To Brexit

[cherdano]

Don't worry, I will keep asking year after year :)

[Zelandakh]

I don't think you can say sad day for the UK when the majority of people wanted independence.

The UK always had independence; the Eu was a series of treaties where we made some agreements for the common good, not a state of subservience. And, of course, prior to 2016, a majority of people wanted the benefits of EU membership. Similarly a majority of Brits want schools, mail services, rail, water and energy companies to be run by the public sector. Should we take a single vote on those and say that is the end of the matter and it should never ever change? How about looking further back - Germany and Italy voted for Fascism; perhaps we should ask them to honour that vote. A majority of American voters were not opposed to slavery in 1861 and an overwhelming majority of South African voters were not opposed to apartheid in 1990.

 

Sometimes large, generational decisions need to be made with a long-term view rather than based on a vote at a specific point in time, particularly when that time is during great upheaval, such as in the middle of a global financial crisis combined with a massive refugee influx. During times of desperation, people are willing to take desperate measures, even if they are likely to be harmful. It happened during the 1930s and has also happened in the 2010s. Britain is not alone in that but one would have hoped that our government was strong enough to keep itself on a good way even through such times.

 

Here is a really simple comparison - take the UK in 1972 and then again prior to the start of the financial crash in 2007. Which UK do you think was economically more successful? Heck, even compare it with the UK of 2019. I cannot say I remember much of the early 1970s but I do know the state the country was in back then.

 

Now it is not like the UK was a terrible place to live in the 70s, there were far worse countries to be in. And I am sure that the UK will not die overnight after this decision. There will just be a little bit less investment over time; fewer jobs available; and generally even less influence in the world than would be the case if the UK were a part of the EU. We could perhaps change the name to "The United Kingdom of Slightly-Less-Great Britain and Northern Ireland", particularly if this finally pushes Scotland over the edge.

 

In short, you can make a certain subset of people believe almost anything if you back it up with the right media. Even without Fox or any centre or left wing media, close to 40% of American voters do not trust the results of the 2020 POTUS election. That is a good indication of what is possible if you lie consistently to the public. And Brexit-pushers have been lying for two generations. You yourself have brought up EU issues that were fraudulent. It is not surprising that some believed it. Add that to the racists and the desperate while cheating the rules and subduing younger voters gets you to 51.9%. Run it another day and you will get 48.1%, or 52.6%, or 46.8%. We have essentially allowed a small, orchestrated lobby group to dictate national policy not only for a single government but for generations to come. And yes, that is indeed a sad day for me but it is a much, much sadder one for the UK as a whole.

[cherdano]

So a year from now, I'll ask all the Brexit supporters in this thread to name one practical gain the UK got from Brexit (other than making it harder for immigrants like me to move to the country - you'll understand that I am not that sympathetic to that view). But don't hesitate to make predictions now if you want to be ahead of the game.

Just so you know what to aim for in your answers - here is a concrete example of Brexit costs:

 

But no pressure - you still have 11.5 months to prepare your answers.

[cherdano]

Just so you know what to aim for in your answers - here is a concrete example of Brexit costs:

 

But no pressure - you still have 11.5 months to prepare your answers.

 

Here is another example:

German imports from:

-9.8% total

-5.9% EU

+1.1% China

-56.2% United Kingdom

Just losing half a month worth of trade with Germany. Yes Covid played a role of course, but not *that* much either (the Calais-Dover crossing was blocked in late December, not in January).

 

You guys better tee up a hell of an answer about the practical benefits. Or were there perhaps other reasons for your sympathy for Brexit?

[hrothgar]

Well, at least the UK was able to get an increase in its fishing quotas...

 

 

Oh, wait...

[Douglas43]

Nigel Farage has announced his retirement from politics, so that's one benefit....

[cherdano]

Nigel Farage has announced his retirement from politics, so that's one benefit....

And today I will quite BBF!

(Who will be back first, me on BBF, or Farage in politics?)

[y66]

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/fintan-o-toole-tories-appetite-for-farcical-fodder-is-insatiable-1.4593235

 

Blessed are the makers of processed pork products, for they shall come to symbolise British pluck in the face of the foreign foe. The invention of the “sausage war” as a cover for the flagrant breach of an international treaty is absurd. But we have to remember that we are trapped in a nightmare where the more absurd the imagery is, the more seriously we have to take it.

