So, rather than lying a la Hammond or Fallon, or completely fucking up a la Abbott he chose to delay to try and get the figures right?!
Or, am I missing something?
I guess it's as the education/childcare policy was recently announced (today?) and he was tweeting about it before going on air.
As above, you'd think these politicians would know their numbers, if I went to a meeting at work & didn't know my numbers I'd equally be shot down.
But it seems he did have the numbers to hand, on an iPad, but it was deemed better radio to ridicule him of looking those numbers up. Maybe Jeremy isn't as fast using tech as the interviewer, so rather than letting him find the exact figures it was far better to show how clever the interviewer was. You can certainly blame Corbyn's aids for deciding that an iPad was the idea tool for him to use in a live interview, but I can't help but feel that the interviewer has put political bias or a simple desire to appear aggressive (as we saw above with Paxman) above actually useful broadcasting.
I'll add, that I'd like to think myself fairly tech savvy (I'm a software developer by trade), but I don't have a huge amount of experience with iPads. I've been handed one in the past with info I need on screen, pressed something accidentally and had absolutely no idea how to get back to the info I need. It would seem a poorly chosen tool to give to someone to use during a live interview.
So, rather than lying a la Hammond or Fallon, or completely fucking up a la Abbott he chose to delay to try and get the figures right?!
Or, am I missing something?
I guess it's as the education/childcare policy was recently announced (today?) and he was tweeting about it before going on air.
As above, you'd think these politicians would know their numbers, if I went to a meeting at work & didn't know my numbers I'd equally be shot down.
But it seems he did have the numbers to hand, on an iPad, but it was deemed better radio to ridicule him of looking those numbers up. Maybe Jeremy isn't as fast using tech as the interviewer, so rather than letting him find the exact figures it was far better to show how clever the interviewer was. You can certainly blame Corbyn's aids for deciding that an iPad was the idea tool for him to use in a live interview, but I can't help but feel that the interviewer has put political bias or a simple desire to appear aggressive (as we saw above with Paxman) above actually useful broadcasting.
I'll add, that I'd like to think myself fairly tech savvy (I'm a software developer by trade), but I don't have a huge amount of experience with iPads. I've been handed one in the past with info I need on screen, pressed something accidentally and had absolutely no idea how to get back to the info I need. It would seem a poorly chosen tool to give to someone to use during a live interview.
Probably, but he's the leader of the labour party fighting to run our country, he's attending an interview on the day his parties education/childcare policy was announced and that's why he was on the programme, is it too much to ask that he has numbers either in his head or directly to hand? How many did he need to remember?!
I'd have given any politician a hard time had they rocked up to discuss a policy and didn't know their numbers.
So, rather than lying a la Hammond or Fallon, or completely fucking up a la Abbott he chose to delay to try and get the figures right?!
Or, am I missing something?
Bloody Hell, the rose tinted spectacles are well and truly super glued in some cases.
Our potential Prime Minister went on a show to launch an educational policy, something that as I swing voter matters to me greatly, and didn't know how much it cost. Or, am I missing something?
In what way is he a hypocrite and May not? And in what way does her bench have quality?
On record that Corbyn has bullied his backbenchers into voting the way he instructs when his record as a backbencher voting against the whip is totally unbelievable. Screams hypocrisy to me.
His Home Secretary should he win will be Diane Abbott and chancellor John McDonnell. Both of whom are poor choices in my opinion. As for conservative front bench they are not any better.
With you all the way on Abbott but McDonnell seems at least OK.
McDonnell might look like someone's favourite uncle but he is an outright Trot. What's worse is that he now won't admit or let on exactly just how extreme his views are.
My problem with Corbyn is this: The manifesto is not hard left at all in a European context. But that is where he comes from. Him. Abbott and McDonnell. I've seen the hard left close -up, thank you very much and I detest them as much as I detest the hard right Tories. The hard left disguises its true intentions until it gains power. The hard left took control of the Labour party in the mid 80s and Liverpool is the place where you saw the result in practice. It took Neil Kinnock to root them out and John Smith to finish the job. "Hard" anything leads to authoritarianism, corruption and intimidation. It ought to have no place in British politics.
