For The Devil

[doofaloofa]

would be interesting to see the numbers for the UK.

Well here is an annecdote from Ireland

A few years back we had a building boom...happy days

The economy was lousy with decent paid jobs. If a bloke didn't like his job/boss/view from the canteen window he could go down the road and get a better paid job with a nicer boss and a better view.

So desperate were we for workers that we had to import them from forn parts, yes here in Ireland importing navies

Yet during this whole time there was still 4% unemployment

Much of this 4% was blaggers working fox jobs and signing on, but still there were people who couldn't be arsed

[Cullion]

It's all well and good saying that private health care and mutuals can provide health care but what would be in place to protect the workers who paid in if these mutuals go bust? Like when firms who provided private pensions went bust and left many people who were due for retirement out of pocket.

Some questions for you to consider:-

i) How often did mutuals go bust historically?

ii) What protects people when the state goes bust ?

Ok so I now see that UK uncut aren't as honest as they seem and have their own agenda. But the coalition government are still cutting benifits to the most vulnerable members of society. Take for instance the budget for social services in London. The richest areas like kennisgton are having the smallest reduction in budget where's as some of the poorest and most troubled areas like hackney are having huge budget reductions, meaning less social workers doing more work and more vulnerable people suffering.

Why not tax the super rich that bit extra? They can afford it, would they really leave the country if they had to pay more tax? The coalition government want to make the poor poorer which just leads to more desperation and more crime .

Lots of super-rich people really would leave the country. Here's the thing that the left just don't get about extremely wealthy people and corporations -- They just don't have to be here. And you can't just carry on taking their money when they go overseas because our laws (including our tax laws) only apply within our borders.

We in the UK tested this theory pretty much to destruction in the 1970s.

I don't agree with everything the coalition are doing (especially not the subsidy that's still being given to the banks), but you have to pay attention to the fact that the cuts haven't even really started yet, we're still spending more each year than we did the year before. That should scare you.
Having said that,

[adskibullus]

Some questions for you to consider:-

i) How often did mutuals go bust historically?

ii) What protects people when the state goes bust ?



Lots of super-rich people really would leave the country. Here's the thing that the left just don't get about extremely wealthy people and corporations -- They just don't have to be here. And you can't just carry on taking their money when they go overseas because our laws (including our tax laws) only apply within our borders.

We in the UK tested this theory pretty much to destruction in the 1970s.

I don't agree with everything the coalition are doing (especially not the subsidy that's still being given to the banks), but you have to pay attention to the fact that the cuts haven't even really started yet, we're still spending more each year than we did the year before. That should scare you.
Having said that,

The 70's were long before my time. Is there any actual evidence to support the claim that the super rich would leave?

So how do we cut the deficit? Where is all the money being spent? Is the public sector really that bloated?

[Cullion]

The 70's were long before my time. Is there any actual evidence to support the claim that the super rich would leave?

Yes, they left in droves. By the end of the 1970s, after a term of Labour government, the country was begging the IMF for a bailout and there were constant strikes. Margaret Thatcher was elected in 1979 on the basis that most British people were sick and tired of watching the country being dragged into terminal decline by militant unions and money-losing nationalised industries that required constant subsidy to stay afloat.

So how do we cut the deficit? Where is all the money being spent? Is the public sector really that bloated?

i) Read the jobs pages of the Guardian. It's full of the kind of unproductive jobs I was talking about earlier.

ii) Compare number of days off sick taken in the public sector to the private sector.

iii) Look at the difference in pension costs between full-time, permanent public sector workers and everybody else. They're much more generous terms, and they're entirely funded by the taxpayer. This is getting to be a bigger deal as the baby-boomers retire.

Government spending in the UK accounts for about 50% of our economy. In 'communist' china, it's only about a quarter to a third of their economy.

That's not a typo. A bigger proportion of our economy is under political control than in China. That's what I call a bloated public sector.

[adskibullus]

Yes, they left in droves. By the end of the 1970s, after a term of Labour government, the country was begging the IMF for a bailout and there were constant strikes. Margaret Thatcher was elected in 1979 on the basis that most British people were sick and tired of watching the country being dragged into terminal decline by militant unions and money-losing nationalised industries that required constant subsidy to stay afloat.



i) Read the jobs pages of the Guardian. It's full of the kind of unproductive jobs I was talking about earlier.

ii) Compare number of days off sick taken in the public sector to the private sector.

iii) Look at the difference in pension costs between full-time, permanent public sector workers and everybody else. They're much more generous terms, and they're entirely funded by the taxpayer. This is getting to be a bigger deal as the baby-boomers

So there's a good chance that they would leave, this is bad.

What's your source for the number of days taken off ill by public sector workers? Also about pensions is it not fair to say that they have better pensions to counter that they earn less than they would working in the private sector.

I know teachers say that with their level of qualification they could earn more in the private sector but teach because its a vocation that they want instead of pure money earning.

Seems like alot of the lefties workin the public sector.

[judoka_uk]

It's all well and good saying that private health care and mutuals can provide health care but what would be in place to protect the workers who paid in if these mutuals go bust? Like when firms who provided private pensions went bust and left many people who were due for retirement out of pocket.

Well generally they competed on safety and quality, so people only paid their money into mutuals and friendly societies that were well run and safe.

Of course it is possible for them to go bust and now and again pension funds do go bust, but it's a relatively rare occurrence and as with any financial investment you have to accept that there is no such thing as risk free.

The greater issue is that if we keep on having the state pay for things there is a very real danger that the government will go bust. The tax base is too small and too mobile to support the size of government we already have, expand it and companies and rich people will leave.

