[Closed] Austerity, deficit, debt - where are we?

Ten pages.

Last three a quotefest among the argualympians.

Good to see the correct use of the cedilla, mind you.

Although let down by the overlong ellipsis...

Dunno about nuclear bombs but I've got the Mother Of All Easter Eggs!

Somebody to use a badly placed Hitler reference.

We are still spending more than we take in so are in deficit.

This means our debt is growing

If we want to reduce our debt we need to spend less or take in more...

There will be more austerity, more privatisations and more tax increases to come...

Lets see, still have massive debt, debt still growing every year, %GDP spent servicing debt increasing year on year.
But yet all we see on news is people demanding more spending on x,y,z public services. Doesn't matter what government we elect as majority of UK public think we are entitled to the best of everything without paying for it, and won't stand for someone pointing out reality.

But not to worry, Trump will have started nuclear war long before the money runs out and we'll have much bigger problems than a 2 day wait for a doctors appointment.

Hmmm...well the prison service is beyond help but then again, it was before Brexit was even thought of.

Trump will have started nuclear war

I reckon that Korean **** may also have a finger of blame pointed in his direction.

@CaptainFlashheart; important to be grammatically and syntactically correct - thanks for the acknowledgement 😉

As for my question - more serious than frivolous.

Politicians - as always, dissembling.

On serious subjects I both say what I mean and mean what I say - as do most people; there are some exceptions and, unfortunately, senior politicians are amongst their number. Truth becomes elastic - stretched, distorted, twisted.

This post could be re-visited for the next 5 years and the question will still remain valid - or nuclear holocaust will render everything meaningless. That's a cheery thought on which to say - goodnight and I'm sure the sun will still rise tomorrow morning.

Ten pages.

[s]Last three[/s] All of them a quotefest among the argualympians.

CFH FIFY 🙂

OP we are in much better shape than we where in 2010 where each year we spent £90bn per year more than we raised in taxes

Austerity - still a completely bogus political tool to cut the state

Debt / Deficit - still there and getting worse due to the above. Its a failure to tax properly and collect that tax properly thats the cause.

Worried about debt? Devalue your currency, problem solved!

The tricky part is finding a convincing excuse....

But the north Koreans are struggling to get theirs off the ground..

I know the answer it's.... hang on, let me just have a bite of me fugu.....

@jamba: can you explain and quantify?
We're all in it together so what's
£90 billion between friends??

a series of weak politicians that mistake the ability to win westminster parliamentary games for strength

I suspect we will get even bigger jokers in charge of things, pushing single issue punishments for teh baying mobs to vote for, punish that twunt not me! Oh and lots of misdirected anger.

We will pay the debt not the rich and powerful. Tax dodging big companies and banks will come out of this with a tidy profit, while the country gets trashed in the name of necessary austerity.

They have already hit the poor on benefits, making it harder for them to get money. I reckon they realise they need to do this before the middle classes start queuing for their Jobseekers. Once they are tied up with the red tape, they'll be less likely to riot and the government will be able to carry on unchallenged.

They are simultaneously turning everyone against each other, creating unfair systems to destroy any kind of unity. It's immigrants fault, single mothers, my neighbour gets more state subsidy than I do, it's the scum bags on benefits, public sector pensions are better than mine etc.

The future looks grim TBH.

Not to mention transferring as much public money into private hands as possible.

Deficit and Debt are key tools for any government.
First rule is to not fall into the trap of comparing household accounting to governments.

Countries can borrow at much better rates than the private sector so debt is manageable in a lot of ways. Spending on the right things does a lot like educate and create skills, security and defence to maintain the supply of raw materials etc.

If spending and debt are in use to either grow the economy or to support the economy in times of trouble then it's a tool that can and should be used. In times of economic down turns reducing debt means dropping other services and reducing the governments opportunity to support and grow an economy.

"If spending and debt are in use to either grow the economy or to support the economy in times of trouble then it's a tool that can and should be used."

Indeed, but if you reach the point you can no longer borrow you are ****ed like Greece.

It's a bit like a progressive gambling scheme. As long as you can keep increasing the stakes you're fine.

I'm with Fifeandy, on this.