Of course there are many young people (on CL too) who have no idea what I am on about. But Corbyn is older than me. I remember him from those days. I don't believe for one minute he or McDonnell have changed. Abbott has the further disadvantage of being thick. That "change of hairstyle" comment was just crass.
Yet unfortunately, he will count my vote for Clive Efford as a vote for him. And if he keeps her majority down, we will be stuck with him and the entire Momentum crew (for which read Soshulist Workah) as the main opposition for five years. What a grim scenario.
I used to run with the Revolutionary Communist Group (about 35 years ago) so trust me when I say that Cobyn is not hard left. He is soft left it is just that our politics have moved so far to the right he appears hard left merely on the virtue of standing still.
Incidentally I am now quite sure that I was the only member of the RCG who was not an undercover officer. I am not sure membership ever got over 15 mind.
In what way is he a hypocrite and May not? And in what way does her bench have quality?
On record that Corbyn has bullied his backbenchers into voting the way he instructs when his record as a backbencher voting against the whip is totally unbelievable. Screams hypocrisy to me.
His Home Secretary should he win will be Diane Abbott and chancellor John McDonnell. Both of whom are poor choices in my opinion. As for conservative front bench they are not any better.
With you all the way on Abbott but McDonnell seems at least OK.
McDonnell might look like someone's favourite uncle but he is an outright Trot. What's worse is that he now won't admit or let on exactly just how extreme his views are.
I am a bit pissed so will no doubt regret this later but I like Lev Bronstein. Who else has been in a Stranglers song, got killed with an ice pick and had an affair with Frida Kahlo. We need mor of that kind of colour in British politics.
Yeah, probably not the best idea to out yourself as a Communist, even if no longer Revolutionary .
35 years ago I was also slim, had hair and didn't need glasses.
My wife recalls, many years ago, being asked out on a double date with her friend Eva (Swedish), by Corbyn and Livingstone - they refused because JC and KL weren't left wing enough!
Some of the bias on here is quite funny, Jeremy Corbyn's interview last night being described as assured?? He was terrible, he drowned in my opinion, he got blown away by the member of the public asking about the IRA, he couldn't answer the business owners question and concern properly just ranted on about poor people (again targeting the most vulnerable), then Paxman mauled him, although him cutting through him bugged me, he has to let people speak.
May was equally as shite and wobbly and it just goes to show how much of a farce this whole election is
Those who believe raising tax rates is more effective than increasing tax revenue from economic activity might want to look at the Sweden experience.
It has experienced the highest increase in the income inequality gap of any developed country. It has worsened by 40% over the last 30 years. Since the mid 2000s income inequality has worsened by 5% compared to the UK's income inequality narrowing by over 10%. These are not my figures, they are the World Bank figures. The Swedish effective tax rate has increased from 31% to over 36% over the same period, the equivalent UK figure is 31.4%.
Worse, Sweden has no wealth taxes no capital gains taxes and gives tax breaks to property owners, that's why all middle class Swedes have summer lodges.
So dramatic has been the change the OECD has tried to work out what's gone wrong. The views and conclusions are summarised below:
"In the bottom end of the income distribution, working-age benefits were cut or frozen following the economic crisis of the early 1990s. Decades of slow uprating led to a gradual decline of benefits relative to earnings."
"......a shift away from manufacturing, and higher, mostly non-labour, immigration, are behind more than 40% of the increase in the Gini coefficient [inequality measure] from 1987 to 2013 (Robling and Pareliussen, 2017)."
