To wonder if it's possible to have an open and Frank discussion in UK about immigration

[DoeEyedNear]

And not have it shut down by people saying it's racist to discuss immigration. Not just here but in the press any mention of immigration and any debate is shut down with "can't say that it's racist"

It's not about forgery. Yes the Police could arrest you for "no papers" if we made ID cards compulsory (and made it compulsory to carry at all times) but there isn't the will there. Police don't have the will or the resources so they try to pass it on to the Border Force who haven't got any resources either - that wouldn't change just because we made everyone carry a bit of plastic.

We have ID cards for immigrants already, but they are largely ignored by the Police and border folk - introducing them for everyone wouldn't solve anything, it would just be costly and inconvenience the law-abiding whilst not addressing the real issues.

The real issue is a sizeable black economy with no real will on the part of those in authority to tackle it.

We already have these -

www.gov.uk/biometric-residence-permits/overview

Having to carry ID at all times would have had me in prison more times than I like to think, as I am a world-record holder for losing things.

The poorer you are in the UK the higher a proportion of your income you pay in tax. Income tax is just one chunk of UK tax revenue. We have lots of other regressive taxes eg VAT which penalise the poor more than the wealthy.

Athenaviolet do you have evidence to support this statement? It is an honest question. Given that vat is for everyone and income tax is highest for high earners i would be surprised if high earners pay a lower percentage than low earners.

Here you go, Nolim.
www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/the-graph-that-shows-how-the-poor-are-paying-more-than-the-rich-in-tax-10353982.html

I'm not really qualified to contribute to the debate on immigration but I am always puzzled by the comment that we need increasing immigration to ensure that pensions are paid. Does this, however, not become an increasingly elaborate ponzi scheme?
Surely, all those who are currently contributing (and not) have a right to expect that others will contribute to ensure pensions are paid in the future and the bottom of the pyramid has to get bigger and bigger.
Or have I missed the point completely? Happy to be enlightened as I genuinely don't get it.

Needmorespace - When pensions were devised the old died sooner so they were not paid for long, and the young reproduced faster, so there wasn't an issue economically until that trend reversed. Now most of us need to wait extra years to get our state stipend, and population growth is encouraged by other means, ie immigration. I don't think globalism was a twinkle in anyone's eye when all this was thought up, it was just part of the original welfare state plan - cradle to grave - for the British.

Wrt immigration, I am the child of immigrants, albeit from Ireland which will of necessity always have a special status in the UK. I have close friends from nearly all the current and prior immigration groups. I don't know any illegal immigrants. My concern is for all of Europe, not just SE England, and I feel quite negative about it from the perspective of retaining all the individual European countries' indigenous cultures, not to mention our enlightened, and Enlightenment, values. The numbers do not indicate this will be possible. I miss hearing English spoken outside.

Garlick, the other chart indicates that the culprit is indirect taxation in the form of levies on cigarettes, alcohol etc. which naturally take a bigger bite from those on lower incomes as they are flat rate taxes.

Needmorespace - the whole world economy is a giant Ponzi scheme. It only works if population and gdp grows year on year

Make as much money as you can, and convert the money into assets before it all comes crumbling down! The elite know it will burst at some point which is why the housing market in London is out of control for example. We are in a giant asset grab phase that preceeds a big crash

A bit late but mollie123 said on page 3 "British men/women fought in the war alongside commonwealth countries but we-their grandchildren need visas to visit them(Australia/NZ) and cannot just immigrate there unless rich/required skill etc"

This is totally inaccurate:

(1) Brits fighting "alongside" Commonwealth citizens in the war is a bit bloody rich! we came from the ends of the earth to fight for Britain in wars that had absolutely nothing to do with us! "Where Britain goes we go" etc (in fact NZ declared war on Germany first because of the dateline!) and you slam the visa door in our faces! Bloody cheek.

(2) You don't need a visa to visit NZ, British citizens can enter under the visa waiver for up to 6 months on holiday.

(3) Out of interest I looked at NZ visa requirements - if I was a Brit wanting to obtain a skilled visa, with my age, qualifications, work experience I'd be home and hosed on points. Yet Britain won't let me in. Rude. (Am not looking to come back but it would be nice to have the option, I love London and it makes me sad to think I'll never live there again.)

Also, how dumb to deprive yourself of a well-educated, easily assimilated, source of young, English-speaking labour who have no access to benefits (NHS aside) & generally go home after a few years' anyway? Kiwis and Aussie are the perfect immigrants.

Need more space- pension rights are tied to NI contributions but this makes people believe that they pay into a pot during their working lives which is then drawn on when they retire. In fact pensions are paid from current taxation.

This was fine when there was the post war baby boom as the proportion of workers to dependents was high.

