Donate to Remove ads

Got a credit card? use our Credit Card & Finance Calculators

Thanks to johnstevens77,Bhoddhisatva,scotia,Anonymous,Cornytiv34, for Donating to support the site

Our societie's situation.

including Budgets
scotview
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 1480
Joined: November 5th, 2016, 9:00 am
Has thanked: 602 times
Been thanked: 911 times

Our societie's situation.

#350211

Postby scotview » October 24th, 2020, 12:27 am

Currently the State is providing more and more support for our Society. This evening I've seen the Marcus Rashford kids food initiative overwhelmingly presented and supported by the media.

Just to put some perspective on where our society is now, notwithstanding the Covid effect , the following is a precis of my childhood upbringing.

I was brought up in the North of Scotland about 50 years ago.

My father was a mechanical fitter, whose job was to build large, stationary, industrial air compressors. Whilst , at that time, his job was not considered particularly specialised, in todays' work environment he would probably be considered as exceptionally skilled.

My mother never worked, but we went home from school at mid day to a home cooked dinner. We came home after school to an equally substantial freshly cooked supper.

We were in the same boat the rest of our contemporaries and were quite poor in comparison to today's society.

We had no central heating BUT did have an open fire with a back boiler which heated our hot water cylinder (quite eco friendly when you think about it).

We didnt have a car until my dad could pay for it, he was 50 years old when he bought it.

Only a few families depended on support, the "dole" as we knew it. This was mainly provided to a VERY few incapacitaded folkes or, for example, to fishermen who couldnt venture out to the wild North Sea because of winter storms.

Do you think that we can continue to have the State provide so much support or will our society have to start providing for itself.

I'm not sure what the answer is........BUT we are NOT, as self sufficient a society as we once were. WE are NOT in a good place.

Observations most welcome.

Lootman
The full Lemon
Posts: 18678
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 3:58 pm
Has thanked: 628 times
Been thanked: 6561 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350212

Postby Lootman » October 24th, 2020, 12:54 am

scotview wrote:Only a few families depended on support, the "dole" as we knew it. This was mainly provided to a VERY few incapacitated folks or, for example, to fishermen who couldnt venture out to the wild North Sea because of winter storms.

Do you think that we can continue to have the State provide so much support or will our society have to start providing for itself.

You are correct in that what was intended as a safety net for the few has turned into an entitlement crutch for the many.

Since you mentioned Scotland I read somewhere recently that more than 50% of people in Scotland rely on the government for at least some of their income. That is truly stunning since it means a majority expect others to subsidise them. The entitlement culture is with us.

And i wonder how many of those kids who Rashford is lamenting about have a parent who in receipt of welfare handouts designed to pay for their food, and yet that same parent spends on alcohol, tobacco or gambling, and has an iPhone or Sky Sports package, and maybe at least one annual trip to Spain?

Thatcher stopped the worst excesses of this, but we need a leader with a spine to smack these parasites down. Where is he or she?

Dod101
The full Lemon
Posts: 16629
Joined: October 10th, 2017, 11:33 am
Has thanked: 4343 times
Been thanked: 7534 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350213

Postby Dod101 » October 24th, 2020, 1:03 am

My dear friend
What you describe is not far removed from own upbringing a bit further south in Dundee. My father though came from the far north; in fact his father was born on Stroma and he in Fair Isle.

In the days you are describing we were all more or less self sufficient. Today is different and not wrong just different. Society has changed so much that it would be unrecognisable to those living 50 years ago. That is life.

Dod

Dod101
The full Lemon
Posts: 16629
Joined: October 10th, 2017, 11:33 am
Has thanked: 4343 times
Been thanked: 7534 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350215

Postby Dod101 » October 24th, 2020, 1:09 am

Hi Lootman
You are not wrong; you seldom are, but the 50% who are working are mostly working for the public sector, the NHS most likely. ('Mostly' means more than 50%) It really is quite shocking, the divide East/West. Edinburgh owing to its financial sector has a very wealthy class, but much of the rest of the country is very poor by any measure.

Dod

johnhemming
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 3858
Joined: November 8th, 2016, 7:13 pm
Has thanked: 9 times
Been thanked: 609 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350221

Postby johnhemming » October 24th, 2020, 7:29 am

Lootman wrote:Since you mentioned Scotland I read somewhere recently that more than 50% of people in Scotland rely on the government for at least some of their income.

