exiledwhite2

Floyd will win on points Hope Manny wins and he should give Floyd a lot of problems but it could be fairly comfortable for Floyd I want to pay but record it but you can only do this if bought on your remote which I can't do, box is too far from phone socket I am member of some boxing torrent sites where it will be available for free but I've got to go out to a wedding at about 11 so might not have time Annoying

Blimey, I had to close it down. So sad.

Tickled me that. Was a vibrant place 25 years ago, real shame what's happened.

No, it's not. It's balanced and fair. I'm not going to throw diamaterically opposed propaganda at you to make a point. Which is why I'd suggest you don't lap up the articles in the Guardian as gospel, either. I was simply proving that somebody 'with a little economic sense' or whatever you called it would not necessarily say that 'austerity' was a disaster. It's absolute nonsense to suggest that everyone with 'any sense' disagrees with it. FWIW I think Martin Wolf is perhaps Keynesian and might even be anti-austerity, but he's at least able to judge it objectively. Don't know how many times Whites Man has to say it. The theory (Gordon Brown always banged on about it) goes that you save when times are good, and spend when they're not. However Labour spent when times were good, we're now in a ton of debt and we can't afford to spend our way out of trouble.

He'll take a while to climb off the canvas after that one I should think

Spend when the economy is doing well, spend when it isn't! Literally unbelievable how many people believe this is sensible and sustainable.

Yeah except that Martin Wolf in today's FT doesn't wholly agree, amongst many more, and I suspect he has a basic grasp of economics. He instead takes an honest and balanced view. If you reading the Guardian without an accompanying huge pinch of salt then, well, you won't exactly be getting a fair and balanced representation of views. Why is a household budget a bad analogy for the economy? Very few analogies are perfect. Why is that one so wrong?

Don't believe it does, personally, but wouldn't let anyone try it on me I've seen people 'go under' and they've told me later they did it because they felt under so much pressure

Yeah and I agree. Got some in my family, mixture of bone idle / woe is me, and some genuinely borderline incapable due to their circumstances. But you say nobody is saying any different - there's folk advocating total abolition of dole, or for the jobless to be given no currency except a food parcel, in this thread. I was aiming it at them. They are advocating screwing a lot of people who are victims of circumstance who want to work, as the numbers I mentioned prove I think.

Just a bit of balance to some of the extreme views on the jobless. In 2005 the unemployment number was 1.4m or so, it was 2.6m in 2011. Jumped a million in a year post credit crunch. I'd say the hardcore long term unemployed are a problem, but those numbers do kind of lay waste to the idea that nearly every out of work person is simply idle. Many are simply at the mercy of the economy, we all are to some degree but the unskilled particularly are only ever an interest rate move or a corporate relocation away from a fair period out of work again.

Tesco bombed for numerous reasons of their own making, and price being driven down isn't one of them Large part of their 'loss' is adjusting the value of land they own etc too, it's not a genuine 'loss' in the true sense, it's taking a hit now so they can deliver in future Supermarkets could afford to pay more if they chose to. Whether they should is a different matter, I don't see why they should if they are getting the employees they need

Yeah it's exactly this. Smith has done well really considering he was an unimpressive British champ, seemed to be going nowhere. He's hung in and got his rewards. Even if they add up to, in reality, a few whoopings. He's no doubt made a few quid for his trouble. Ward is such a curious case isn't he.

Aye alreet. The first term of their tenure they stuck to Tory spending plans. And ran a surplus. And guess what, the economy still grew, pretty bloody healthily at that.

You'd be VERY surprised if you took a look at London rental prices, even for sharing in less salubrious areas. Eye watering to say the least.

Interesting stuff Latest poll below (by election forecast, published in FT) - Con / Lib Dem / DUP still a good eight short of what they need. Labour / SNP short too. Conservatives 281 -25 Labour 275 +17 SNP 43 +37 Liberal Democrats 26 -31 DUP 8 -1 Plaid Cymru 4 +1 SDLP 3 Ukip1 +1 Greens 1 Other 8 I too totally expected (and haven't ruled out yet) a late swing to the Tories but I think they've run a terrible campaign so far with transparent vote grabbing policies that people see straight through. These marginals are key - how on earth the Tories are looking like losing so many of them is baffling, they could swing back Tory though - hope this link works: http://elections.ft.com/uk/2015/projections/#marginals

What's the magic number Malcolm, 326? There's no realistic coalition there able to hit that number. What happens then? Especially with these fixed term parliaments.

You're splitting hairs now. There was a huge growth in receipts through the period of Labour. If we didn't save then, when should we save? How are we going to pay back this £1.4 tn? Tax and NI receipts : 1997-98 293.6 1998-99 313 1999-00 336.6 2000-01 358 2001-02 365.6 2002-03 372.6 2003-04 398.3 2004-05 426.5 2005-06 457.1 2006-07 487.8 2007-08 514.3

I'm genuinely unsure whether some people realise the Govt has to repay it's debts. I'd love the two lads in this thread who seem dead set against a surplus to explain how we will ever clear the £1.4tn or so that we owe. Or how it can be sensible to be spending more on debt interest than we spend on education, or defence (will be more than both combined soon if we're not careful).

Recessions are generally not planned for, though 2008 was of course quite sudden with the collapse of Lehman, but there were signals well before that. I haven't said anywhere that a government should run a permanent surplus. If they are doing that, they could reduce tax, and promote growth that way huh? Or as Gordon Brown himself said he would do, they could spend on a counter-cyclical basis i.e. save money in the good times, invest it in capital projects etc in the bad times. It can't be much simpler. If you spend to promote growth, then when that growth and additional revenue arrives you should pay off the debt from the spending. You can't just spend and borrow more forever, you do realise this don't you?

Governments should spend money to provide essential services. Not to play economic games with. And it is nonsensical to compare the ratio of debt in the post-recession 90s with the boom of the noughties. You're missing a very simple point here. In the good times you should pay down your debts. We didn't. So when the bad times hit and the tax take fell (Gordon Brown hadn't cured boom and bust after all) we found ourselves drowning in debt. Still are. If you don't secure your finances in the economic good times, when exactly do you?

Running a surplus will inevitably lead to a deficit? How will we ever pay off this £1.4 trillion or so debt then?!

It's what spending is against revenues that counts. It was higher, surprise surprise. Labour stuck to Tory spending plans in their first term and we ran a surplus. But they presided over an economic boom and still managed to run a deficit, by the end.

It nearly doubled for crying out loud, get a grip! You have no objectivity at all.

There is nothing to disagree on mucker, public spending went through the roof under labour and that's a fact. You can qualify it all you like but you can't deny it.

Look at this for an illustration. Eye watering to me. http://www.economicshelp.org/blog/5326/economics/government-spending/