 

To understand what is going on with the Northern Ireland protocol we have to ask: why sausages? Why did Boris Johnson confront Emmanuel Macron at the G7 summit over the weekend: “How would you like it if the French courts stopped you moving Toulouse sausages to Paris?”

 

The question, as it happens, makes no sense. The Saucisse de Toulouse is made all over France, so even in the unlikely event of a blockade, Parisians would have no trouble finding some for their cassoulets.

 

And as an emblem of the allegedly terrible deprivations inflicted on the plain people of Ulster by the protocol, the sausage seems, on the face of it, even less apt.

 

If we go back to February 2020, we will find a very different official story: that the protocol would be great for the Ulster sausage.

 

Why? Because Northern Ireland has lots of fine sausage-makers, including Karro Food in Cookstown, Cranswick in Ballymena and the wonderful Finnebrogue Artisan in Downpatrick.

 

Not only is the protocol not causing a sausage famine in the six counties, it is a great boon for these pork peddlers. Says who? Well how about the Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs, whose Minister is one Edwin Poots.

 

In February 2020, Poots’s department exultantly pointed to the great advantage that Northern Ireland sausage-makers would enjoy because of the protocol: unfettered exports to both Britain and the EU. There is in fact a huge opportunity for them. The UK was selling £17 million (€19.8m) of sausages a year to the EU, with almost half of that going to the Republic. Now, only Northern Ireland sausages can be sold to the EU. The protocol really puts the sizzle into this export trade.

 

So if you were going to pick out an object to epitomise the evils of the protocol, the last one should be the sausage. But the decision to bang on about bangers has nothing to do with ordinary logic – and that is precisely what makes this whole charade at once so ludicrous and so dangerous.

 

The “sausage war” tells us, firstly, that Northern Ireland matters, well, not a sausage. You can only pick on good news for Northern Ireland and turn it into an intolerable outrage if what is actually happening there is entirely irrelevant to you.

 

But if this is not about the decimation of the Ulster fry, what is it about? The bleak answer lies in the return to a habit deeply ingrained in English nationalism: the use of basic foodstuffs as weapons in proxy wars against nasty Europeans.

 

Before God Save the King was widely adopted, the unofficial national anthem of England was The Roast Beef of Old England: “Then, Britons from all nice Dainties refrain / Which effeminate Italy, France and Spain; /And mighty roast beef shall command on the Main.”

 

In 1996, when the European soccer championship was being played in England, a Tory minister Gillian Shephard objected to the use of Beethoven’s Ode to Joy as the tournament anthem on the grounds that it is German. Britain was then engaged in a “beef war” with Germany because the nasty Krauts were refusing to eat British beef for fear of mad cow disease.

 

Readers of a certain age may remember the Tory agriculture minister John Gummer force-feeding his own four-year-old daughter Cordelia a beef burger in front of TV camera crews and newspaper reporters, as an act of patriotic heroism. All that was lacking from the photo op was a cow with a red-white-and-blue rosette saying “I’m mad, me!”

 

The tabloid headlines ran throughout the 1990s: “Germans urged to call truce in ‘mad cow war’”; “Kohl’s beef blitzkrieg”, “French set to back down as Germans hot up beef war”; “Beef War: I’ll Bring Britain To Its Knees”; “Battle lines drawn for new beef war”; “Time to retaliate”. Substitute sausage for beef on this menu of red-blooded chauvinism and its’s once more with feeling.

 

The appetite for this farcical fodder is, among the Tory base, insatiable. Serve any old piece of meat with some jingo sauce and they swallow it whole. The “sausage war” was cooked up in the back kitchen because the smart boys know it will always go down well with the customers.

 

This reversion to old habits is a way of keeping the political benefits of Brussels-bashing even after Brexit. Phoney belligerence may have served its rational purpose but it is still far too useful politically to be dispensed with.

 

The rational thing would be for the Brexiteers to declare victory and move on. But reason is a poor substitute for the ancient pleasures of the patriotic food fight.

 

And of course the sausage wars help to distract from all the porky pies. Who cares if Northern Ireland chokes on them?