Police officers are employees of the state.

johnhemming
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 3858
Joined: November 8th, 2016, 7:13 pm
Has thanked: 9 times
Been thanked: 609 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350235

Postby johnhemming » October 24th, 2020, 8:58 am

As more things get automated one would expect the incomes of people working earning smaller sums to be increased by the state. I don't see any practical alternative. This has been happening in the UK for decades.

In part one of the arguments about low productivity is that we have a lot of low paid jobs. Sadly, however, the alternative is not to have the low paid jobs and for people to either work in an Italian style black economy or be out of work.

Hence all the wittering on about productivity comparisons does not really address the underlying issue which is about technological change and how to have a society where everyone can participate on a reasonable basis.

JohnB
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 2497
Joined: January 15th, 2017, 9:20 am
Has thanked: 677 times
Been thanked: 997 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350259

Postby JohnB » October 24th, 2020, 11:19 am

The economy thinks that Marcus Rashford's unique skills are work £200k a week, and he campaigns about £15/week school meal vouchers. He has raised £20m for his food charity, which is twice his annual wage. He does a lot more than me in both absolute and relative terms. He's a good guy doing the wrong thing.

I think its inevitable that in a global automated society special talents will be rewarded, and those without in demand skills won't. So you need to think of a wealth redistribution system, and I think that's done most fairly with a government taxation and spending system. The alternative, philanthropy or having ecosystems based round serving the whims of the rich, does not appeal to me, as the money is spent on gimmicks, not where serious studies suggest it has the most impact.

If you think poor children need more money, increase Universal Credit, not create a complicated scheme of free school meals. It would remove the overheads of running the scheme, and the stigma of visibly getting handouts at school. Telling the poor how to run their lives is inefficient and demeaning.

scrumpyjack
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 4812
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 10:15 am
Has thanked: 605 times
Been thanked: 2675 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350261

Postby scrumpyjack » October 24th, 2020, 11:28 am

The trouble with most of these charities is that they are incredibly wasteful and inefficient. The proportion of the money they raise that goes in delivering their charitable purpose is often miniscule.

Another charity set up by a footballer is the Willow Trust and it is supported by many of the great and good. Its purpose is to give disabled or underprivileged children special days out. All sounds wonderful, but if you look at the accounts 2/3rds of the money raised goes in the costs of raising it and that is before you get to the admin and overhead costs of the charity.

So whilst we may complain about government waste, the state is probably better at delivering many of these worthy causes than the charity sector is!

JohnB
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 2497
Joined: January 15th, 2017, 9:20 am
Has thanked: 677 times
Been thanked: 997 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350264

Postby JohnB » October 24th, 2020, 11:36 am

For the really poor in Africa, its often argued you should just give them* money

Just Give Money to the Poor
The Development Revolution from
the Global South
Armando Barrientos and David Hulme
Brooks World Poverty Institute
University of Manchester, U.K.


https://www.oecd.org/dev/pgd/46240619.pdf

* More benefits accrue to children if you give money to the mothers

scrumpyjack
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 4812
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 10:15 am
Has thanked: 605 times
Been thanked: 2675 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350266

Postby scrumpyjack » October 24th, 2020, 11:43 am

Dod101 wrote:Hi Lootman
You are not wrong; you seldom are, but the 50% who are working are mostly working for the public sector, the NHS most likely. ('Mostly' means more than 50%) It really is quite shocking, the divide East/West. Edinburgh owing to its financial sector has a very wealthy class, but much of the rest of the country is very poor by any measure.

Dod


and I wonder how much of that financial sector and its wealth would move south come independence? For firms like Standard Life most of their customers are south of the border anyway.

GoSeigen
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 4349
Joined: November 8th, 2016, 11:14 pm
Has thanked: 1590 times
Been thanked: 1579 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350273

Postby GoSeigen » October 24th, 2020, 12:00 pm

Dod101 wrote:Hi Lootman
You are not wrong; you seldom are, but the 50% who are working are mostly working for the public sector, the NHS most likely. ('Mostly' means more than 50%) It really is quite shocking, the divide East/West. Edinburgh owing to its financial sector has a very wealthy class, but much of the rest of the country is very poor by any measure.

Dod


Very curious, how on earth did you judge this not to be wrong:

Since you mentioned Scotland I read somewhere recently that more than 50% of people in Scotland rely on the government for at least some of their income. That is truly stunning since it means a majority expect others to subsidise them. The entitlement culture is with us.


