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"If you want to have things function and maintain social cohesion, you don't want vast population movements. You need fiscal transfers. That means regional subsidies, benefits payments, tax breaks to allow individuals to keep going in tough times.

"The EU has a system like this, but it's very small: half a percent of GDP. In the UK it's 3 to 8 percent of GDP, something like six to 15 times as big. If you're going to make the euro function, you're going to need much larger transfers from the richer parts of Europe — like Germany and Northern Italy — to poorer parts — like Greece, Southern Italy, and Spain."

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economics OR immigration - no, both and they interact
The economics zone
EMU (European Monetary Union) and inflation – a civil liberty issue
A citizen's wage

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economics OR immigration - no, both and they interact

Much of recent debate on staying or leaving the EU has related to either whether immigration should continue or be curtailed, and on the UK economy and whether it will worsen or improve after exiting the EU.

do immigrants take work, making less available for others?

Many of the UK population do not do waged work - some are children, others are pensioners, others are doleys, and others keep house.

Of sixty incomers, they will take up, say, twenty-two jobs to provide income for themselves and dependants. This has nothing to do with the jobs of the population at large. As the incomers tend to be young and ambitious, it is more likely they'll produce a surplus and thus add to the wealth of the native population.

The incomers will build houses and change the sheets of incontinent old men, while paying taxes on top.

They will not "steal your jobs". This concept is irrational and economic nonsense.

Incomers may well make the country more crowded, but they are very unlikely to lower the standard of living, until they in turn become pensioners. At this time, more young vigorous workers will be needed, a form of Ponzi scheme, or by then robots will be changing bed sheets.

Immigration is not one problem. It is refugees, it is economic migrants and more seriously, it is aggressive Islamism.
Immigration is not a separate issue from economics.

migration in a global context

Britain is no longer powerful, however romantically people may hope and wish otherwise. Uncontrolled flows of people are becoming the norms across the world. The power of governments to stop them are increasingly limited.

The powers in Europe are widely concerned by the invasion. For example, they are seeking to bribe the border states to stop the flows.

Those countries that do have more control are islands: Britain, Japan, Australia, the USA; but moderated by the mad socialist cloud cuckoo cult - socialism.
Then there are the dictatorships like North Korea, Pootinland [Russia] and Saudi Arabia. Invariably, these are poor and nasty.

First, referendum voters must decide where they want to go. If they do not, sure as blazes, they won't get there.
At present, people are playing with fire like a blissfully ignorant child.

protecting the 'workers' - the rich man in his castle

Meanwhile, there are those who can afford to live and move where they wish. And there are those who live as (rich) slaves worrying about the price of cabbages, and with little ability to buy a shed in London or New York. Politics is different for the rich man in his castle and the peasant in the cabbage fields.

Those that have the ability to think (most people do not) are much more free than the non-contemplative peasant.

It is a mockery and a lie that all people are 'equal', most politicians sell out to filthy lucre and fancy chandeliers. The majority of the population do not live in that world and never will.
Noblesse oblige. I do not believe an EU exit will benefit the 'peasantry'.

My concerns are for those who cannot compete, the drawers of water and the hewers of wood.

'The economy' is not 'one thing', it looks very different to the lord in his castle and to the peasant outside his gate.
The peasants cannot compete with the German and Japanese robots, nor with the starving peasants of Asia.

The EUSSR and wealth transfers are mechanisms for protecting European 'peasants'.
(A big problem at present is German 'greed'. They would rather milk southern Europe countries than aid them. At the same time, of course like any doley, southern Europe countries will always want more.

motivations of politicians

Politicians want votes. A higher minimum wage could act as a lever in income redistribution.
I want a citizen's wage. It is a grave error to confuse income redistribution with socialism.

Money value is primarily controlled by the Bank of England, that is the government. Money is about power, not accounting. Much of modern UK politics is managed decline. Much else is fairly educated unions like the medics trying to grab more money for themselves.