I'm not sure UK policy on spending/borrowing is much different to the rest of Europe which makes my think we're probably following best practice. Of course best practice may not be effective!

OP we are in much better shape than we where in 2010 where each year we spent £90bn per year more than we raised in taxes

Financially maybe, however many of tbe things that matter are turning to shit.

Financially maybe, however many of tbe things that matter are turning to shit.

Thats the real cost of Labour's budget management incompetence. It's really tough and painful to fix. Look at Greece for an example. Fixing excess spending doesn't make you "better off" there have to be real cuts and reductions in services / spending - that to many looks "worse off". However the akternative is you are bust and that point you are Greece on a much larger scale and welfare and public spending collapses, probably totally. The Tories made a choice to protect education spending in absolute terms and to increase spending on the NHS. They decided those are things that deserved special treatment. Now costs are risin at 4% per anum in NHS and as we have discussed many times no political party has a plan to confront that.

TJ an Independent Scotland would have far more "austerity" than UK as a whole does now.

The Toires have a record lead in the polls as there is no credible alternative Government.

The whole debt and deficit is a tory mirage
1) they are not reducing debt or deficit
2 If they actually collected the tax due there would be no debt or deficit
3 we are a low tax low wage economy compared to the rest of europe

. Fixing excess spending doesn't make you "better off" there have to be real cuts and reductions in services / spending - that to many looks "worse off". However the akternative is you

Austerity was pretty much called off post-referendum, publicly anyway - I guess we've all read about the pressure the NHS and Police are under and the millions having their benefits taken.

Deficit - is coming down, but it should always be remembered that it's the amount of over-spend we have not an underspend. Perhaps selling out slice of Lloyds off to Osborne's mates at a cut price was a decent indicator of his true plans there.

National Debt still rising, just slower than before.

Thats the real cost of Labour's budget management incompetence.

How long does this excuse last for?
Until

its all Brexits fault

Brexit wasnt a Tory idea...oh no not at all.

Simple fact is taxation needs to rise and the cuts should be targetted at the better off. Things like child benefit for all whats the point of it. We are hardly rich neither of us 40% tax payers but I have no idea where it goes and wouldnt miss it.
All that other free shit for well off pensioners could go.

I'm no Tory, but they came to power with an economy on Life Support and it still is, most of the tools at our disposal are being used to stimulate it. The Tories are actually doing more about Tax Avoidence than Labour did.

I don't blame Labour for the economic crash, but I don't blame the Tories for inheriting it either.

Probably the next threat to general taxation and income are the likes of Uber/Deliveroo etc. how much tax/NI is not being paid by the way these people operate, how much of the money actually goes past HMRC and how much is part of an offshore lower tax corporation?

Adding all this on to the existing Apple/Amazon style arrangements and the multi-nationals negotiating a minimum payment to keep people happy it all points to a revenue problem.

It doesn't mean that the state and it's operations can not be made more efficient and savings made but cuts impact people and outcomes more than taxing people properly.

Brexit could mean an end to operating in one state because it's profitable and claiming to be in another because it's tax efficient.

One of them silver linings.

Unless we turn into a tax haven for them.

@mike is spot on. These online / gig models are going to kill tax revenues unless Government does so ething about it. Tories currently have a study running. I raised this with my MP at a meeting a week ago.

Tories currently have a study running. I raised this with my MP at a meeting a week ago.

Taxation has to rise? Do you mean taxation or the tax intake? The two things are not necessarily linked. You would have thought that to raise tax income you raise taxes wouldn't you? But he reality is not that. If you raise taxes the rich go elsewhere and those that remain tighten their belts stop spending and the GDP drops resulting in a lower tax intake and triggers a recession. Been done before and failed spectacularly and no reason why it would work if tried again. It really is not that easy or simple. No-one knows the answer, but one thing we can do is to control our spending hence austerity.

Austerity has been a success in terms of its specific goals, but is taking too long - should have gone deeper and harder and got over and done with more quickly, but political ambitions compromised that. The deficit has been cut by more than 2 thirds, but until we start running a surplus we cannot start to pay down the debt and so it continues to rise. We are in a precarious position, such is the epic size of our debt we can only hope to manage it while interest rates are low. If interest rates rise then we're screwed, we can't hope to even service the debt let alone pay it down with interest rates much higher than they are now.

