UK General Discussion: Rishecession

[Cassius]

Those that know, know.

Why are you always like this?

What, correct?

No. See if you knew, you would know, but you don't know what you don't know. I know that you don't know, and I know that you know that I know.  You're not in the know, so you cannot know what is known, which is that you don't know what I know.

Know what I mean?

Truly an unknown unknown, I know.

[Badger]

Well - it could be worse. At least we’ve disavowed Trussonomics as a country. Some people want to give it another try…
https://mobile.twitter.com/WSJopinion/status/1582551879703302145

A massive unfunded energy subsidy is restrained spending, news to me!

Trussonomics is somewhere in between zombie-Reaganite voodoo economics and Peronism.

(key word being "zombie". Reaganomics can work very well when tax rates are high to begin with, like they were 40-50 years ago. It doesn't work when tax rates are low!)

As I have said repeatedly, she saw that one significant concession to public opinion (which is, lest we forget, *massively* hostile to right wing libertarianism) as a green light to go full Britannia Unchained everywhere else. This was never likely to work, even if the speed of its implosion still surprised.

I do hope you aren't doing the "*real* libertarianism has never been tried" schtick

To be clear, my point is just that it's well established that this kind of economic policy fails when initial tax rates are left of the Laffer curve. So yeah, real Brownbackism has been tried and failed. But that was in a low tax environment to begin with, so it's not comparable to the high tax environment in the mid-late 1900s (when Reagan took office, the top marginal rate was 69%).

Not trying to derail the thread here, I was just being careful not to paint Truss's insane "economic" plan with overly broad a brush.

Other than the fact the Laffer Curve was objectively laughable.

[Southern Senator North Carolina Yankee]

Well - it could be worse. At least we’ve disavowed Trussonomics as a country. Some people want to give it another try…
https://mobile.twitter.com/WSJopinion/status/1582551879703302145

A massive unfunded energy subsidy is restrained spending, news to me!

Trussonomics is somewhere in between zombie-Reaganite voodoo economics and Peronism.

(key word being "zombie". Reaganomics can work very well when tax rates are high to begin with, like they were 40-50 years ago. It doesn't work when tax rates are low!)

As I have said repeatedly, she saw that one significant concession to public opinion (which is, lest we forget, *massively* hostile to right wing libertarianism) as a green light to go full Britannia Unchained everywhere else. This was never likely to work, even if the speed of its implosion still surprised.

I do hope you aren't doing the "*real* libertarianism has never been tried" schtick

To be clear, my point is just that it's well established that this kind of economic policy fails when initial tax rates are left of the Laffer curve. So yeah, real Brownbackism has been tried and failed. But that was in a low tax environment to begin with, so it's not comparable to the high tax environment in the mid-late 1900s (when Reagan took office, the top marginal rate was 69%).

Not trying to derail the thread here, I was just being careful not to paint Truss's insane "economic" plan with overly broad a brush.

The bigger problem here is that a non-world reserve currency nation thought it could get away with murder. The downfall of supply side is not just that it doesn't work in low tax (and commodity dependent locales), but also that if it is dependent on deficit spending to carry out, it only is feasible to the extent that the bond market is willing to tolerate it. Clearly here, they were not.

This is a taste of what deficit spending would do to the US if it lost its status internationally both in terms of world reserve and oil being sold in dollars.

The idealist answer would be well "they should cut spending" and we all know how that is going to go in the real world and so the onus is at the end of the day the one ballooning the deficit is the one who cuts the taxes before they have cut the spending to pay before it.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

https://twitter.com/Number10cat
I highly suggest people check out this Twitter account. It's utterly golden.

https://twitter.com/Number10cat/status/1583916429124206592?cxt=HHwWgIDU_bXmmfsrA...
Couldn't help but laugh at this one, Lol.

[Pericles]

This is unacceptable from Labour. Public services are already on their knees, there can't be any more austerity. Find the money from tax hikes alone.

[CumbrianLefty]

Labour seem to have a current line of avoiding many specific money commitments, partly because they think it will distract from the Tories troubles and give them something to attack. Of course this cannot hold longer term, and I'm sure they know this.

And yes - some of us do see the media fixation with "gotcha" yes/no answers to often quite complex questions as a problem, and not something to be encouraged.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Bit of an outrage factory clickbait headline from The Grauniad there. Politicians in opposition will generally avoid making firm spending commitments unless they have a very good idea what the figures are likely to look like when/if they take power (which, right now, no one does) or they're doing the old trick of committing themselves to spending whatever the incumbents are. It's clear enough (including from that answer) that the health service would be a priority. My guess is that Labour in power would do what they usually do and increase social spending in phases over several years, or at least aim to. The actually interesting thing is the idea of putting more of an emphasis on preventative healthcare, because that would be a major policy shift.

[Torie]

The NHS does not focus on preventative care? Ouch.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

The NHS does not focus on preventative care? Ouch.

The NHS is not a single organisation, but is better understood as a funding mechanism for a very large number of separate organisations. Every hospital is, in practice, its own bureaucratic kingdom with its own culture and ways of working, and GPs are actually independent contractors rather than directly employed by the NHS. The blood and transplant service (i.e. the provision of blood, plasma and donated organs, not what is then done with them) is its own organisation, the ambulance services are their own organisations and so on. One consequence of some rather incompetent reforms pursued during the Cameron government has been to overwhelm GP surgeries with bureaucratic work (they were, insanely, given certain commissioning responsibilities that used to be handled at a county level by bodies called Primary Care Trusts) which has cut the amount of time that GPs have for patients and has also made the profession less attractive for obvious reasons. This means that many people who used to report to their local GP surgery for minor injuries and so on now head straight for their nearest A&E. Austerity measures around about the same time has also meant that the various specialists essential for preventative strategies (dietitians and so on) are less available than they were previously.