UK wages go up too much or too quickly will not make the UK uncompetitive. If people want to sell, they will lower prices, or work longer hours, or produce better goods using their intelligence. Or simply not sell the product.

the immigration 'bogeyman'

The UK has the choices, within bounds, to increase or decrease immigration. It is the wealthy of the Middle East and Africa who can afford £6000 to cross the Channel. That means self-selection of the more successful. The alternative is North Korea and guns along the coasts, or go live in Serbia.

The way to slow immigration is to vote in a Socialist government and destroy the economy again. People are coming to the UK because the Conservative government are improving the economy and opportunities.

on the imminent UK/EU referendum

Ever increasingly, the only Outer who seems mentally focussed is Nigel Farage, and maybe he's tired and emotional. My reasons for staying in are not based on the popular 'arguments', but the attempts by the Outers are reinforcing my inclinations, not undermining them . But everyone wants something different, and most don't know what they really want, and most don't have a clue as to how to get it even if they did have a clue!

the unwieldy EU beast

"A map of the world that does not include Utopia is not worth looking at. So said Oscar Wilde, and I agree. So let me draw you a map of Eutopia, where Britain has taken its rightful place as the natural leader of Europe, and I will give you directions for how to get there.

"No British citizen has ever heard of this idealist possibility. Instead, in this EU referendum, we are faced with two dismal alternatives. Both are unacceptable. To remain is too frustrating. To leave is too frightening. No wonder the country is ambivalent, split 50/50, right down the middle.
[Quoted from Lord Saatchi , Daily Telegraph, 15 June 2016.]

No extreme is ever a happy state. In my view, presently, the EUSSR is big enough.

First is to make the EUSSR to be more moderate. Britain can teach that to Europe, a better objective than daft maunderings about immigration and 'economics'.

Britain is one of the greatest centres of soft power on the planet. That is the serious asset the UK has at present.

real reason for remain
britain's influence on and relationship to Europe (EU)

Britain has rescued the continent from foolishness twice in a century, and this goes back further.
Britain has driven the pragmatism if the enlightenment and factory production.
Britain has been the main centre of scientific advance.
Britain has better democratic institutions and experience thereof

The list of Britain's intellectual, moral, political influence goes on and on.
Britain has vastly forwarded and improved the wider world.

The EUSSR needs Britain more than Britain needs the EUSSR.

related material
on uk economics in or out of the eu
on immigrants and jobs
a citizen's wage
the economics zone
EMU (European Monetary Union) and inflation – a civil liberty issue
franchise by examination, education and intelligence

on immigrants and jobs

"of course, immigrants bring their jobs with them when they arrive."
says a correspondent.

They want a hospital, someone will have to work in it.
They want food, someone will have to grow it.
Every person consumes. Even 'Princess' Charlotte wants nappies changed, and someone to manufacture and change them.

Some, like her, consume more than they produce.
Some, therefore, produce more than they consume. The 'Princess' provides work for idle hands.

If the average production falls below average consumption, then the standard of living falls - or does it?

China is producing plastic bath ducks on a monumental scale, and with it they are choking in the pollution. Meanwhile, twits are trying to fish ducks out of fairground stalls and 'winning' plastic cars. Or they could be lying on the beach, sleeping or driving fast cars to round circuits to nowhere.

If average production rises, then average production and consumption of plastic ducks can rise, and Chinese peasants can swap their wages for bigger TV screens.

Immigrants produce jobs as well as consume jobs. Those considering, for instance, whether to stay in the EU or not, need to stop being distracted and decide whether they want more people or not. It is not about jobs.

"82% from Eastern Europe are working here [so] you cannot claim that migrants are taking jobs from those of us.
I mean how can you fault the migrant when he brings his own job from afar in his backpack?"

82% of what?
Tthe population of Poland? 82% of the jobs done in the UK?
Someone has to change old people's nappies when they become too crook to control their sphincters.

