New Prime Minister, New Government

Other than allowing the Bank of England control of interest rates, Labour has done me no favours at all.
I started my apprenticeship under Conservative government and for the years of subsequent Conservative government the company I work for continued to take on large numbers of apprentices and offer them jobs when the came out of their time. When Labour got in and since those numbers fell, the industry taking big hits in production and continues to get smaller. I was one of 60 apprentices in my year, subsequent years the numbers were around 30, now it is down to 2 or 3.
Labour have showered us with Stealth Tax after Stealth Tax. My father died 3 years ago, the Labour Government taking a share of his hard earned Estate in IHT. If Labour had increased IHT thresholds his Estate would not have been liable, another stealth tax. Personal tax allowances haven't increased as and when they should, further stealth taxes. OK Labour have given us other tax breaks and Child benefits, but I'm probably paying for them in stealth taxes anyway. NI contributions at one time had an upper limit, not so many years ago, I'm now paying over double in NI.
The company I work for has dwindled in size at the location I work. There were around 4,000 employees when I started this is now around 500 and to reduce to around 350 before the year is out. Thankfully the company has never forced redundancy in the 31 years I've worked there and alot longer still, voluntary redundancy, early retirement or transfer have always been on offer, but in the current climate there are fewer jobs to transfer into and the company don't want to invest in the 2 years necessary in retraining skilled workers for some jobs.
I'll be applying for another job next week, same company, different location. I have another 17.5yrs of working life left until I'm 65. I don't relish the thought of having to look for another job outside of the company if the worst should happen, but with the downsizing happening at work, we just don't know what the future holds.
There will be at least 60 of us applying for 4 jobs, jobs we should be capable of performing but not what we were originally trained for. All hoping we are making the right decision in moving on.
 
desantnik said:
GDP is not exports, GDP is the output of the country - ie its net monetary worth.

But here is the figure in a nice interactive graph for you to play with:

http://www.google.com/publicdata?ds=wb-wdi&met=ny_gdp_mktp_cd&idim=country:GBR&dl=en&hl=en&q=uk+gdp

For imports and exports, this is quite informative:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/feb/24/uk-trade-exports-imports

You might be surprised at both the types of things exported (in the nice graphic) and also who the top country is that we import from... and further more, looking down the list how disasterous it would be for the nutters at UKIP to suggest we leave the EU!!
Click to expand...

all our exports are down, and imports too...but we need to sell more abroad as thats money in to the country..the problem is that the chinese products are cheap, and in a world of value engineering then cheap is king.
 
Appologies for the necro-post but...

Capital Gains and VAT increased... hate to say I told you so, but I told you so :)

With that kinda clairvoyance I ought to get down the bookies and stick some money on some horses!
 
Did you rush out for a last-minute splurge, or are you now waiting until next January 3rd?
 
desantnik said:
Appologies for the necro-post but...

Capital Gains and VAT increased... hate to say I told you so, but I told you so :)

With that kinda clairvoyance I ought to get down the bookies and stick some money on some horses!
Click to expand...

But it isn't a surprise, everyone knows we spent too much without thinking so we have recoup it somehow.

I know it will be middle earners who foot the bill but that is how it has always been.

VAT increase is good to bring in extra revenue but a little hard on small business' with a poor cash flow.

I am self employed, Labour promised me in 1997 that they would enforce payment within 30 days to small companies and sole traders from their debtors, has this happened? has it eckerslike.

13 years of tax rises and and my pension is up the swanny. Even my dad said that he can't believe what a mess we were in and he has been a Labour voter all his life.

I am guilty myself of not saving enough but it doesn't help when our leaders of the last 13 years tell you not to worry, Britain is at the forefront of fiscal dominance.

Just think of all the crappy schemes all governments spend money on......... dome, wembley, saving bankrupt car manufacturers, bailing out banks, hunting bill policing, miners strike policing, Iraq, Scotland (just kidding) etc.....

I just hope that I still continue to have the urge to go and look for work and keep my family happy and healthy.