 

Related: Boris Johnson’s gibberish may be surreal but it's also dangerous

[Douglas43]

And today I will quite BBF!

(Who will be back first, me on BBF, or Farage in politics?)

 

You on BBOF I hope!

[cherdano]

So a year from now, I'll ask all the Brexit supporters in this thread to name one practical gain the UK got from Brexit (other than making it harder for immigrants like me to move to the country - you'll understand that I am not that sympathetic to that view). But don't hesitate to make predictions now if you want to be ahead of the game.

 

If you know benefits of Brexit for the hospitality industry, you can let "HOSPITALITY & CATERING NEWS" know directly, no need to via me: https://twitter.com/MarinaPurkiss/status/1417138447878393860/photo/1

[StevenG]

If you know benefits of Brexit for the hospitality industry, you can let "HOSPITALITY & CATERING NEWS" know directly, no need to via me: https://twitter.com/MarinaPurkiss/status/1417138447878393860/photo/1

Why should we care about the hospitality industry? It is an industry that does not create any wealth, merely economic activity. Why is it struggling? Because it relies heavily on foreign labour. Why does it rely on foreign labour? Because the pay and the working conditions are atrocious - so atrocious that even those British people who need bottom-end jobs can usually find better elsewhere.

So it seems to me that the country as a whole is better off. We have fewer people that need feeding, housing, etc., but we are not losing the fundamental economic value of a pure service industry, which is to distribute wealth around the people of the country.

Of course, if the industry were to adjust with better wages and more civilised working conditions, it would be able to compete with other service industries. But for me, if people are going to work in non-wealth creating jobs, I'd rather they worked in something useful and necessary - care or the NHS for example.

I've said before that I wanted to escape "freedom of movement", that I wanted this country to have the ability to control immigration. The visible effects on the hospitality industry are exactly what I wanted to see, but I want to see it over the entire economy. I want to see higher wages at the bottom end. I want to see better working conditions. I want to see better training, so that our young people acquire proper skills, rather than employers just poaching trained people from abroad. The amount of skills this country has lost over the last few decades is frightening. Free movement has damaged the way the labour market works to the detriment of ordinary people in this country, but to the benefit of the better off who get nice cheap labour (and a nice, warm fuzzy feeling about how liberal they are). If that's coming to an end, I'm all for it.

However, these aren't normal times. We don't know how much of this is side-effects of Covid. maybe things will return to something like the old normal in the long run. I hope not.

[cherdano]

You know StevenG, when I asked above for tangible Brexit benefits, I kindly asked to exclude the reason "I would like to see fewer people like cherdano in this country". Your are entitled to your xenophobic bigotism, but please don't consider them an answer to my question. Also, I am afraid it's too late to get rid of me from the UK.

[Gilithin]

Why should we care about the hospitality industry? It is an industry that does not create any wealth, merely economic activity. Why is it struggling? Because it relies heavily on foreign labour.

 

I've said before that I wanted to escape "freedom of movement", that I wanted this country to have the ability to control immigration. The visible effects on the hospitality industry are exactly what I wanted to see, but I want to see it over the entire economy.

Wow, are you seriously posting that your biggest gain from Brexit is that you do not have to look at people you perceive to be foreigners? I am not too sure how one reacts to that other than placing you in the same Box101 as drewes and Chas.

[StevenG]

You know StevenG, when I asked above for tangible Brexit benefits, I kindly asked to exclude the reason "I would like to see fewer people like cherdano in this country". Your are entitled to your xenophobic bigotism, but please don't consider them an answer to my question. Also, I am afraid it's too late to get rid of me from the UK.

Why do you not actually read what I said and think about the economic argument? You just seem to filter anything you instictively disagree with through your own lens. (You never used to be like this; I always thought you one of the more sensible commentators here.)

I do not have any desire to get rid of you from the UK. There is no problem with itinerant mathematicians. I am horrified by the way this appalling government treats people who have built a life here, whether that's Windrush or EU citizens or anyone else in a similar position. I do not wish to expel anybody, merely move to a system that creates a better life for people who are already here.

I would have no problem of freedom of movement at all if it did not result in a significant inflow. What I do object to, as I said in my previous post, is the distortion it creates in the labour market. I have watched this country get poorer over my entire adult life, and I believe that inefficiencies in the labour market are a significant cause. (I worked this out about 30 years ago, and nothing I've seen since has changed my mind.)

