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How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

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Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#191

Post by exasperaited »

Neil44 wrote: post #174
KingTravis wrote: post #143

I've struggled to understand exactly why our productivity is so bad here and I feel that this really explains it quite well - over reliance in tried and tested methods coupled with a lack of capital investment - for example relying on push-carts in the yards rather than looking at whatever was a more automated approach. It's not necessarily a case of a "productivity puzzle" but rather a puzzle as to why business owne…

Ha, see what the unions have to say when you threaten the livelihoods of the poor downtrodden push card operatives, there will be placards and flaming braziers by the front gates before you can blink.

This frankly reads as somewhat sociopathic, not just anti-union.

In 2025 I admire anyone brave enough to take this position: are you independently wealthy?

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#192

Post by rusk »

jack_tripper wrote: post #119
rusk wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nukes are useless as anything other than a self destruct mechanism. A gunman pointing at your head with himself in the line of fire.

Nuclear submarines as in nuclear propulsion submarines. And nukes are useful because you never need to fire them.

That’s the point, and you’re in big trouble if that’s what you’re actually dependent upon is something you can’t use. Nukes are only for the other nukes. The bit of butter, so they say, Betty bought to make the bitter butter better.

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#193

Post by gpderetta »

jack_tripper wrote: post #120
XorNot wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not about starting a direct conflict, it's that blockading it can be done at a distance rather easily. If ships can't get to the UK, or the foreign shipyards reduced to rubble - or outbid - then it's more effective and cost efficient then any direct kinetic action.

Submarine fleets will torpedo your blockade. No need to fire nukes.

My understanding is that the UK currently has 5 attack submarines. Is that enough to break a blockade?

More are planned (the SSN-AUKUS), but it is probably still some time away.

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#194

Post by ReptileMan »

TLDR: Failed to innovate and adapt.

In a way it is story that repeats itself on a larger scale as a whole with the western world.

One of the things that annoys me is that the west lost the opportunity to continue to be world's manufacturing powerhouse in the 90s and early 00s. We should have invested in automation and efficiency to the point where developing countries even if using slave labor and no environmental regulations to still not be able to compete on price of end product. It is not as if there was not substantial technological advantage at the time.

If there was going to be a rust belt - well it is better if jobs were outright destroyed/obsoleted than moved to other countries.

China has "dark factories" - so little labor that they could turn the lights off. Absolutely no reason those couldn't be in US or UK if proper investments were made at the time.

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#195

Post by GOD_Over_Djinn »

gerdesj wrote: post #16
webdevver wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ive long held this take aswell. a lot of people point back at history, with the argument of "we did it before, we can do it now!" but whats to say it wasn't a transient? transients can last 1 year or 100 years, but in the latter case i think its 'hard' for us to believe that it was a fluke, because we view transients that last longer than a human lifespan with a bias of perceived permanence. how could the UK ever com…

[flagged]

Worst comment I’ve ever read on hn

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#196

Post by rusk »

throwaway290 wrote: post #151
rusk wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nukes are useless as anything other than a self destruct mechanism. A gunman pointing at your head with himself in the line of fire.

Tell that to Ukraine! Edit: it's not about throwing nukes at each other... It's about having nukes that you can use if someone invades you.

Russia aren’t going to use nukes on their own doorstep. That’s a a NATO problem. It’s like openly knifing somebody in public repeatedly while holding the would be hero’s at bay with a gun. Yes this is an actual thing that happened in the UK about 10 years ago.

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#197

Post by Sholmesy »

widdershins wrote: post #177
sefrost wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The economic situation in the UK has become bizarre. I would recommend interested HNers to read up on the State Pension Triple Lock; and the various income tax cliff edges as some key examples. With respect to the income tax, it is possible for higher earning (not by US standards) employees to receive a bonus and actually take home less money than before they received the bonus. The triple lock is a politically motiv…

> With respect to the income tax, it is possible for higher earning (not by US standards) employees to receive a bonus and actually take home less money than before they received the bonus. What are you referring to here? Higher rates of income tax are only taken on the money earned over the band. So If you earn £50,271, you pay 20% on £50,270 and 40% on £1. Are you referring to some other kind of tax then? https://w…

As well as the childcare benefit removal others have mentioned, you also begin losing your "tax free allowance".

The marginal tax rate for 100k -> 125k is 60% (due to losing the ~£12k tax free allowance)

  "Your personal allowance goes down by £1 for every £2 that your adjusted net income is above £100,000. This means your allowance is zero if your income is £125,140 or above."

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#198

Post by ReptileMan »

giorgioz wrote: post #172

Italy is barely mentioned in the whole article. Today Italy is the biggest shipbuilding manufacturer in Europe: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/countries-dominate-global-s... I feel the double standard of such articles quick in pointing out Italy being behind in many statistics (which it is and is fair to point it out). When it's Britain behind the whole article is written only from the point of view of the UK and a…

There are few ships ever built that don't sink when you ram them properly into rocks. I don't think that I have read a single article that faulted the shipbuilder for the disaster.

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#199

Post by Panzer04 »

coldtea wrote: post #132
eru wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why? Singapore is an island, too, and we don't need a national-strategic ship building industry. As long as your friends build ships, you are fine. The UK is friends with South Korea, for example.

> Singapore is an island, too, and we don't need a national-strategic ship building industry. That's because it exists on the benevolence and because of the benefits of it existing to several third parties. If/when that balance stops, they could turn it into a failed state in a forthnight. Being this careless by relying on "friends" (in global politics? lol) is ok for a small place like Singapore that can't do anythi…

This can go round and round forever.

It's not practical for most countries to have a viable industry in every so-called critical good across an economy. As another commenter noted, it's even less practical the more complex it gets because you need to be self-sufficient in the entire stack, not just parts of it.

What good is fuel refining without oil? What good is shipbuilding without mines and smelters? Without the ability to build massive shipboard diesels? Etc.

Moreover, it tends to make your real friends a bit nervous when you want to make yourself independent of them, because than you have less reason to defend them. It's not to say you should make your food production dependant on them, but when your sole reaosnt to figure out how to build ship engines is so you don't need to buy them from Germany (totally random, probably wrong example) it feels a bit off.

This is all ignoring the tremendous costs inherent in this sort of autarkic ideal. People enjoy the highest standards of living ever today thanks to global trade.

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#200

Post by roenxi »

lm28469 wrote: post #152
thorin wrote: post #138

Same reason it got out of every other industry. It wasn't short-term profitable. After the 70s at least everything began moving to the private sector and there was no strategic thinking. This completed in the 90s and there was no reason for anyone to think that semi-conductors, minerals, even oil and gas now shouldn't be bought from a friend rather than being produced internally.

It's almost as if Europe entirely gave up sometime in the 70s. People used to have vision for the next 50+ years, now they care about the next 3-5 years because they know they'll bounce to another position. That's why everything is seemingly slowly crumbling away (healthcare, industries, culture, education), we're putting bandaids here and there to maintain the illusion but I think everyone can tell the general trend

People have a very clear vision of 50 years in the future, it has been a major fight playing out for decades. One side wanted cheap energy and lots of industry, the other side wanted green energy and not much industry. That debate has been ongoing and everyone involved was pretty up-front about what the consequences would be.

The turn away from nuclear power around the turn of the century was probably the decisive moment. From then on it hasn't been possible to articulate a vision of a prosperous society with a realistic path to get there.

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