits, it can use debts/bonds to do it and hope that it collects more amount in tax in future to pay for it. On the other hand, things like covid expenses are temporary issues and money is spent purely to protect current generation. So current generation must pay it off. But it shouldn't stick forever. For every one American who is happy living in Sweden, I have seen plenty of Americans running back after living in Sweden and even France for a year or two. Most of the ones who prefer to stay in Sweden from America are the ones who already have achieved their financial goals. On railways, I have travelled around often. Even statistics tell the same: https://www.bcg.com/publications/2017/transportation-travel-tourism-2017-european-railway-performance-index UK does better than Norway. Sweden does a bit better than UK. UK is the best when it comes to safety. Switzerland is the best and they have a mix of public owned and private owned. The way forward for power generation is to build nuclear power plants. I haven't done enough research on where we are at building nuclear plants though. On China, my point was that China invested a lot on motorways compared to Europe in the last 40 years because they were way behind Europe. They built all that still suffer a lot from traffic problems. On high speed rail, isn't it a government project? About opening offices in Europe, one can open office. But the cost they need to pay in the form of taxes when they hire labour is high. Add to it, the fact that it's close to impossible to fire anyone even if they don't do any work at all, makes it a bad choice to set up offices there. Check out where most tech companies set up their offices. You will see a inverse correlation between taxation and number of tech companies. When Indian engineers are hired elsewhere in the world, they are not cheap anymore. An Indian working in UK or US is not getting lower salaries than someone else working in the same company and at the same level. It's only cheaper to outsource the work to an engineer living in India. But from that engineer's perspective, it's still good because low cost of living and taxes means he can live like a king in India. Seeing number of Indian techies relocating will make it look like India is losing all its talent. That's not the case though. India has way too many engineers graduating every year. The ones who relocate to other countries are only a fraction. There is even a joke that we tell ourselves - An Indian becomes an engineer first. Then he thinks about what to do with his life. India has a thriving startup culture and many MNCs hiring plenty of people there. Software engineering wages are still as high as ever. In fact it's getting higher. UK simply doesn't produce that many people interested in tech jobs. Same with US. The demand for software engineers is only rising year by year. Chinese situation is indeed a weird one. They have an oppressive government. They have a powerful body that chooses the president based on qualifications and track record in lower levels. All it takes is for corruption to seep into that body(I forgot its name) to take down the country. Though it hasn't happened yet, I expect it to happen anytime soon. As for their power sector, they are in a far worse situation compared to UK. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58733193 Investing alone is not going to be enough. You need to see results. I don't expect them to solve the energy crisis as quickly. I was on the fence with brexit. Brexit's outcome was always going to be about how the post brexit trade deals were set up. Though getting out if EU's protectionism is good for long term growth, the government has to be in good hands. I don't think the Tories did a particularly good job there. And the voters were cheated. While the advantage of brexit lies in getting out of protectionism, they sold the idea to voters that we will become more protectionist but only to British businesses. I would like to see someone with a better economic vision lead the country. I don't see a suitable candidate yet though. This is getting a bit boring for everyone else so I’ll try to answer without raising another argument. Unemployment calculations were set internationally in the 70s which as you can imagine didn’t involve much training or gig economy stats. Whilst the western world adopts those measures the OECD accuses the U.K. of sharp practice in our inputs, so if someone works one hour a week that is classed as a job. We have a lot of those types of job so our measure is skewered. If they are on universal credit they are not classed as unemployed, there are various reasons for this. An example is we put someone on a training course while they are looking for a job. Their benefit name changes so they are off the unemployed list. I don’t know how it works so can’t show the method. We basically stretch the rules more than others. ( both labour and Tory.) On Swedish taxes they work as many weeks as we do before the money they have left is their disposable income. Seeing as they are paid more, they have more money at the end of the day, even with a higher income tax rate. The national insurance rate is nearly half that of the U.K. so taken into account the tax rates are similar. Strange but true. Like I said headlines aren’t always the truth. I must accept and agree your point on the Americans as in reality 50% of Americans don’t believe in free healthcare so you are right most of them won’t like the tax. I still believe after using the Swedish and Norwegian trains that they are a much more pleasant experience so it depends if you want a scruffy dirty local train or a clean pleasant train really. Interestingly the Swedish government are replicating my idea of part deregulation. They believe this will benefit rail users but still retain some state control. So they think that will be an improvement on their already better service. Who knew I had a good idea? . So we both win on this argument to a certain extent.
I agree tech and labour is more attractive in low wage low regulation countries but they also low protection for employees such as Dubai or Singapore.
If a company wants to invest in Europe whilst employment law is a consideration it’s well down the list. You don’t build a business based on how easy it is to sack someone. Given that France has tough laws to get past before you can sack someone their economy is on a par with the U.K. so it’s hasn't held investment back has it?
As for cheaper engineers I tend to disagree with you from experience. The engineers may well earn similar wages as other countries ex pats but what they tend not to get is free housing, private education for the children or multiple flights home. By excluding those costs the Indian engineers are definitely cheaper.
The point in chinas history is irrelevant to the lack of investment in the U.K., we are not investing in roads that’s a sad fact. £40b paid in £24b spent.
China I agree with you does have an energy crisis partly self inflicted on the coal front but also they are desperately trying to keep up with their growth. The U.K. hasn’t grown at anywhere near the same rate and we are struggling even more if the predictions come true. I think nuclear is the only quick option. But not great long term. ( maybe clean coal) Shame we have to import our engineering skills for this by not investing years ago and keeping those skills in house.
On Brexit everyone on here knows I was and am totally against it. Personally it’s cost my businesses a fortune. Our economy isn’t dynamic or cheap laboured or structured enough for manufacturing, to allow free market forces. As a result it’s likely that subsidy along with protectionism is the only way open to us now. Subsidy is nationalisation by another name. Cheap imported food will just undermine home grown far more than the EU ever did as the EU members had similar standard rules,
Anyway it’s been fun and whilst I’m probably right of centre I think you may be right of right so let’s agree we have different viewpoints and come at this from different angles. I’m sure we’ve bored enough people to death on a swinging site for far to long now.
Hope the above is an acceptable end? I know we won’t agree on strategies but I’ve tried to be even with this post.
True. Let's agree to disagree. Just 2 points I can't accept.
On building business based on high easy it is to sack someone, it depends a lot on how much you pay for the employee. Tech industries already pay a huge salary because of high demand. They can't afford to have a bunch of highly paid employees who are coasting through. So ability to sack is important for them when they hire employees on that salary.
I believe I am right of center myself because I still believe healthcare and education should be run by government. There should be also public funded universities for skills which are in demand in the economy.
Anyway, it was a great debate "I’m not going to argue and I agree university should be free absolutely. I enjoyed it too. Thanks | |||
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