Since you are a better mathematician than I am, could you please explain how importing people to do non-essential jobs that do not create any wealth can do other than reduce resources for people for are already here. And can you explain how a system that seems to always create a need for more labour than is available is sustainable in the long term.

[StevenG]

Wow, are you seriously posting that your biggest gain from Brexit is that you do not have to look at people you perceive to be foreigners? I am not too sure how one reacts to that other than placing you in the same Box101 as drewes and Chas.

Read what I said. I said nothing about looking at foreigners. Anyone who knows me will know that I am not racist in any way.

You seem to use an argument that is all too common these days. 1) Racists oppose immigration. Therefore 2) anyone who suggests that immigration can cause problems is a racist. That argument is fallacious.

[Winstonm]

Why should we care about the hospitality industry? It is an industry that does not create any wealth, merely economic activity. Why is it struggling? Because it relies heavily on foreign labour. Why does it rely on foreign labour? Because the pay and the working conditions are atrocious - so atrocious that even those British people who need bottom-end jobs can usually find better elsewhere.

So it seems to me that the country as a whole is better off. We have fewer people that need feeding, housing, etc., but we are not losing the fundamental economic value of a pure service industry, which is to distribute wealth around the people of the country.

Of course, if the industry were to adjust with better wages and more civilised working conditions, it would be able to compete with other service industries. But for me, if people are going to work in non-wealth creating jobs, I'd rather they worked in something useful and necessary - care or the NHS for example.

I've said before that I wanted to escape "freedom of movement", that I wanted this country to have the ability to control immigration. The visible effects on the hospitality industry are exactly what I wanted to see, but I want to see it over the entire economy. I want to see higher wages at the bottom end. I want to see better working conditions. I want to see better training, so that our young people acquire proper skills, rather than employers just poaching trained people from abroad. The amount of skills this country has lost over the last few decades is frightening. Free movement has damaged the way the labour market works to the detriment of ordinary people in this country, but to the benefit of the better off who get nice cheap labour (and a nice, warm fuzzy feeling about how liberal they are). If that's coming to an end, I'm all for it.

However, these aren't normal times. We don't know how much of this is side-effects of Covid. maybe things will return to something like the old normal in the long run. I hope not.

 

Being American, I am not nearly so close to this situation. That said, it is entirely normal for an influx (an excess) of workers to lower pressure on wages. And I'm unclear on what you mean when you say a wealth-creating industry or job. What does that mean to you?

[cherdano]

So if I ask "name a benefit of Brexit other than making it harder for immigrants to move to the UK" and someone replies "the benefit is making it harder for immigrants to move to the UK" then I do take the liberty not to consider this an answer to my question.

 

Second, if someone writes "I hope we will have fewer immigrants because [incomprehensible and silly economic argument]" then yes I do take the liberty to shorten that to "I hope we will have fewer immigrants". Wanting to have fewer immigrants because of a silly economic argument doesn't make you a better person than someone who doesn't like fewer immigrants per se - it just makes you someone who tries to rationalise their xenophobia with made up and silly economic arguments.

 

Third, "I am fine with you as an immigrant, just not with those others" doesn't work for me, sorry. I share a lot of experiences with a Romanian cleaning lady or a Spanish nursery teacher or a Polish tradesman in how we experience the UK, and I don't feel appreciated because you don't like them but are fine with me.

[mikeh]

Why do you not actually read what I said and think about the economic argument? You just seem to filter anything you instictively disagree with through your own lens. (You never used to be like this; I always thought you one of the more sensible commentators here.)

I do not have any desire to get rid of you from the UK. There is no problem with itinerant mathematicians. I am horrified by the way this appalling government treats people who have built a life here, whether that's Windrush or EU citizens or anyone else in a similar position. I do not wish to expel anybody, merely move to a system that creates a better life for people who are already here.

I would have no problem of freedom of movement at all if it did not result in a significant inflow. What I do object to, as I said in my previous post, is the distortion it creates in the labour market. I have watched this country get poorer over my entire adult life, and I believe that inefficiencies in the labour market are a significant cause. (I worked this out about 30 years ago, and nothing I've seen since has changed my mind.)