It's a mess there is no getting around that. Mis- management of our economy and tax pennies on a biblical scale by the Blair/brown government. When Blair took over we were heading for a surpluss. He did little to the economic policy and we achieved a surplus shortly after he took over. Then almost as quickly as we went into surplus out came the cheque book and the blank cheques started flying. The size of the public sector swelled to un-sustainable proportions, the size of the benefits bill exploded and the NHS continued on its downward spiral despite the increasing amount of cash thrown at it. Then the global financial crisis happened which we were wholly unprepared for financially, and that has completely screwed us.

One thing is certain, politicians can't manage a P-up in a brewery, but ultimately no body knows what to do next. We are in uncharted territory so there are no experts or expert opinions, just educated guesses amongst a defeaning roar of uneducated guesses. It's a low level state of panic.

The two things are not necessarily linked. You would have thought that to raise tax income you raise taxes wouldn't you? But he reality is not that. If you raise taxes the rich go elsewhere and those that remain tighten their belts stop spending and the GDP drops resulting in a lower tax intake and triggers a recession. Been done before and failed spectacularly and no reason why it would work if tried again. It really is not that easy or simple. No-one knows the answer, but one thing we can do is to control our spending hence austerity.

the NHS continued on its downward spiral despite the increasing amount of cash thrown at it.

My problem with Austerity is it only seems to apply to a small proportion of the country with the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer.

Dont get me wrong I have no problem with a meritocracy but the present vast difference in lifestyles is unhealthy and will divide society. Thats not good for anyone.

@aa without wishing to get distracted

[img] [/img]

@wilburt "rich" wealth is mostly in assets rather than income and with ultra low interest rates asset values are going up. Globalisation and things like gig economy are undermining income / employment opportunities of low and increasingly middle income earners in developed countries.

But we do know how much tax isn't collected, from the figures out there corporate tax "measures" cost more than the amounts of benefit fraud, we already have high earning celebs paying minimal tax through various off shore mechanisms. Collecting the tax as prescribed and removing some loop holes would be effective and increase the tax income without need for increase in tax rates

Great in theory, but what if they are abiding with EU tax rules? We can't just make up our own rules you know...

@jamba

I didnt just mean the seriously rich, even the the difference in lifestyles between comfortable working families and people in areas without opportunity is stark.
I travel frequently between London, Suffolk, Otley and then Halifax.

I have family in all four places and the first three could be different planet from the last one. The life chances are a fraction of the others if you find yourself in some shit estate in Halifax.
The best advice I have for family around there is move and dont look back. Some can do that and some cant.

Great in theory, but what if they are abiding with EU tax rules? We can't just make up our own rules you know...

We can't just make up our own rules you know...

Bullshit.

tjagain - Member

The whole debt and deficit is a tory mirage
1) they are not reducing debt or deficit

That's not right, the deficit has been going down since 2010.

[img] [/img]

In other countries private savings compensate or match public debt, notably Japan and to some extent European neighbours.

Edit: the answer is to tax those with the ability to pay, but the tories are turning the UK (and Jersey, malta, Gibralta, IOM etc.) into tax havens. I saw an Italian on TV accusing London of being the center of European money laundering and tax evasion.

London is one of the biggest financial centres in the world and we do get up to all sorts of skullduggery for anyone who'll pay and at least try to fence the money before we deal with it - but in my experience most city types wouldn't give a shit if it came in blood splattered piles of cash as long as they could claim they were only playing by the rules and if they didn't do it someone else would.

It's what we do in the world.

@aa without wishing to get distracted

Austerity, deficit, debt - where are we?

Honestly FUBAR.....Why well take

National Citizenship scheme part of the big society aimed at 16 yes to develop their social consciousness and citizenship roughly a three week summerscheme with a residential ...1 billion granted for this term in parliament... All targets missed, planned 75 million spend on media, Local Authority work with young people aka youth services especially those needing early intervention and help or support total cut in local authorities since 2007 approx 450 million....

Where has the rest of the money appeared from for this scheme? In a time of austerity