"...there comes a point at which men feel that amusement and ease are worth more than all other goods put together."
[Russell, 1920, p.28]
Or in more succinct form, 'Work is the curse of the drinking classes'.

related material
EMU (European Monetary Union) and inflation – a civil liberty issue

Quotation from Russell, Bertrand, The practice and theory of bolshevism
First published in 1920 by George Allen & Unwin. [6] 1995, Spokesman [Nottingham, UK], 0851245412 pbk / 0851245404 hbk £7.99 pbk / £30.00 hbk [amazon.co.uk] {advert}                    $67.50 hbk [amazon.com] {advert}

on uk economics in or out of the eu

For those still transfixed by the dishonest claims from EU Referendum Leave figure-heads, Boris Johnson and Michael Gove.

Does anyone still not understand that the UK is presently close to the level regarded as 'full-employment' as accepted by economists?
From where do you hope to get employees when the UK gets out of the EUSSR?

There is one certain way of slowing immigration, and that is elect another fascist 'new politics' Labour government to destroy the economy. The immigration will never stop while the Conservatives are building up the economy.

Does no-one understand another basic of economics? Not only do incoming workers tend to work and pay tax, they also build houses if the interfering planners let them. They also 'work' in the NHS (the best in the world!).

The modern world has changed. People can span the world on a £500 ticket. People (migrants/refugees) are paying fishermen £6000 just for a trip across the English Channel. Perhaps those adverse to immigration hope for a Kim, or a Chaves, or a Castro to put everyone off. Is Jeremy Corbyn a friend of such heroes of the revolution?

It is technology that changes societies, not philosophies, let alone the hands of slimers and dunces like Boris and Gove.

Not only can you fly around the world like an albatross, the robots are already mopping up the factory work. This is a process bound to accelerate unless the socialists are given another chance at turning Britain into a bee-hive or ant's nest.

The only (sane) ways to get rid of the indigent economically incompetent are to educate/train them for available work, or encourage them to work with a real citizen's wage in place of means tested 'benefits'.

related material
EMU (European Monetary Union) and inflation – a civil liberty issue
citizen’s wage
franchise by examination, education and intelligence

on trusting promises

"One of the biggest private pension funds in the country is almost out of money, and fresh out of options.

"The Central States Pension Fund has no new plan to avoid insolvency, fund director Thomas Nyhan said this week. Without government funding, the fund will run out of money in 10 years, he said.

"At that time, pension benefits for about 407,000 people could be reduced to "virtually nothing," he told workers and retirees in a letter sent Friday.

"In a last-ditch effort, the Central States Pension Plan sought government approval to partially reduce the pensions of 115,000 retirees and the future benefits for 155,000 current workers. The proposed cuts were steep, as much as 60% for some, but it wasn't enough. Earlier this month, the Treasury Department rejected the plan because it found that it would not actually head off insolvency."

Aa another example, every week the French state looks somewhere else to cut pensions or grab even more taxes.
As the wells run dry, so states try to suck even more water.
Eventually, the wells will run dry, while the productive side of economies can no longer keep up with the 'demands'.

related material
the economics zone

on disability cuts and middle-class tax breaks

The Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, was accused of

"taking money out of the pockets of some of the most vulnerable people in this country..."

There is zero evidence that the real incapacitated will lose out.

There are several medical conditions that incapacitate but they can, and often do, go into remission.

Some of the incapacity benefits provide cars. For instance, I know one handicapped fellow swanning around in a new BMW, despite earning well.

There are diseases, like some forms of M.S. and strokes, that can cripple the person for a period. The person then recovers in practical terms for many years, but their benefits continue.

Socialism has once more left a near bankrupt state in the UK. Only by getting more people into work, and so paying taxes, can large economic problems be corrected to any degree.

Socialism always spends the seed corn to bribe dependent client groups, and Socialism fails to invest in the future.

That is how Britain keeps falling well below its potential, and is steadily losing its standard of living built up by Conservative and Liberal governments in the long past.

It isn't those on benefits who are losing out, it those who work and build who are being undermined by a confiscatory Socialist cult who live in millionaire's houses and exploit the real poor and the real workers.

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the economics zone

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© abelard, 2016, 19 march
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