The problem started when the baby boomers had much smaller families than their parents and gps.

The birth rate fell below 2 and the dependency ratio increased so now there aren't enough workers to pay the taxes needed to pay the pensions of the upcoming baby boomers as they start to retire. This is going to be an even bigger economic problem than the 2008 crash and Germany is the worst affected.

Even now we are supposedly in recovery, tax takings are low because of low pay and insecure employment. Young people aren't starting ft employment until several years later than a generation ago. Women are having DCs later which is slowing down the workers replacement rate. Older people are living longer, and longer with high cost conditions and are less likely to be cared for for free by relatives than a generation ago.

So less money in + higher costs out = a pensions crisis.

I imagine soon enough we will abolish the non means tested pension like Australia and means test the adult children for care costs of the elderly like Germany. There they even send old people to homes in Poland to cut costs!

Tax paying working age migrants coming here on mass is is probably the only solution that will have time to work to avoid economic disaster in Europe in 30 years time.

For a population to stay stable it needs a reproduction ratio of 2.1 (2.1 children per woman)

Hong Kong has dropped to 1.1 : its population will halve in a generation without immigration. And most of those people will be old, non productive, drawing on the state.

Greece has dropped to 1.3 : its population will halve in under two generations - leaving LOTS of pensioners drawing from a shrinking tax pool.

Bringing in immigrants raises the ratio of workers to pensioners. Getting those immigrants to work while having children does even more good.

Without Immigrants, Europe will have equal numbers of pensioners and workers within 50 years.
That is clearly not going to work if we want to maintain any sort of civic society.

There won't be such a thing as 'pensioners'. People will work until they are too sick/disabled to do so.

Japanese reproduction rate is 1.4 and they seem to be managing without immigration. (Just saying)

yeoldetrout
they seem to be managing without immigration
If you think so.
But once you start reading you'll see that their economy has stagnated for the last 20 years and that the proportion of older people is unsustainable.
Thousands of Japanese businesses are zombies and the agricultural sector died a decade ago.
But hey, they have kept the forriners out so that is all OK.

Data set here BTW
www.oecd.org/eco/surveys/economic-survey-japan.htm
Bold structural reforms are crucial to boost growth in the face of a rapidly ageing population and very high government debt.

I'm not sure everything is rosy for Japan:

AFR story

Japan is an economic & regional powerhouse.
yes they don't have growth, but...
Relatively few young people means high employment rates.
Their health care system is said to be excellent. They have some of the longest lifespans in the world, and fewest social problems.
I dunno, it just looks like end of decent quality of life for most, to me.
Also, all that in spite of 20 yrs of deflation (or whatever the deflation statistic is),
Certainly not an economic basket case country.

Well, their national debt is currently 220% of GDP, projected to rise to 400% by 2040 without huge structural change. For comparison, ours is around 76%. Greece's is 177%.

A tiny 3% increase in consumption tax a few years back threw the economy into recession, meaning the planned further increase (to only 10% from 8%) has been postponed.

It's all pretty fragile and economic policy is focused on driving down borrowing costs. Abenomics hasn't really delivered, and Angel Gurria recently described the situation as 'two decades of economic malaise'.

The costs of the ageing population are funded largely through debt.

There are pluses for Japan. Their elderly are far, far healthier than ours, needing less acute care despite longer lifespans, thanks to better diet and lifestyles.

Their extremely low birth rate means savings on education and juvenile health care which aren't seen here.

Relatively few young people means high employment rates.
But married Japanese women do not work.
Or have lots of children.

And productivity levels in Japan are pretty grim, potentially linked to lack of competition for jobs and corporate structures that don't encourage productivity and labour improvements. Abe launched a new plan for this in the last few weeks I think.

I happen to work in public health, on (would you believe), challenges of Europe's ageing demographics.

Thus why I am so bored and less convinced than ever by the doom-mongering (about deflation, birth rates, immigration etc).

(says this immigrant, pausing to yell at youngest of 4 DC to Get Orf the Table)

I'd rather be Japanese than Greek, that's for sure.

I'd rather be Japanese than Greek, that's for sure.

Yep, me too. But painting Japan as some sort of economic role model is just a bit bizarre.

I mean, I'm not generally worried about UK debt levels, and certainly weary of the ongoing hysteria over the national debt here.

But Japan's trajectory is scary. There's only so much that can be achieved with monetary policy in the absence of pretty serious structural reform.

um, economic role model? I just said they were managing okay, not end of the world conditions.
Does managing okay = "fantastic economic role model",
I am never going to get the hang of British understatement, am I?

But Japan is not managing OK.
Its kicking the can down the road and storing up an almighty mess.