"One such trend is the increasing number of humanitarian and family reunion migrants, who have lower incomes than natives and less adequate housing. Furthermore, residential segregation leads to school segregation. With low skills compared to natives, partly as a result of lower education attainment, partly due to difficulties with language and culture, many struggle finding employment (OECD, 2015; Bussi and Pareliussen, 2015)." "Finally, housing market inefficiencies hit the least well-off. The difference in housing conditions between the rich and the poor is high in Sweden. Tightening the generous tax treatment of owner-occupied housing would increase affordability. Easing strict rental regulations while maintaining tenant protection against abuse would increase mobility for those who cannot afford to buy, incentivise rental housing supply and lead to better utilisation of the housing stock. Some prioritisation to municipal housing with well-designed allocation rules could help low-income households and limit residential segregation."
So high tax rates do not solve the problem of falling wages, pressure on welfare benefits, impact of migration on wages, lack of integration between native citizens and migrants and the resulting pressure on housing stock and housing subsidies. It seems that taxing income just creates a wealth inequality problem unless you also tax wealth much harder. Which manifesto, Labour or Tory is moving towards taxing wealth to plug the gap in public services funding?
So we may all be attracted to Corbyn's manifesto, and many will rally to the bugle calls anti the rich/corporates/bankers etc. but no party is ever going to tax or wish their way to the land of milk and honey. Unless and until the UK improves GDP per head and wages rise as a result, no one is going to benefit.
The median disposable income in the UK is around £26,000. No matter how much you tax the rich, the medan income will stay at £26,000, tax does not produce new money, contrary to what socialists think. This pre supposes UK workers will stick around in the UK to keep less than 10% of their earnings and even modest income earners only keep a small fraction. It also pre-supposes that workers act irrationally and work for high wages and lower disposable income, that businesses do not suffer from less productivity and GDP output is maintained. At some stage, taxation to increase state spending, become counter productive as it simply fails to generate desired revenue and leads to increased borrowings.
Corporation tax isn't a tax on wealth or rich corporates, it's a tax on workers, a cut in business investment, a reduction on tax revenue from dividends and a reduction in pension fund income. Whatever good the state does with what it gets its hands on is unlikely to make up for the bad it creates elsewhere. The sovereign fund idea works if you have a flow of new cash to fund new ideas, but a sovereign fund created from increasing taxes and purloining existing assets does not bode well unless you have great confidence in government to invest well.
It's cloud cuckoo land and the socialist Remainers so fearful of a leap in the dark with Brexit, have suddenly been given a new faith by Corbyn the prophet who by denouncing and destroying the forces of evil will gather followers and deliver them blindfolded to the righteous land of money trees where there is no strife or poverty and cash will be harvested from the fields of plenty to pay for all our public services.
Those Remainers who branded Brexit supporters idiots for voting for an economic recession and a negative effect on UK business, and are now voting for Corbyn, might want to stand up and share with us the cause of the unfortunate disruption of their brain wave patterns.
So, rather than lying a la Hammond or Fallon, or completely fucking up a la Abbott he chose to delay to try and get the figures right?!
Or, am I missing something?
Bloody Hell, the rose tinted spectacles are well and truly super glued in some cases.
Our potential Prime Minister went on a show to launch an educational policy, something that as I swing voter matters to me greatly, and didn't know how much it cost. Or, am I missing something?
Maybe I am biased, you could be quite correct. However, having seen the fall out after that blundering fool Abbott opened her mouth if, for some reason, he didn't know them at that precise moment and decided to pause to try to get the figures RIGHT then in my opinion that is responsible and not crime of the century.
I've met loads of people in my work that when I ask a question and I know they don't know the answer, just bullshit me and make stuff up on the spot. The ones that will say, "hold on, I'm not sure, let me find it" are far more trustworthy and I respect them more. It's more responsible.
But yeah, I'm guilty of rose tinted specs too I suppose, but that's equal for both sides I think now, this close to Polling Day.
So, rather than lying a la Hammond or Fallon, or completely fucking up a la Abbott he chose to delay to try and get the figures right?!
Or, am I missing something?
Bloody Hell, the rose tinted spectacles are well and truly super glued in some cases.
