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The strange case of Britain’s demise

economist.com

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Re: The strange case of Britain’s demise

#491

Post by 2143 »

RachelF wrote: post #131
bsnnkv wrote: post #10

I recently posted some of my feelings related to watching the UK post-2019 from the US as a Brit that left as part of the ongoing brain drain.[1] I received my Green Card since that post and I've booked my flights for a visit to the UK for early next year. Mostly I just want to share how sad reading this article made me feel this morning. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33682030

Yes, the UK has supplied competent people to the world via emmigration for a long time. One wonders if the average intelligence of the place is going down?

Just to be clear: competent people exist everywhere, in the USA, Canada, UK, New Zealand, India, Japan, China, Argentina, Korea, Luxembourg, Sweden, and everywhere else.

What matters is where these competent people want to go.

When people want to leave, that means there's something lacking at where they are currently.

My opinion is that every place must create an environment where their best brains want to stay there (without being forced to, of course!). The whole world could be better due to that.

Re: The strange case of Britain’s demise

#492

Post by 2143 »

asdadsdad wrote: post #339
astrange wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've mainly seen Canada be used to park people there who can't immigrate to the US because the system for that is too backed up. Being in the same timezone as SV is pretty helpful for collaboration.

I think that can be true, but from knowing many people that did take that route, I don't think that's a stable kind of immigration though. i.e. people who do that would rather be in the US but couldn't and are often just waiting around for the right opportunity to go back. Some stay forever, sure, but I think the two countries offer entirely different lives, specially for career-driven people.

> two countries offer entirely different lives

Curious about this. Could you please elaborate?

Like, the differences in lives of a software developer in, say Toronto and San Francisco (other than salary)?

Just curious.

Re: The strange case of Britain’s demise

#493

Post by mytailorisrich »

astrange wrote: post #490
mytailorisrich wrote: post #447

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, immigration has kept unskilled workers' wages low. That's why businesses have been keen and workers have had enough. That's not specific to the UK, and is the usual effect of large immigration.

Immigration doesn’t lower wages. Telling people this usually doesn’t convince them because they just want an excuse to complain about immigrants, but nevertheless it’s true. https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/why-immigration-doesnt-red... In particular Australia’s population is 1/3rd immigrants. Australia’s minimum and median wages are both significantly higher than the UK. Does that mean there are so many immigrants…

There's a very big assumption in your claim, which is that immigration is balanced among 'social classes', skills, jobs,etc. In that case, indeed overall demand grows along with overall supply. Australia has an immigration system aimed at achieving that.

Things do not work out so great if immigration isn't balanced.

In the UK there has been a huge influx of unskilled or low skilled workers from Eastern Europe that has put a big dampener on wages at the low end of the spectrum.

One of the reasons the UK has a productivity issue is that cheap labour.

Re: The strange case of Britain’s demise

#494

Post by Jochim »

iso1631 wrote: post #477
sph wrote: post #452

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm no fan of Corbyn but there was a politically motivated character assassination leading up to the election, where all major newspapers reported him and his party for anti-Semitism. The media all parroting lines fed by the Government with no critical analysis is complicit in Tories, and whoever wants to play the dirtiest, to remain in power and do whatever they want. The naive elector sees Corbyn pissing off the Je…

There's this view amongst Corbyn supporters that everyone would have voted for him if it wasn't for the evil newspapers. Setting aside that in 2019 under 15% of the country read a newspaper, it's a moot point. Part of the job of being leader of a political party, just like any business, is to handle public relations. Corbyn's team was awful at this. It's no good whining about it, you have to handle it. Personally his…

I don't want millionaires to pay for their own care. I want to tax them more than it'd cost them to pay for that care privately.

Millionaires paying for their own care is how you end up with a terrible, underfunded, and eventually privatised public care system.

Re: The strange case of Britain’s demise

#495

Post by cauch »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #456
cauch wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Judging what is "worse" is tricky. Of course, if the alternative is proposing policies that don't fit with your ideology, you are going to judge them badly ("how can they be good politicians, they haven't even understood what is obvious to me"). But it does not mean they are worse, it just means that they are not representative of your ideology. In a healthy democracy, the community should accept that there will be p…

Except pretty much everyone agrees, even within Labour, that Corbyn was unelectable... in part because his team and policies where squarely on the far left. A repeat of the Micheal Foot days in the 80s. So, yes, in the end people may have had issues with the sitting government but they concluded that they were the "least bad" option. A healthy democracy needs a credible opposition.

> Except pretty much everyone agrees, even within Labour, that Corbyn was unelectable... in part because his team and policies where squarely on the far left.

That does not make of him a bad politician (he can be, but you keep saying "he is a bad politician because I don't like his ideology and his ideology was not popular enough", which is NOT a criteria to decide if it's a bad politician or not). In a democracy, every ideology must be represented, even if they don't correspond to the majority and are therefore unelectable.

But again, that is not my point: Corbyn was shit, unelectable, whatever, ... And yet, the other party had bad politicians. Corbyn is not the one putting those politicians there. Corbyn supporters neither. Neither Corbyn or his supporters have any say in this, because they have a different ideology and therefore cannot build a good-politician party that defends an ideology they don't agree with.