26 years self employed , never signed on, never claimed sick pay. Proud man.
 
tiler65 said:
Just think of all the crappy schemes all governments spend money on......... dome, wembley, saving bankrupt car manufacturers, bailing out banks, hunting bill policing, miners strike policing, Iraq, Scotland (just kidding) etc.....

26 years self employed , never signed on, never claimed sick pay. Proud man.
Click to expand...

Well done on the last comment, and a proud man you should be, but sometimes a proud man can ask for help.

The only thing i would like to say about the top part of the quoted comment is scotland and the schemes we pay for there, i have nothing against scotland and the scotish people, my wifes scottish and 2 of my 3 daughters are scottish but why is it that they can have free perscription and have in some areas a bigger strain on the NHS due to the drinking and the deep fried mars bars (well not mars bars at the moment because they have the cross of St George on so they are being boycotted) than most areas of the UK, We pay alot into Scotland but dont have a say in stopping this, either we all pay or we all get it free
 
i thought vat would get to 19% so 20 is a bit of a surprise, but not much else of a surprise (except that housing benefit is to be CAPPED at £400 a week...I mean...£400??????)
 
barneyrubble said:
No huge surprises though.
Click to expand...

No, none whatsoever. My point was that many poo-poo'ed the suggestion that these two things were the measures that were going to happen.

Everybody knew something had to give (to the tune of 75 billion in cuts and extra income) but these two things were flatly denied by many as likely.

Without overloading anyone on complex economics, surely you can see that if you accept that the VAT cut was neccessary and effective in keeping the economy afloat, how in simple terms do you imagine a VAT increase might effect things? You don't need to have graduated from the LSE to work that out surely?

photon said:
Did you rush out for a last-minute splurge, or are you now waiting until next January 3rd?
Click to expand...

As it happens :thumbs: but I'd not go as far as to say it was motivated by a VAT hike :D
 
The VAT decrease did not actually bring prices down, that is the crazy thing about it. 90% of sellers adjusted their prices with some bunkum about poor crops in the east etc to get out not losing their cash.

What actually stopped the economy working was the lack of loans/overdrafts/mortgages to small business', sole traders & first time buyers.

VAT does't increase until Jan 4 2011 but how many rises will we see prior to that by greedy conglomorates. Tesco are a prime example.
 
Last edited:
desantnik said:
Without overloading anyone on complex economics, surely you can see that if you accept that the VAT cut was neccessary and effective in keeping the economy afloat, how in simple terms do you imagine a VAT increase might effect things? You don't need to have graduated from the LSE to work that out surely?
Click to expand...

Please no complex economics tonight :D
It's far too late and I'm far too tired for it.

However, do you believe that the VAT cut was really effective in keeping the economy afloat?
Personally it had no impact whatsoever on my spending habits and in fact I'd be inclined to believe the opposite. I don't think that it stimulated spending to the extent that was intended and in fact was counter-productive in reducing government income.
 
SarahLee said:
Please no complex economics tonight :D
It's far too late and I'm far too tired for it.

However, do you believe that the VAT cut was really effective in keeping the economy afloat?
Personally it had no impact whatsoever on my spending habits and in fact I'd be inclined to believe the opposite. I don't think that it stimulated spending to the extent that was intended and in fact was counter-productive in reducing government income.
Click to expand...

It had no impact on my spending either and it will not when it goes up to 20% just have to save alittle more for that big lens but going to do it
 
Brown had a degree in economics, that didnt seem to help. Tiler is correct, it was the lack of money coming from banks that had the biggest impact on people..
 
matty said:
i thought vat would get to 19% so 20 is a bit of a surprise, but not much else of a surprise (except that housing benefit is to be CAPPED at £400 a week...I mean...£400??????)
Click to expand...

£400 a week, £1600 a month thats some rent/repayment for a house,and some people should get it but dont start me on that, i know people have spent alot of money on houses but its getting stupid, and i think alot of people are going to lose out if they go ahead with plans that you need a min 25% deposit for a home, there will be no first time buyers and the housing market will crash again.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top