Our potential Prime Minister went on a show to launch an educational policy, something that as I swing voter matters to me greatly, and didn't know how much it cost. Or, am I missing something?
Lots of frothing Tories getting ever so excited this morning on social media, highlighting the fact Corbyn wasn't able to confirm the cost of his childcare manifesto pledge. Right up to the point you ask them whether free childcare is a good idea for working families and how much the Tory party manifesto sets aside for this.
So, rather than lying a la Hammond or Fallon, or completely fucking up a la Abbott he chose to delay to try and get the figures right?!
Or, am I missing something?
Bloody Hell, the rose tinted spectacles are well and truly super glued in some cases.
Our potential Prime Minister went on a show to launch an educational policy, something that as I swing voter matters to me greatly, and didn't know how much it cost. Or, am I missing something?
Maybe I am biased, you could be quite correct. However, having seen the fall out after that blundering fool Abbott opened her mouth if, for some reason, he didn't know them at that precise moment and decided to pause to try to get the figures RIGHT then in my opinion that is responsible and not crime of the century.
I've met loads of people in my work that when I ask a question and I know they don't know the answer, just bullshit me and make stuff up on the spot. The ones that will say, "hold on, I'm not sure, let me find it" are far more trustworthy and I respect them more. It's more responsible.
But yeah, I'm guilty of rose tinted specs too I suppose, but that's equal for both sides I think now, this close to Polling Day.
Sorry, I was unduly harsh. I caught up with 400 posts last night and this morning and the hypocrisy of some individuals got me a bit hot under the collar. Your post was the easiest for me to respond too.
Time for me to stop reading this thread for now.
I'll depart by saying that no matter the outcome, commentary and toing and froing, this general election is a battle of epic mediocrity.
You can get bet this will get more coverage than Amber Rudd representing the Tories in the leader's debate. Obviously he should have known the figures but better to be honest and say I'll have to check than to try and blag it, cough Dianna Abbott. God knows how many figures are swimming around politicians head's at this time.
So, rather than lying a la Hammond or Fallon, or completely fucking up a la Abbott he chose to delay to try and get the figures right?!
Or, am I missing something?
Bloody Hell, the rose tinted spectacles are well and truly super glued in some cases.
Our potential Prime Minister went on a show to launch an educational policy, something that as I swing voter matters to me greatly, and didn't know how much it cost. Or, am I missing something?
Maybe I am biased, you could be quite correct. However, having seen the fall out after that blundering fool Abbott opened her mouth if, for some reason, he didn't know them at that precise moment and decided to pause to try to get the figures RIGHT then in my opinion that is responsible and not crime of the century.
I've met loads of people in my work that when I ask a question and I know they don't know the answer, just bullshit me and make stuff up on the spot. The ones that will say, "hold on, I'm not sure, let me find it" are far more trustworthy and I respect them more. It's more responsible.
But yeah, I'm guilty of rose tinted specs too I suppose, but that's equal for both sides I think now, this close to Polling Day.
Sorry, I was unduly harsh. I caught up with 400 posts last night and this morning and the hypocrisy of some individuals got me a bit hot under the collar. Your post was the easiest for me to respond too.
Time for me to stop reading this thread for now.
I'll depart by saying that no matter the outcome, commentary and toing and froing, this general election is a battle of epic mediocrity.
Maybe the personalities are mediocre but Labour's manifesto is the most ambitious manifesto we have seen since Thatcher. The difference is no one ever complained about how much Thatcher's manifesto was going to cost (for example, the exorbitant amount paid in welfare due to whole industries being closed down and those workers subsequently being forced into long-term unemployment).
Those who believe raising tax rates is more effective than increasing tax revenue from economic activity might want to look at the Sweden experience.
It has experienced the highest increase in the income inequality gap of any developed country. It has worsened by 40% over the last 30 years. Since the mid 2000s income inequality has worsened by 5% compared to the UK's income inequality narrowing by over 10%. These are not my figures, they are the World Bank figures. The Swedish effective tax rate has increased from 31% to over 36% over the same period, the equivalent UK figure is 31.4%.