The fact that the restaurant A serves expired food is not a good excuse for going to the restaurant B, eating slightly less expired food, pay your bill, leave without complaining about restaurant B, and conclude that the main reason is that restaurant A was bad. Restaurant A is bad, and we can, and should, complain about it, but when there is an article about restaurant B explaining that they are failing to serve correct food, you cannot bring in restaurant A as an excuse for the failure of restaurant B. The MAIN REASON restaurant B serves bad food is BECAUSE RESTAURANT B IS FAILING.

You may even be centre-left and chosen Tories for the first time just because you did not like Corbyn. But as soon as you vote Tories, the quality of the politicians in the Tory party is YOUR RESPONSIBILITY. If you vote for them, you are part of the process that reward their choice of bad politicians. (I use "you" as the "hypothetical you", not you in particular)

Also, your idea that what matter is the electability is really bad for democracy. Basically, it implies that minorities should never be represented.

> A healthy democracy needs a credible opposition.

If your definition of "credible opposition" is "an opposition that I would have maybe voted for", you are dead wrong.

In a healthy democracy, when you have two main parties, one in power, one in opposition, then, there is one party that you should think is okay, and one party that you should think is shit (it's more complicated than that, but it is to illustrate). If you like all the parties, it just means that you have just one ideology represented.

Re: The strange case of Britain’s demise

#496

Post by sparks1970 »

ashwagary wrote: post #446
version_five wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are two components though. One is the ability to choose the party, the other is the pressure on a party to adjust so that it appeals to enough voters to elect it. If a party doesn't need to adjust to get some votes, as in proportional representation, then we (potentially) end up with coalitions that live or die based on narrow issues, which is what the original post I replied to alluded to. On the other hand, i…

Put simply, "when most of the thieving stopped, the thriving stopped." Britain faltering is not "strange" and has little to do with political party, rather its ability to use violence to extract capital from productive outside entities and support its welfare state is nearing an end. The Economist has a long history of avoiding the elephant in the room because the people running it are hopelessly biased.

Who are these productive outside entities who's capital is being violently extracted and why is this system (whatever it is) coming to an end?

I'm genuinely interested but you don't support your assertion with any evidence.

Re: The strange case of Britain’s demise

#497

Post by 2143 »

pifm_guy wrote: post #219

Britain is in a post-empire downfall, and has been for 120 years. If you want to see where it leads, see Portugal which is 50 years further ahead on that path.

I've never been to Portugal, and don't know much about it.

Upon reading your comment, I casually looked up its economic stats and on first glance nothing jumped out at me.

So, what's wrong with Portugal?

Re: The strange case of Britain’s demise

#498

Post by mytailorisrich »

reallydontask wrote: post #470
mattlondon wrote: post #454

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The young like it because they don't have much skin in the game. "Tax the rich!" Is great when you are not rich, and most young people are not (yet) rich. Coming out of uni saddled with debt and doing entry level jobs etc, it is easy to just think selfishly and say "The rich should pay for more! Not me!" Eventually you run out of other people's money though.

> The young like it because they don't have much skin in the game. This is completely backwards, they have the MOST skin in the game. They are the ones that are going not going to have things we take/took for granted like: living and working in the EU or being able to enjoy a pension.

Well if you're pro-EU, Corbyn is also a poor choice...

Re: The strange case of Britain’s demise

#499

Post by Jochim »

ssabev wrote: post #485
halo wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you expand on “supply-side problems”, “economic reform” and “structural issues” without filtering it through euphemisms?

Supply side: * We do not have enough houses in economically productive areas - look at the OxCam arc, London. NIMBYs keep sapping every attempt at building more houses. * Terrible childcare - we have to pay about 1-2k per kid for childcare. Go figure out how to have children in a climate where it's cheaper for a parent not to work (if you're on the average income). * Healthcare - as a naturalised brit I will never un…

> * Healthcare - as a naturalised brit I will never understand the sacrosanct nature of the NHS. We plough a ton of money into something that is very equitable but is terrible for outcomes. Most folks who have money I know always tend to go private rather than dealing with a 6 month wait for a routine check up.

The deterioration of the service is intentional and fairly recent. A large part of that "ton of money" is funnelled straight into private hands thanks to the initiatives put in place by our criminal government.

"Right to choose": Public money funding private healthcare instead of being put towards expanding the capacity of the NHS in that area.

Private consultants: Paying a private company to poach NHS specialists who are then contracted back at a much higher rate.

Agency nurses: Paying nurses so poorly that they leave the profession, resulting in a staffing shortage. Then paying a private agency double to triple the wage of a staff nurse.

Private providers: Preventing the NHS from providing services under it's remit and instead handing public money over to private enterprises.

Re: The strange case of Britain’s demise

#500

Post by Jochim »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #139
mmarq wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Hardening eviction rules is economic suicide. No, it isn’t. The current state of affairs in England (even Scotland and Wales have different regulations) only causes misery and an immense waste of resources on housing. Or do you think Germans or Frenchmen spend 3 months a year doing house viewings? Nowhere in the civilised world you can evict a family that doesn’t have rent arrears and nowhere in the civilised world…

No-one evicts a good, rent paying tenant in England. Issue #1 is that the supply does not keep up with demand so rents keep going up. Issue #2 is that tenants don't know the law.

Knowing the law is useless when the law doesn't protect you.

As a student my landlord wanted to do electrical work that required me and my partner to vacate the property. The law states that he has a duty to provide alternative accommodation. We brought this up and the response was simply that we'd be evicted instead.

Fuck private landlords. They can go do actual work for a living instead of leeching off of society.

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