AFAICS that is something plucked from someone's memory, vaguely expressed, which could mean practically anything. Then a "stunning" conclusion is jumped to, before finally a little abusive dig at some sh/tty people to make us feel better about our awesome selves.

Is it appropriate to fawn quite so much over this stuff before at least having the benefit of a reference to the information on which it's based?


GS

Dod101
The full Lemon
Posts: 16629
Joined: October 10th, 2017, 11:33 am
Has thanked: 4343 times
Been thanked: 7534 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350278

Postby Dod101 » October 24th, 2020, 12:17 pm

scrumpyjack wrote:
Dod101 wrote:Hi Lootman
You are not wrong; you seldom are, but the 50% who are working are mostly working for the public sector, the NHS most likely. ('Mostly' means more than 50%) It really is quite shocking, the divide East/West. Edinburgh owing to its financial sector has a very wealthy class, but much of the rest of the country is very poor by any measure.

Dod


and I wonder how much of that financial sector and its wealth would move south come independence? For firms like Standard Life most of their customers are south of the border anyway.


I suspect not that much in fact. Standard Life as in the insurer is owned by Phoenix Holdings based in England, Standard Life Aberdeen is based in Edinburgh as is Baillie Gifford. They are though large international businesses and I think the only reason for them and many others moving from Edinburgh would be punitive taxation, corporate or personal.

Dod

anon155742
Lemon Slice
Posts: 260
Joined: June 13th, 2019, 8:56 pm
Has thanked: 891 times
Been thanked: 160 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350287

Postby anon155742 » October 24th, 2020, 1:09 pm

I think that the recent news shows that more benefits should be given out as voucher form rather than as cash.

scottnsilky
Lemon Slice
Posts: 255
Joined: November 9th, 2016, 8:07 pm
Has thanked: 92 times
Been thanked: 53 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350323

Postby scottnsilky » October 24th, 2020, 3:57 pm

Dear OP,
You say your mother never worked, I think she might take exception to that! Never worked outside the home?
My mother too.

kempiejon
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 3488
Joined: November 5th, 2016, 10:30 am
Has thanked: 1 time
Been thanked: 1145 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350330

Postby kempiejon » October 24th, 2020, 4:25 pm

anon155742 wrote:I think that the recent news shows that more benefits should be given out as voucher form rather than as cash.

A few decades back it as deemed worthy to give kids book tokens as gifts, so children could spend it on a book rather than fritter it away on fags and dry cider I suppose. Amazon vouchers became popular but I think have been superseded by e-vouchers adding credit to peoples' accounts and I gather pre-loaded visa cards had their day. Hard currency is more useful though but actually benefits are usually made by direct debit. Vouchers would just add bureaucracy and cost. There's something like 20 million people on benefits, that's a lot of printing.

gryffron
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 3605
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 10:00 am
Has thanked: 550 times
Been thanked: 1584 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350440

Postby gryffron » October 25th, 2020, 10:16 am

But back in the "good old days" housing was cheap and plentiful, as were jobs that could afford it. Today, our housing market is so far broken that mere employment cannot pay for it. DAK what proportion within the M25 receive housing benefit? Bet it's huge. And includes a huge proportion of workers, not just the elderly and unemployed.

The "over 50%" in Scotland includes all government workers, not solely benefit recipients. The UK govt has deliberately heavily exported jobs there. Most of HMRC is now in Scotland. Something Nicola conveniently forgets.

johnhemming wrote:As more things get automated one would expect the incomes of people working earning smaller sums to be increased by the state. I don't see any practical alternative. This has been happening in the UK for decades.

I agree about the problem But since the profitable production is not owned by the state. Nor even taking place within this state, as opposed to China etc. How is the govt supposed to infinitely fund welfare from production it can neither control nor tax?

Vouchers instead of cash may be designed to modify behaviour, but in practice the vouchers, or even the goods they purchase, can be easily traded or converted to cash. So all vouchers really achieve is to add complexity and cost to the entire distribution process. Issuing, spending, and redeeming. I do not favour vouchers, but neither do I favour the cripplingly complex system of benefits introduced by control freak Gordon Brown. With hundreds of individual little benefits. But every time the Tories try to remove any one the leftie politicians and press bleat that "Tracy in Newcastle will be 50p/week worse off if you remove that one".
The problem is that in many cases, especially housing, the benefits distort the market rather than fixing it.

