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How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

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Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#281

Post by graemep »

Barrin92 wrote: post #64
ggm wrote: post #2

The best time to try and fix this is 20 or 30 years ago, but absent a time machine, the next best time is now. Either you feel this kind of construction process is national-strategic and you ignore the cost over imports, or not. If you don't regard this as a core competency which should be kept in the national register, then sure, buy the ships from other places. But, don't come whining when the national-strategic in…

>Right now, we're very far from Autarky and we're far too close to total dependency. The biggest problem with this thinking is that nationally mandated production is fundamentally unable to reduce dependency because national economic policy cannot increase aggregate output . That's to say when you politically prioritize to build ships the question always is what you aren't building instead, because all allocation con…

> The biggest problem with this thinking is that nationally mandated production is fundamentally unable to reduce dependency because national economic policy cannot increase aggregate output. That's to say when you politically prioritize to build ships the question always is what you aren't building instead, because all allocation consists of trade-offs.

The trade off is worth making. It gives you the ability to survive if things go wrong in return for being slightly worse off in the meantime.

> It's actually worrying me quite a bit that people seem to have completely forgotten what a comparative advantage is. Free trade is good because it gets you more stuff

It can also mean very little more stuff. Part of the problem with our current system is that we will import rather than produce because its very slightly cheaper.

It would be ridiculous for the UK to grow its own tea, however it would be perfectly reasonable for it to aim to produce more of its own basic foodstuffs.

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#282

Post by rswail »

HPsquared wrote: post #163
purple_turtle wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having nuclear weapons does not give you immunity to all threats. Quite recently we had a case of nuclear state being partially occupied by a state without nuclear weapons. And even in that case use of nuclear weapons would be unacceptable escalation and they used regular army to (mostly) kick them out and carry on with their earlier invasion on other parts of the front. (I am speaking about Kursk if anyone is confus…

People like to imagine a big obvious threat that you respond to in kind, but what about a gradual creeping encroachment aka salami tactics? Classic scene from "Yes, Prime Minister": https://youtu.be/yg-UqIIvang

Voted up just for the reference to Yes Prime Minister, one of the UK's best contributions to political education and entertainment.

On the other hand, there's Sir Humphrey's opinion on Trident.

"It's the nuclear deterrent Harrods would sell."

https://youtu.be/XyJh3qKjSMk?si=S8wpuTSnFsRUZGrf&t=87

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#283

Post by expedition32 »

They can build faster and cheaper in Asia. Something the Netherlands learned after they threw a lot of money at it trying to save the shipyard industry.

Just accept heavy industry is over and find new ways to make money. You will never out build Asians but you can out bullshit them and nobody bullshits better than the Dutch!

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#284

Post by rswail »

protocolture wrote: post #66
ggm wrote: post #2

The best time to try and fix this is 20 or 30 years ago, but absent a time machine, the next best time is now. Either you feel this kind of construction process is national-strategic and you ignore the cost over imports, or not. If you don't regard this as a core competency which should be kept in the national register, then sure, buy the ships from other places. But, don't come whining when the national-strategic in…

Australias Unofficial naval strategy is "bomb the shit out of scary boats with Growlers". Australias Official naval strategy is "We need more boats for reasons ( cough asylum seekers cough ), definitely not because it is politically expedient to keep boat builders employed"

Australia's naval strategy is to defend our sea lanes that we rely on for trade, primarily our trade with our largest customer, which is China.

Conveniently, they need what we have, and we want what they make.

On the other hand, the primary strategic threat is apparently also China.

https://youtu.be/sgspkxfkS4k?si=9n6fTPusYI9jcUhj

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#285

Post by energy123 »

barrkel wrote: post #252
hypeatei wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm of the opinion that things like shipbuilding don't really matter in times of war for countries with nuclear weapons. There would be dire consequences for anyone invading and/or blockading a nuclear armed country. A lot of people seem to yearn for the "good old days" where we built giant, tangible things that did cool stuff. That's fine, but the "national security" arguments ring hollow as you're basically saying…

Direct kinetic war between nuclear powers is pretty much unthinkable - mutual annihilation if either core territory is threatened. Instead, wars happen through proxies or direct attacks on non-nuclear powers, and then you need the ability to project power short of a nuclear response. Russia can't prevent aid to Ukraine with nuclear blackmail. The US can't defend Taiwan without ships - it can't use nuclear blackmail i…

Pursuing total defeat is unthinkable, bu pursuing limited gains with clear signalling is plausible, and it's happened a few times against nuclear powers, like Yom Kippur War.