Worse, Sweden has no wealth taxes no capital gains taxes and gives tax breaks to property owners, that's why all middle class Swedes have summer lodges.
So dramatic has been the change the OECD has tried to work out what's gone wrong. The views and conclusions are summarised below:
"In the bottom end of the income distribution, working-age benefits were cut or frozen following the economic crisis of the early 1990s. Decades of slow uprating led to a gradual decline of benefits relative to earnings."
"......a shift away from manufacturing, and higher, mostly non-labour, immigration, are behind more than 40% of the increase in the Gini coefficient [inequality measure] from 1987 to 2013 (Robling and Pareliussen, 2017)."
"One such trend is the increasing number of humanitarian and family reunion migrants, who have lower incomes than natives and less adequate housing. Furthermore, residential segregation leads to school segregation. With low skills compared to natives, partly as a result of lower education attainment, partly due to difficulties with language and culture, many struggle finding employment (OECD, 2015; Bussi and Pareliussen, 2015)." "Finally, housing market inefficiencies hit the least well-off. The difference in housing conditions between the rich and the poor is high in Sweden. Tightening the generous tax treatment of owner-occupied housing would increase affordability. Easing strict rental regulations while maintaining tenant protection against abuse would increase mobility for those who cannot afford to buy, incentivise rental housing supply and lead to better utilisation of the housing stock. Some prioritisation to municipal housing with well-designed allocation rules could help low-income households and limit residential segregation."
So high tax rates do not solve the problem of falling wages, pressure on welfare benefits, impact of migration on wages, lack of integration between native citizens and migrants and the resulting pressure on housing stock and housing subsidies. It seems that taxing income just creates a wealth inequality problem unless you also tax wealth much harder. Which manifesto, Labour or Tory is moving towards taxing wealth to plug the gap in public services funding?
So we may all be attracted to Corbyn's manifesto, and many will rally to the bugle calls anti the rich/corporates/bankers etc. but no party is ever going to tax or wish their way to the land of milk and honey. Unless and until the UK improves GDP per head and wages rise as a result, no one is going to benefit.
The median disposable income in the UK is around £26,000. No matter how much you tax the rich, the medan income will stay at £26,000, tax does not produce new money, contrary to what socialists think. This pre supposes UK workers will stick around in the UK to keep less than 10% of their earnings and even modest income earners only keep a small fraction. It also pre-supposes that workers act irrationally and work for high wages and lower disposable income, that businesses do not suffer from less productivity and GDP output is maintained. At some stage, taxation to increase state spending, become counter productive as it simply fails to generate desired revenue and leads to increased borrowings.
Corporation tax isn't a tax on wealth or rich corporates, it's a tax on workers, a cut in business investment, a reduction on tax revenue from dividends and a reduction in pension fund income. Whatever good the state does with what it gets its hands on is unlikely to make up for the bad it creates elsewhere. The sovereign fund idea works if you have a flow of new cash to fund new ideas, but a sovereign fund created from increasing taxes and purloining existing assets does not bode well unless you have great confidence in government to invest well.
It's cloud cuckoo land and the socialist Remainers so fearful of a leap in the dark with Brexit, have suddenly been given a new faith by Corbyn the prophet who by denouncing and destroying the forces of evil will gather followers and deliver them blindfolded to the righteous land of money trees where there is no strife or poverty and cash will be harvested from the fields of plenty to pay for all our public services.
Those Remainers who branded Brexit supporters idiots for voting for an economic recession and a negative effect on UK business, and are now voting for Corbyn, might want to stand up and share with us the cause of the unfortunate disruption of their brain wave patterns.
Perhaps you could first share with us the cause of the disruption to your brain wave patterns over the course of the last year when you argued in favour of what most intelligent people around the world consider to be one of the dumbest ideas in the history of dumb ideas!