[Torie]

Thanks for the thoughtful and comprehensive response.

In the US, there is a much better focus on prevention I think these days, and computers and what not have made things reasonably efficient. One huge problem however is the quality of care giving organizations or people, is so uneven. Thus it is necessary to have coverage not leashed by geographic location, and to check out the qualifications of the individuals carefully, and not be shy about hiring and firing. So in that sense it can be a time consuming task, and the patient needs proactive, and not afraid to ruffle feathers. Covid has taken its toll. The Hospital and its service providers, primary care and otherwise, in Hudson, NY is close to collapse.

For sickie types, it is advantageous to be in a place like NYC. It really does.

[EastAnglianLefty]

More broadly, lots of preventative care focuses on things like lifestyle measures, and action here has generally been driven primarily by local authorities rather than the NHS. Heavy cuts to local government spending has meant that local authorities are much less able to carry out this work now than was previously the case.

[Storr]

https://twitter.com/PickardJE/status/1584273884920287233?s=20&t=b1ybUMO4ZibT...

[Torrain]

The fighting is over, let the healing begin.
https://twitter.com/NadineDorries/status/1584303574061707264
https://twitter.com/NadineDorries/status/1584304190020792321

[Torrain]

On a more sincere note, it's now very likely that the UK will appoint it's first South Asian PM, and the first Hindu to hold the office, on the third day of Diwali, no less! That feels notable, and worth celebrating, at least for a few hours before we launch back into the chaos that is the UK run by the 2022 incarnation of the Conservative Party.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

[If my soul was made of stone]

https://twitter.com/PickardJE/status/1584273884920287233?s=20&t=b1ybUMO4ZibT...

Kevin Rudd rn:

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Rudd's currently too preoccupied brown-nosing Albo in the vain hopes of becoming US Ambassador.

[Middle-aged Europe]

The fighting is over, let the healing begin.
https://twitter.com/NadineDorries/status/1584303574061707264
https://twitter.com/NadineDorries/status/1584304190020792321

Well, somebody's butthurt.

[Logical]

Just a girlboss living her best life https://twitter.com/DominicPenna/status/1584202221646118912

[If my soul was made of stone]

Just a girlboss living her best life https://twitter.com/DominicPenna/status/1584202221646118912

Is she trying to court Heston Blumenthal with hopes of starting some absolutely deranged High Tory Bake-Off spinoff together? Weak effort if so.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Is she trying to court Heston Blumenthal with hopes of starting some absolutely deranged High Tory Bake-Off spinoff together? Weak effort if so.

Maybe she wishes to be a somewhat less right-wing replacement for Prue Leith.

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

Just a girlboss living her best life https://twitter.com/DominicPenna/status/1584202221646118912

Theresa was the only Tory PM in my lifetime whose failures weren't entirely caused by self-inflicted wounds.

[Middle-aged Europe]

The butthurt continues: Johnson backer comes out in favour of a general election, citing Sunak's lack of a "mandate" (as per BBC liveblog).

A Tory MP who backed Boris Johnson to lead the party says the party is now "ungovernable" and a vote on the next prime minister should be put to the nation.

Sir Christopher Chope says he's "very angry", adding that the former prime minister and his successor Liz Truss had their authority "undermined by the people who now wish to take over and inherit the crown".

"We now have the prospect of having a Conservative Party leader who doesn't have a mandate form the country and won't even have a mandate from the membership either," Chope told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

"Respect is a mutual thing, if people who are now seeking the crown want to have the respect which comes from having a mandate then the best way they can get that respect is by winning a mandate with the people. That's why I think a general election is the only answer, otherwise we're just going to go from bad to worse."

He added: "The party is ungovernable in the House of Commons and so we're going to have continuing rebellions so I'm very pessimistic."

[Torrain]

The butthurt continues: Johnson backer comes out in favour of a general election, citing Sunak's lack of a "mandate" (as per BBC liveblog).

There have been a couple of claims like this from Johnson loyalists. The only MPs to come out so far are Chope and Dorries - who both have majorities so large they’d probably survive if we went to the polls tomorrow. Johnson’s supporters in seats with less than a 20,000 vote majority have notably stayed silent.

The other calls come from members of the Lords (like Johnson ally Zac Goldsmith), who don’t have to face reelection.

Notably - any Johnson loyalist who could realistically hold ministerial office again has instead rallied behind Sunak.

[Kahane's Grave Is A Gender-Neutral Bathroom]

The butthurt continues: Johnson backer comes out in favour of a general election, citing Sunak's lack of a "mandate" (as per BBC liveblog).

There have been a couple of claims like this from Johnson loyalists. The only MPs to come out so far are Chope and Dorries - who both have majorities so large they’d probably survive if we went to the polls tomorrow. Johnson’s supporters in seats with less than a 20,000 vote majority have notably stayed silent.

The other calls come from members of the Lords (like Johnson ally Zac Goldsmith), who don’t have to face reelection.

Notably - any Johnson loyalist who could realistically hold ministerial office again has instead rallied behind Sunak.

Goldsmith would have been a good PM choice, tbh.