Given that 30,000 people pay 11% of all income tax, it would only take a few thousand leaving to dramatically increase the amount of tax we would have to pay to make up for what they used to pay.

Ok so I now see that UK uncut aren't as honest as they seem and have their own agenda. But the coalition government are still cutting benifits to the most vulnerable members of society. Take for instance the budget for social services in London. The richest areas like kennisgton are having the smallest reduction in budget where's as some of the poorest and most troubled areas like hackney are having huge budget reductions, meaning less social workers doing more work and more vulnerable people suffering.

Does it not make sense that the richest part of London would spend very little on benefits and so would make the majority of cuts to it's overall budget in places other than benefits?

That's the reason Kensington's social services budget has small cuts and Hackney's has large cuts, because Kensington spends most of it's budget on things other than social services and Hackney spends most of it's budget on social services.

Why not tax the super rich that bit extra? They can afford it, would they really leave the country if they had to pay more tax?

Because making someone else bear the burden for unaffordable government spending is what has gotten us into this mess. The top 1% already pay 26% of all income tax and the top 0.1%, pay 11% of income tax. The richest already pay huge amounts of tax.

Tax people who are rich enough to move and whose ability to make money is mobile and they will leave. We don't have to get into abstract economics and discuss the Laffer curve, or even look at history, you simply have to look across the channel at France, right now.

The socialist government introduced a 75% tax rate for earnings over a million Euros and bam, France's richest man, Bernard Arnault, leaves the country.

Even those who are rich, but not super rich are leaving, actor Gérard Depardieu has quit the country for Belgium and put his multi million pound Paris home on sale.

People who are rich enough to leave will simply not sit there and be fleeced and given how significant the contribution of the rich is no country, especially not ours, can afford to hike up it's tax rates and then watch the people who pay the most tax walk away.

The coalition government want to make the poor poorer which just leads to more desperation and more crime .

Why on earth would they want to make the poor poorer what could they possibly have to gain by that?

[Cullion]

What's your source for the number of days taken off ill by public sector workers?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ukne...ve-a-year.html

This analysis goes deeper and tries to excuse the difference by saying that people in the private sector 'may not feel able to take time off when they are ill', as if that's a problem with the private sector workers.

http://fullfact.org/factchecks/publi...ck_leave-27245

The average number of days sick leave in the public sector is about 12 days a year.

Where I work (in the private sector) it's 3 days a year.

Also about pensions is it not fair to say that they have better pensions to counter that they earn less than they would working in the private sector.

No, it's not fair to say that. Public sector wages are now higher than the median private sector wage, and many public sector workers are doing jobs which wouldn't exist in the private sector because no customer who has a choice in the matter actually thinks what they do is useful (re-read the Guardian jobs page).

I know teachers say that with their level of qualification they could earn more in the private sector but teach because its a vocation that they want instead of pure money earning.

That's just delusion on their part. Partly because the average teacher is less academically well qualified (in terms of degree class, and prestige of institution) than you find in the best paid parts of the private sector, and partly because, as one might expect from people who've never left school, they're massively overestimating the value of paper credentials awarded by academics as compared to things like work ethic.

And if they don't care about money, why are they always threatening to go on strike in order to get more money ?

Seems like alot of the lefties working the public sector.

Hold that thought.

It's almost as if there's a mysterious connection between people deriving their income from public spending.. and those same people investing lots of time creating all kinds of tortuous and self-righteous political justifications for increased public spending...

It's kind of obvious, no ? You're being continually fed 'spin' about economic reality by big swathes of the professions that you rely on for much of your information: The BBC, the educational professions, and employees of large government departments.
It's not about the truth, it's about these people protecting their working conditions and pensions at your expense.

[adskibullus]

Although legally reducing the tax you pay is legal it's morally wrong. Of course the government need to cut the budget deficit but shouldn't they also be looking at ways of plugging these loop holes so that the system is more fair. Why cut public sector jobs when the private sector is struggling, this just adds to more unemployment and more people on JSA.

[Cullion]

Although legally reducing the tax you pay is legal it's morally wrong.

That's absurd. The government takes money by force and wastes massive amounts of it on simple incompetence and handing it out to special interest groups with good political contacts. Of course it isn't immoral to avoid being leeched on by such a system.

Of course the government need to cut the budget deficit but shouldn't they also be looking at ways of plugging these loop holes so that the system is more fair. Why cut public sector jobs when the private sector is struggling, this just adds to more unemployment and more people on JSA.

Because many of the public sector jobs aren't productive and the tax & debt burden required to sustain them is a big part of what is making the private sector struggle.

[adskibullus]

That's absurd. The government takes money by force and wastes massive amounts of it on simple incompetence and handing it out to special interest groups with good political contacts. Of course it isn't immoral to avoid being leeched on by such a system.



Because many of the public sector jobs aren't productive and the tax & debt burden required to sustain them is a big part of what is making the private sector struggle.

How do you define productive? The public sector provides a service it cannot be run on or be judged by its profits or losses. You can't put a price on the services the public sector provides.

Although I do realise the public sector does waste alot If money. I know somebody who's had a year off fully paid from their NHS job due to stress. Still why cut the public sector so hard when the private sector can't accommodate them. Surely it would have been better to make cuts slowly while focusing on boosting the economy by forcing banks to lend money to small businesses, and encourage entrepreneurial ideas.

How do we trim the fat from the public sector without harming front line services? Are we suggesting privatisation of the public sector? If we are will this have negative effects on the services given? Would you feel comfortable have a doctor basing your treatment on cost of an operation etc?