So, rather than lying a la Hammond or Fallon, or completely fucking up a la Abbott he chose to delay to try and get the figures right?!
Or, am I missing something?
Bloody Hell, the rose tinted spectacles are well and truly super glued in some cases.
Our potential Prime Minister went on a show to launch an educational policy, something that as I swing voter matters to me greatly, and didn't know how much it cost. Or, am I missing something?
Maybe I am biased, you could be quite correct. However, having seen the fall out after that blundering fool Abbott opened her mouth if, for some reason, he didn't know them at that precise moment and decided to pause to try to get the figures RIGHT then in my opinion that is responsible and not crime of the century.
I've met loads of people in my work that when I ask a question and I know they don't know the answer, just bullshit me and make stuff up on the spot. The ones that will say, "hold on, I'm not sure, let me find it" are far more trustworthy and I respect them more. It's more responsible.
But yeah, I'm guilty of rose tinted specs too I suppose, but that's equal for both sides I think now, this close to Polling Day.
JC should have known that figure, but imagine how much sleep he's getting at the moment. Obviously if you are a Labour politician you just cannot, cannot get the figures wrong.
Contrast Mrs May refusing to put a figure on the cap for social care and how that has been reported...
Some of the bias on here is quite funny, Jeremy Corbyn's interview last night being described as assured?? He was terrible, he drowned in my opinion, he got blown away by the member of the public asking about the IRA, he couldn't answer the business owners question and concern properly just ranted on about poor people (again targeting the most vulnerable), then Paxman mauled him, although him cutting through him bugged me, he has to let people speak.
May was equally as shite and wobbly and it just goes to show how much of a farce this whole election is
You can get bet this will get more coverage than Amber Rudd representing the Tories in the leader's debate. Obviously he should have known the figures but better to be honest and say I'll have to check than to try and blag it, cough Dianna Abbott. God knows how many figures are swimming around politicians head's at this time.
Lots to consider there as usual. I'll be fact checking a lot of your assertions with my Swedish mate. dont worry, he is far to the right of me, and is CEO of Haki, a scaffolding company. Nevertheless....
In the meantime, i am glad you brought up the issue of economic predictions of Remainers. I tried to explain ad nauseam that no sensible person with any economic background was predicting instant recession. My personal prediction was that we would see U.K. growth slowing to a rate lower than that in leading euro zone countries. ( wheats for most of last year it was outperforming most, as much touted by Bojo and co.
In that regard, what then are your comments about the Q1 GDP growth figures for,the U.K., and for the euro zone?
From what I can see of it he had the figures (on an ipad) but the interviewer seemed to see the chance of making a Paxman-type point out of him not immediately having them at his finger tips (on Womans Hour?).
It re-enforces my prejudice that you can't beat a good old 'analogue' bit of paper with the figures on (the interviewer had her notes on a piece of paper in her hand).
There seems to be an awful lot of forgetting or not knowing figures so far in this election.
Its certainly worrying whichever side of the fence you sit, they either don't know, won't say or just get them wrong. Having just watched the video of Corbyn during that interview he looked properly flustered tapping on his iPad and flicking the manifesto, think he knew he'd been rumbled.
I'll forgive him though, still can't bring myself to vote for him but I won't hold it against him.
There seems to be an awful lot of forgetting or not knowing figures so far in this election.
Its certainly worrying whichever side of the fence you sit, they either don't know, won't say or just get them wrong. Having just watched the video of Corbyn during that interview he looked properly flustered tapping on his iPad and flicking the manifesto, think he knew he'd been rumbled.
I'll forgive him though, still can't bring myself to vote for him but I won't hold it against him.
I think with labour it's a case of knowing that a lot of what they want to do means raising taxes and although they've broadly come out and said this, they haven't necessarily costed it. I think the Tories just assume because labour have historically been tagged as the party who are financially incompetent, they just don't have to.
Strong and stable as a slogan seems to be the default answer for everything.
