UK austerity has inflicted 'great misery' on citizens, UN says • Hacker News Board

Re: UK austerity has inflicted 'great misery' on citizens, UN says

#101

Post by grey-area » Sun, Nov 18, 2018, 7:11 PM UTC

raverbashing wrote: post #100

grey-area wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are no easy solutions here, but it's simplistic and wrong (morally and objectively) to claim that the people of Greece deserve the destitution imposed by the EU. I say this as a supporter of the EU project who thinks this was a very dangerous and counterproductive move for the EU. Did the cleaners at the finance ministry deserve to be fired because of arbitrary austerity? Does a grandmother in Athens who worked…

> to claim that the people of Greece deserve the destitution imposed by the EU Destitution was not "imposed" to them. While I agree there are issues with the Euro zone/lack of a fiscal union, the end problem is lack of money going in. That shows up as austerity in this case BUT would have shown up as devaluations/debt/inflation in other cases. Coming from a 3rd world country I can say I have experience in this unfort…

Destitution was not "imposed" to them

I'd contend it absolutely was, this is why I gave examples of measures imposed by the troika like firing cleaners.

Austerity is the wrong solution at the wrong time and is especially galling given the central bank's largesse to other sectors/countries at the same time.

They should have imposed a large haircut on creditors and given long term loans to Greece, instead they imposed drastic budget cuts (aka destitution for the people of Greece) and sold it as justice. It was unfair, cruel, and fundamentally wrong.

Re: UK austerity has inflicted 'great misery' on citizens, UN says

#102

Post by EliRivers » Sun, Nov 18, 2018, 7:25 PM UTC

repolfx wrote: post #85

EliRivers wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm so sick of receiving tax cuts I don't need and will literally never notice, alongside cuts to public services that some people really really need being cut, that the Tory party will never win my vote. Well, I say never; never is a long time, but as long as they keep trying to win my favour by cutting my taxes, they can get bent. I'm not some kind of Pavlovian econo-rational robot, and I object to them treating me…

Why don't you just donate the extra money you don't need to charity instead? There's no obligation to fund all social activities through tax. For instance if you don't need a few hundred pounds per year, why not buy a friend private health insurance.

Can I also have everyone else in the same boat as me also donate the money they don't need? My few hundred pounds is not going to go far. I don't want them to take just my few hundred pounds. I want them to take in hundreds of millions of extra pounds.

I don't want charities having to rescue people from defunded services that were defunded to give money to people who will never notice it; I want the government to come up with better policies than "let's just cut some more taxes for people who don't need it and won't even notice".

Re: UK austerity has inflicted 'great misery' on citizens, UN says

#103

Post by emmelaich » Sun, Nov 18, 2018, 11:42 PM UTC

RobertoG wrote: post #35

emmelaich wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, it's easy to avoid austerity by borrowing off the next generation.

I know that the 'borrowing off the next generation' is a popular sentence, but, does that means anything at all? Would you prefer to live in a country with a high public debt and industry, infrastructure and an educated population or in a dessert with zero public debt? What even means the 'public debt' number when a country have its own currency and inflation is under control? Nothing at all.

Many municipal councils in the USA have enormous debts due to generous pension schemes and inflated wages and salaries.

That's about the most direct example of 'borrowing off the next generation'

Someone has to pay the debts, and it mostly won't be those who benefited from it.

Re: UK austerity has inflicted 'great misery' on citizens, UN says

#104

Post by Devils_Avocado » Tue, Nov 20, 2018, 3:47 PM UTC

nopriorarrests wrote: post #23

Devils_Avocado wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The other choice was to let the Greek govt default on its debts; there're almost 300billion reasons why Germany & France didn't want to do that...

Nothing stops Greek government from defaulting. Just miss your next coupon payment, and viola. But once you default, you have to balance your budget, because nobody will lend to you, and until 2017 Greece were running a deficit. Default would cause even more pain than so much hated austerity.

Nope. They already tried that, the troika rushed in to stop even the suggestion of that being a possibility.

Re: UK austerity has inflicted 'great misery' on citizens, UN says

#105

Post by repolfx » Sun, Nov 25, 2018, 6:54 PM UTC

EliRivers wrote: post #102

repolfx wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why don't you just donate the extra money you don't need to charity instead? There's no obligation to fund all social activities through tax. For instance if you don't need a few hundred pounds per year, why not buy a friend private health insurance.

Can I also have everyone else in the same boat as me also donate the money they don't need? My few hundred pounds is not going to go far. I don't want them to take just my few hundred pounds. I want them to take in hundreds of millions of extra pounds. I don't want charities having to rescue people from defunded services that were defunded to give money to people who will never notice it; I want the government to com…

You may feel you don't need tax cuts or won't notice, but don't speak for everyone. You're really just taking the standard position of "I wish the government would take other people's money but I'll phrase it in an odd way, so I can feel virtuous".

The Inland Revenue does accept overpayments. You could give yourself a tax rise and be the change you wish to see in the world. If you don't then it seems like you're not being entirely straight-laced.