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#286

Post by cassepipe »

pjc50 wrote: post #187
ggm wrote: post #2

The best time to try and fix this is 20 or 30 years ago, but absent a time machine, the next best time is now. Either you feel this kind of construction process is national-strategic and you ignore the cost over imports, or not. If you don't regard this as a core competency which should be kept in the national register, then sure, buy the ships from other places. But, don't come whining when the national-strategic in…

If you're going to talk about Edinburgh (I could almost see the Tasman ferry from my house), may I introduce you to: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_ferry_fiasco "Originally intended to come into service in 2018 and 2019 respectively, both ferries have been delayed by over five years, and costs have more than quadrupled to £460 million" The Scottish government tried to do what commentators here are saying is t…

I have no real opinion on this debate but wouldn't the person you are responding to say that the explosion of budget and lengthening of timeline is exactly because those capacities had been abandoned ?

But I agree it's a good question, how much inefficiency can you accept to revive a branch of industry, how long do you have to wait before you decide to throw the towel ?

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#287

Post by lm28469 »

inglor_cz wrote: post #238
lm28469 wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This sounds like a modern version of Golden Age nostalgia. When France built their nuclear programs, or railways, it was a massive investment, the people in charge when these decisions were taken were long gone by the time the projects were completed. It wasn't seen as a cost but as a national interest, now we're cutting everything down because everything is seen as a short term cost regardless of the long term ben…

In Europe, we are in the middle of a very expensive and long term decarbonization push, an order of magnitude (if not two) more expensive that what France did. In fact, it is so expensive that the question if we can even pull it off is still open. That does not seem to support your idea that "everything gets cut down over short term costs now". There is a massive amount of long term spending happening right now.

Oh sure we do spend, on foreign tech, foreign factories, &c. That's not what I call long term vision, if anything it's the opposite. Germany was Putin's bitch because of gas, now the whole EU will be China's bitch for panels and batteries, amazing!

FYI: China produces >70% of windmills blades, solar panels and lithium batteries

What I meant by vision is securing the long term independence of your country through home grown technologies, for example France got cheap/clean electricity and nukes from their program. What you're describing is just the continuity of the lack of vision we had since the 70s, we outsourced everything to Asia and kept "services", which aren't worth much when shit hits the fan.

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#288

Post by exasperaited »

Neil44 wrote: post #274
exasperaited wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except the post that you were replying to was not, was it? And you were talking in the present tense. If you think unions have no possible value in 2025 you are either independently wealthy, retired on an excellent pension, or very misinformed. Right now everyone should be considering whether there is a union for them, because what is coming down the pipe is not good.

Nobody here is talking about unions in 2025 except you, the whole post is about the decline of British shipbuilding which happened in the second half of the 1900's, along with a lot of other industry.

Sorry, this is just untrue.

You were responding to a comment that was only talking about contemporary issues, so at least someone was talking about contemporary issues:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45873952

So I responded, quite logically, as if you were talking about unions in a contemporary context. Not least because you replied in the present tense to a comment about the present.

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#289

Post by expedition32 »

jacquesm wrote: post #11
ggm wrote: post #2

The best time to try and fix this is 20 or 30 years ago, but absent a time machine, the next best time is now. Either you feel this kind of construction process is national-strategic and you ignore the cost over imports, or not. If you don't regard this as a core competency which should be kept in the national register, then sure, buy the ships from other places. But, don't come whining when the national-strategic in…

For a country that is an Island you'd think that the question of whether or not it is 'national-strategic' would have been answered in the affirmative.

It's a country that is also a capitalist economy. Ofcourse they can build cargo ships. But those ships will be ten times more expensive than anything you can buy from Korea.

Who is going to make up the difference?

Re: How the UK lost its shipbuilding industry

#290

Post by dist-epoch »

expedition32 wrote: post #283

They can build faster and cheaper in Asia. Something the Netherlands learned after they threw a lot of money at it trying to save the shipyard industry. Just accept heavy industry is over and find new ways to make money. You will never out build Asians but you can out bullshit them and nobody bullshits better than the Dutch!

The Chinese are moving up the chain.

If the Dutch thing they can make money just being a middle man they are in for a surprise.

Just like the telecom industry found out.

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