I think so far this election on a whole has really highlighted how much loathing there are for politicians at the moment. If you take this forum as an example, I've read more posts of people who are turning their backs on both parties.
I know people always say they're sick of politics, but I sense this is greater now than any moment in my lifetime. The politicians are getting more detached as time goes on. Labour with their very generous public spending manifesto that may not work in practice and the Conservatives have just gone nuts on what they genuinely believe the British landscape to be.
I watched all the debates during the last US presidential elections and the previous one in 2012. I remember being in awe at how Obama, Hilary Clinton and Bernie Sanders were able to recall complex facts, figures and policy detail without recourse to notes or iPads.
From what I can see of it he had the figures (on an ipad) but the interviewer seemed to see the chance of making a Paxman-type point out of him not immediately having them at his finger tips (on Womans Hour?).
It re-enforces my prejudice that you can't beat a good old 'analogue' bit of paper with the figures on (the interviewer had her notes on a piece of paper in her hand).
I can see the headlines now: "Technophobe terrorist loving geography teacher beardy bloke doesn't even have an I-pad - so called election manifesto scribbled on the back of a fag packet in crayon... IF YOU VOTE FOR THIS BLOKE WOLVES WILL EAT YOUR CHILDREN!!!!!!"
Comments
I'll add, that I'd like to think myself fairly tech savvy (I'm a software developer by trade), but I don't have a huge amount of experience with iPads. I've been handed one in the past with info I need on screen, pressed something accidentally and had absolutely no idea how to get back to the info I need. It would seem a poorly chosen tool to give to someone to use during a live interview.
I'd have given any politician a hard time had they rocked up to discuss a policy and didn't know their numbers.
Our potential Prime Minister went on a show to launch an educational policy, something that as I swing voter matters to me greatly, and didn't know how much it cost. Or, am I missing something?
May was equally as shite and wobbly and it just goes to show how much of a farce this whole election is
It has experienced the highest increase in the income inequality gap of any developed country. It has worsened by 40% over the last 30 years. Since the mid 2000s income inequality has worsened by 5% compared to the UK's income inequality narrowing by over 10%. These are not my figures, they are the World Bank figures. The Swedish effective tax rate has increased from 31% to over 36% over the same period, the equivalent UK figure is 31.4%.
Worse, Sweden has no wealth taxes no capital gains taxes and gives tax breaks to property owners, that's why all middle class Swedes have summer lodges.
So dramatic has been the change the OECD has tried to work out what's gone wrong. The views and conclusions are summarised below:
"In the bottom end of the income distribution, working-age benefits were cut or frozen following the economic crisis of the early 1990s. Decades of slow uprating led to a gradual decline of benefits relative to earnings."
"......a shift away from manufacturing, and higher, mostly non-labour, immigration, are behind more than 40% of the increase in the Gini coefficient [inequality measure] from 1987 to 2013 (Robling and Pareliussen, 2017)."
"One such trend is the increasing number of humanitarian and family reunion migrants, who have lower incomes than natives and less adequate housing. Furthermore, residential segregation leads to school segregation. With low skills compared to natives, partly as a result of lower education attainment, partly due to difficulties with language and culture, many struggle finding employment (OECD, 2015; Bussi and Pareliussen, 2015)."
"Finally, housing market inefficiencies hit the least well-off. The difference in housing conditions between the rich and the poor is high in Sweden. Tightening the generous tax treatment of owner-occupied housing would increase affordability. Easing strict rental regulations while maintaining tenant protection against abuse would increase mobility for those who cannot afford to buy, incentivise rental housing supply and lead to better utilisation of the housing stock. Some prioritisation to municipal housing with well-designed allocation rules could help low-income households and limit residential segregation."
So high tax rates do not solve the problem of falling wages, pressure on welfare benefits, impact of migration on wages, lack of integration between native citizens and migrants and the resulting pressure on housing stock and housing subsidies. It seems that taxing income just creates a wealth inequality problem unless you also tax wealth much harder. Which manifesto, Labour or Tory is moving towards taxing wealth to plug the gap in public services funding?