Since you are a better mathematician than I am, could you please explain how importing people to do non-essential jobs that do not create any wealth can do other than reduce resources for people for are already here. And can you explain how a system that seems to always create a need for more labour than is available is sustainable in the long term.

In what world does the hospitality industry not create wealth?????

 

Take a look at the very rich people who own hotel chains

 

Take a look at the owners of successful restaurants

 

Take a look at the homes built for and purchased or rented by hospitality workers

 

Take a look at the food and beverage industries, much of which is devoted to selling, at a profit, to the hospitality industry

 

Take a look at literally everyone who earns income directly or indirectly from the hospitality industry. What do you think they’re doing with their money! Stuffing it under a mattress or spending/investing it (spending if they are low income, spending and investing otherwise)

 

What about the taxes the industry and its employees, owners, suppliers etc pay

 

Btw, what do you do?

 

I was a lawyer for 40+ years. A lot of my clients got a lot of money from my services. A lot of my clients had to pay out a lot of money (I did a lot of work for insurance companies). But all I was doing was facilitating the transfer of money, with a little of it coming my way. So do lawyers create wealth?

 

Anyone who participates in an economic activity, in respect of which they employ people, and/or pay suppliers, etc is creating wealth.

 

So we are not mining ore or growing crops. But I buy things directly or, more commonly, indirectly from those who do. Without money from my activities I couldn’t buy anything, so my activities lead to opportunity for those who, in your bizarre worldview are creating wealth. Am I not then also creating wealth

 

And my point is that the hospitality industry is a significant wealth creator.

 

As for low paying jobs, a free market allows ‘foreigners’ (aka human beings) to make more money in the UK than they could back home. By sending some of that money back home, they are increasing, albeit slowly and in tiny ways, the economic well-being of their home country. That in turn will, over time, open up more opportunities there, and diminish the attraction of being a ‘foreign’ worker.

 

Meanwhile, your own argument makes zero sense. If the labour market was being flooded by immigrants, to the point that native-born workers refuse to work at those jobs, where are they working! Because the UK doesn’t seem to me, historically, to have suffered from unusually high levels of unemployment. So they’ve mostly found jobs.

 

 

Of course, you have pretty much given away the real point. Xenophobia

 

 

Btw, while I’m Canadian, I as born and raised in England so I’m not a stranger to English culture. I went to a ‘public school’ and was a member of the middle class, with all of the prejudices that went, back then, with that status.

[awm]

It's a very reasonable position to believe that people who are willing to work full-time ought to earn high enough wages to pay their rent, feed their children, and overall live a moderately comfortable lifestyle. I also don't think it's unreasonable to care more about this being true in one's own country than in some far off place across the world. There has definitely been a trend (across many developed countries) where positions requiring fewer skills and/or qualifications are not providing sufficient income, whereas overall GDP growth is driven mostly by gains at the top of the income ladder. It's also logical to note that paying higher wages will lead to increased costs for many goods and services, but that this may be a worthwhile price to ensure that everyone (well, maybe every citizen willing to work) has a comfortable life.

 

Where I disagree with StevenG's post, is that I'm not convinced immigration or free movement of people are major drivers of this phenomenon. Certainly the problem exists across many non-EU countries! At the same time, Switzerland has basically solved this issue and while not an EU member, we are part of the Schengen agreement and subject to free movement of people throughout Europe. Comparing London to Zurich for example, we see that London prices are about 20% lower than in Zurich (33% lower if we exclude rent, which is slightly higher in London)... but London salaries are more than 40% lower. If we dig deeper, we see that people working relatively "low skill" jobs often make quite a bit more; for example:

 

Waiter ~$44k in Zurich vs ~$19k in London

Receptionist ~$53k in Zurich vs ~$23k in London

Cashier ~$35k in Zurich vs. ~$20k in London

 

Reducing immigration will (slightly) reduce the supply of workers which might (slightly) reduce local unemployment rate, but we have not (in recent years) seen big changes in wages from low unemployment. What works in Switzerland is very strong organised labor which has lobbied the government to enforce strict licensing requirements (you basically need to have served an "apprenticeship" in many of these jobs in order to be qualified for full-time employment). This has some nice side effects (for example, there are no "bad" restaurants in Switzerland because anyone running or working in a restaurant really needs to know what they are doing -- this is not so true in the UK and definitely not true in the US).