Gryff

88V8
Lemon Half
Posts: 5769
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 11:22 am
Has thanked: 4097 times
Been thanked: 2560 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350665

Postby 88V8 » October 26th, 2020, 9:47 am

The key problem that our society shies away from is cutting the population.
That would soon remove the 'housing crisis' as well as the myriad hands that are no longer needed to sew, plough, make and mend.
And eventually put a stop to the steady destruction of the natural world that we tut-tut over.

As to food, this morning on the wireless they were once again spouting about healthy food being 'expensive'. Have these people never bought fresh veg and raw meat.
Even at Waitrose prices it is not expensive to cook from scratch. And yet on the occasions when we used to shop in Aldi, I routinely saw people who look less than wealthy, with their trollies full of ready-to-cooks the cost of which would soon eclipse our weekly food bill.
Fat waddlers who can't be bothered to cook, sometimes with their children still slim but doomed. So sad.

As you will gather, I am of the Right, and I could suggest various solutions, but the entitlement culture has become embedded and people will always shout louder for more handouts. Even Thatcher in her pomp would find it hard going nowadays. She never had to deal with 'social media'.

Schools.... schools are for inculcation of the three Rs, they are not a branch of social services.
And when CV19 is no longer a crisis, just wait for the cries that free school meals should be continued 365 regardless.

V8

NeilW
Lemon Slice
Posts: 760
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 4:27 pm
Has thanked: 149 times
Been thanked: 226 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350954

Postby NeilW » October 27th, 2020, 9:55 am

scotview wrote:Do you think that we can continue to have the State provide so much support or will our society have to start providing for itself.


The state needs to do only one thing - ensure everybody has a job at the living wage. Once it sets that price everything else sorts itself out by simple competition.

If those currently claiming Free School Meals had an alternative local job offer available to them at £350 per week (35 x£10 per hour) then they could afford to pay for their own food and lodgings - for themselves and their children.

The labour so purchased by the state can then be added to the "volunteer list" and local authorities and local charities/social enterprises can use that labour as they see fit on anything that doesn't compete with a private business.

And then if the private sector doesn't like that it has a simple option - hire the people away at more than £350 per week and make a profit from doing so.

It's a simple system that puts the money where it is required across the nation exactly where and when it is required. And then takes it away again as the private sector recovers its mojo. A full blown automatic stabiliser that ensures there is enough monetary oil going around the economy for the engine to deliver maximum output.

It's also a wildly popular idea in Scotland, Northern Ireland, Wales and much of Northern England - pulling the Union together. It's less popular in the South East.

JohnB
Lemon Quarter
Posts: 2497
Joined: January 15th, 2017, 9:20 am
Has thanked: 677 times
Been thanked: 997 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350961

Postby JohnB » October 27th, 2020, 10:23 am

But

* Not everyone can work, for physical or mental health reasons

* paying for childcare on minimum wage doesn't work. It seems to be about £5/hour per child

* People have caring responsibilities, again you can't offload those to others when on minimum wage, and it would both cost more for the state to step in, and be emotionally worse for those involved.

* Minimum wage would preclude people living in many large areas, which could distort communities and split families with successful/unsuccessful sides.

I think benefits are essential, but they need to have minimal rules, to reduce admin overhead and increase take up. School meal vouchers spent cafes go against that.

NeilW
Lemon Slice
Posts: 760
Joined: November 4th, 2016, 4:27 pm
Has thanked: 149 times
Been thanked: 226 times

Re: Our societie's situation.

#350978

Postby NeilW » October 27th, 2020, 10:54 am

JohnB wrote:* Not everyone can work, for physical or mental health reasons


You can work unless exempted by age or infirmity. In which case you will get a pension instead - once validated by a qualified doctor in the case of infirmity. I'm surprised that needs saying.

paying for childcare on minimum wage doesn't work. It seems to be about £5/hour per child

* People have caring responsibilities, again you can't offload those to others when on minimum wage, and it would both cost more for the state to step in, and be emotionally worse for those involved.


Why isn't that work? Somebody has to do it.

Minimum wage would preclude people living in many large areas, which could distort communities and split families with successful/unsuccessful sides.


Then that area is too expensive for them to live in. I'd like to live in London too, but I can't afford it, so I've moved where I can afford to live.

And if people know there is a job to go to, they will too - as they have in the past. People didn't start living in cities. They moved from other towns and villages there decades ago.


Return to “The Economy”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 7 guests