So we may all be attracted to Corbyn's manifesto, and many will rally to the bugle calls anti the rich/corporates/bankers etc. but no party is ever going to tax or wish their way to the land of milk and honey. Unless and until the UK improves GDP per head and wages rise as a result, no one is going to benefit.
The median disposable income in the UK is around £26,000. No matter how much you tax the rich, the medan income will stay at £26,000, tax does not produce new money, contrary to what socialists think. This pre supposes UK workers will stick around in the UK to keep less than 10% of their earnings and even modest income earners only keep a small fraction. It also pre-supposes that workers act irrationally and work for high wages and lower disposable income, that businesses do not suffer from less productivity and GDP output is maintained. At some stage, taxation to increase state spending, become counter productive as it simply fails to generate desired revenue and leads to increased borrowings.
Corporation tax isn't a tax on wealth or rich corporates, it's a tax on workers, a cut in business investment, a reduction on tax revenue from dividends and a reduction in pension fund income. Whatever good the state does with what it gets its hands on is unlikely to make up for the bad it creates elsewhere. The sovereign fund idea works if you have a flow of new cash to fund new ideas, but a sovereign fund created from increasing taxes and purloining existing assets does not bode well unless you have great confidence in government to invest well.
It's cloud cuckoo land and the socialist Remainers so fearful of a leap in the dark with Brexit, have suddenly been given a new faith by Corbyn the prophet who by denouncing and destroying the forces of evil will gather followers and deliver them blindfolded to the righteous land of money trees where there is no strife or poverty and cash will be harvested from the fields of plenty to pay for all our public services.
Those Remainers who branded Brexit supporters idiots for voting for an economic recession and a negative effect on UK business, and are now voting for Corbyn, might want to stand up and share with us the cause of the unfortunate disruption of their brain wave patterns.
I've met loads of people in my work that when I ask a question and I know they don't know the answer, just bullshit me and make stuff up on the spot. The ones that will say, "hold on, I'm not sure, let me find it" are far more trustworthy and I respect them more. It's more responsible.
But yeah, I'm guilty of rose tinted specs too I suppose, but that's equal for both sides I think now, this close to Polling Day.
I thought may came across poorly
I didn't think that much of Corbyn.
And Paxman is a prick
Time for me to stop reading this thread for now.
I'll depart by saying that no matter the outcome, commentary and toing and froing, this general election is a battle of epic mediocrity.
Contrast Mrs May refusing to put a figure on the cap for social care and how that has been reported...
Lots to consider there as usual. I'll be fact checking a lot of your assertions with my Swedish mate. dont worry, he is far to the right of me, and is CEO of Haki, a scaffolding company. Nevertheless....
In the meantime, i am glad you brought up the issue of economic predictions of Remainers. I tried to explain ad nauseam that no sensible person with any economic background was predicting instant recession. My personal prediction was that we would see U.K. growth slowing to a rate lower than that in leading euro zone countries. ( wheats for most of last year it was outperforming most, as much touted by Bojo and co.
In that regard, what then are your comments about the Q1 GDP growth figures for,the U.K., and for the euro zone?
It re-enforces my prejudice that you can't beat a good old 'analogue' bit of paper with the figures on (the interviewer had her notes on a piece of paper in her hand).
I'll forgive him though, still can't bring myself to vote for him but I won't hold it against him.
Strong and stable as a slogan seems to be the default answer for everything.
I think so far this election on a whole has really highlighted how much loathing there are for politicians at the moment. If you take this forum as an example, I've read more posts of people who are turning their backs on both parties.
I know people always say they're sick of politics, but I sense this is greater now than any moment in my lifetime. The politicians are getting more detached as time goes on. Labour with their very generous public spending manifesto that may not work in practice and the Conservatives have just gone nuts on what they genuinely believe the British landscape to be.