[fromageGB]

You know StevenG, when I asked above for tangible Brexit benefits, I kindly asked to exclude the reason "I would like to see fewer people like cherdano in this country". Your are entitled to your xenophobic bigotism, but please don't consider them an answer to my question. Also, I am afraid it's too late to get rid of me from the UK.

We didn't pick you up in a rubber dinghy, did we?

[cherdano]

We didn't pick you up in a rubber dinghy, did we?

What does that have to do with the discussion about level immigration started by StevenG's post?? I guess reading accurately becomes twice as challenging when you ser a chance to get a xenophobic ding in?

[kenberg]

It's a very reasonable position to believe that people who are willing to work full-time ought to earn high enough wages to pay their rent, feed their children, and overall live a moderately comfortable lifestyle. I also don't think it's unreasonable to care more about this being true in one's own country than in some far off place across the world. There has definitely been a trend (across many developed countries) where positions requiring fewer skills and/or qualifications are not providing sufficient income, whereas overall GDP growth is driven mostly by gains at the top of the income ladder. It's also logical to note that paying higher wages will lead to increased costs for many goods and services, but that this may be a worthwhile price to ensure that everyone (well, maybe every citizen willing to work) has a comfortable life.

 

Where I disagree with StevenG's post, is that I'm not convinced immigration or free movement of people are major drivers of this phenomenon. Certainly the problem exists across many non-EU countries! At the same time, Switzerland has basically solved this issue and while not an EU member, we are part of the Schengen agreement and subject to free movement of people throughout Europe. Comparing London to Zurich for example, we see that London prices are about 20% lower than in Zurich (33% lower if we exclude rent, which is slightly higher in London)... but London salaries are more than 40% lower. If we dig deeper, we see that people working relatively "low skill" jobs often make quite a bit more; for example:

 

Waiter ~$44k in Zurich vs ~$19k in London

Receptionist ~$53k in Zurich vs ~$23k in London

Cashier ~$35k in Zurich vs. ~$20k in London

 

Reducing immigration will (slightly) reduce the supply of workers which might (slightly) reduce local unemployment rate, but we have not (in recent years) seen big changes in wages from low unemployment. What works in Switzerland is very strong organised labor which has lobbied the government to enforce strict licensing requirements (you basically need to have served an "apprenticeship" in many of these jobs in order to be qualified for full-time employment). This has some nice side effects (for example, there are no "bad" restaurants in Switzerland because anyone running or working in a restaurant really needs to know what they are doing -- this is not so true in the UK and definitely not true in the US).

 

This could lead to a much broader discussion. I have been staying out of the Brexit thread because I am not a Brit and my knowledge is meager. But a couple of comments. Growing up in the USA in the middle of the last century I thought of organized labor as the basic building block of wealth both here and in England. All the pluses and minuses, and the much-changed situation is very complex.

 

The 1952 Steelworkers strike was when I was 13 and just developing political thoughts. I didn't really understand it then, and that's still true. But it was a big event, I understood that much.

 

I doubt that immigration here is a large contributing factor in the deterioration of life for those of modest education, but I will not pretend that I have a good grasp on this even in the US, and certainly not in the UK or Switzerland.

 

I will now wander back to the US centered threads. I might cite some of your salary data there.

[hrothgar]

What does that have to do with the discussion about level immigration started by StevenG's post?? I guess reading accurately becomes twice as challenging when you ser a chance to get a xenophobic ding in?

 

I don't view this is as a xenophobic ding. Rather, fromage is signalling that he gets off by stroking his dick whilst fantasizing about people dying in the English channel....

[cherdano]

M & S closes 11 of its 20 stores in France since the "lengthy and complex export processes now in place following the UK's exist from the European Union are significantly constraining the supply of fresh and chilled product from the UK into Europe".

 

[Cue for fromageGB to get a xenophobic post in!]

[cherdano]

Do I even need to write anything?

 

https://edition.cnn.com/2021/09/28/business/brexit-fuel-food-shortages/index.html

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/european-newspapers-uk-fuel-crisis-b1926226.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/28/world/europe/brexit-britain-fuel-johnson.html