Inflation to hit 15%

[onthefencesitter]

www.independent.co.uk/news/business/inflation-bank-england-cost-living-b2137311.html

www.theguardian.com/business/2022/aug/03/uk-inflation-could-reach-15-by-start-of-2023-experts-say

What do you all think?

Putin has a lot of power atm in terms of wrecking havoc globally but other countries are more exposed. If they get direct supply of energy from Russia or wait in grain shipments as is happening currently for poorer countries. Otherwise a food catastrophe.

yes we will see higher prices due to global market but in terms of exposure it’s those who rely on grain and fuel who can be really hit hard

She’s saying what the (very right wing) Tory party members want to hear so that she’ll get elected, which is why she frightens everyone else

Excellent post. The Tories have been awful since 2010, yet are still voted in and yet seem surprised by what happens.
Furlough went on far too long, our children will now pay for it.
This country is known as UK PLC. We don’t produce anything, industry as all but gone.
This country makes money from the financial sector.
Its the bankers who run the country. It’s the bankers who send our troops to war zones, like pawns in political games of chess.

This is corporate Britain. The people at the top are getting richer yet everyone else getting poorer.

Ive never voted Labour but would vote them in next time. Can we please kick the Tories out. Liz Truss will be awful. I want a GE. I want then Tories to atleast lose a majority.

Please watch videos what Mick Lynch and Eddie Dempsey are saying from the RMT. I have no connection to trains nor do I use them but look at what they’re saying.
They want to make a movement to stop what’s going on with the elite in this country.
Companies making billions of profits, whilst being funded by tax payers. Off shore accounts, like money going to the Caymen islands.
Whilst the poorer in society are paying for it

Didn't Truss used to be a liberal democrat? I'm not a fan of Sunak or Truss but I don't know how Sunak could be construed as being a socialist unless being fiscally sensible on taxation and spending makes him a socialist. He has the very unsocialist Nigel Lawson and Michael Howard backing him.

Exactly this.

Yes. However I was speaking to a friend and they reckon and all their colleagues reckon if Truss gets in we will avoid a recession. He’s a tradesperson who works for a mid size building firm. Not a Tory voter but I’m sure his boss and many colleagues are fully paid up members, however if this is the view of lots of business owners it made me stop and think for a moment.

The higher end of those industries will be fine - those businesses used by the very wealthy. I agree the mid and lower end will be hit. I think a lot of people have their heads in the sand though, I'm expecting things to hit once those big gas and electricity bills come in later in the year.

Personally, I'm already doing things like extending time between hair apps. Taking packed lunches on day trips, rather than eating in cafes. I cut down on subscriptions, although kept the NT one for free parking.

Yes! She's an utter idiot. She'll be nothing more than a patsy for the ERG headbangers and the disaster capitalists who would fuck the country over to make a few bob.

I have never felt more despondent about the way the country is heading in all my 66 years.

The U.K. is state funded extreme capitalism. I don’t know how we’ve reached this point without most the electorate realising. Society is far more unequal than the 70s! Some of the poverty in my small rural SW town is despicable Families are turning fridges off, have stopped buying fresh food altogether and we are collecting coats and warm things because families will be needing them indoors this winter. If the economy is movement of money, why do we allow people to hoard such extreme wealth?

If we have the kind of government I expect Liz Truss to lead, I think it will hit 15%. If we had a sensible government, regardless of which party, it need not do so.

Reduce VAT not income or corporation tax, and have some restrictions on those who are ripping off people with large increases, and inflation could remain in single figures.

Older public sector colleagues remember getting two substantial pay rises a year in the 1970s.

There was a point where I got a pay rise every month for 3 consecutive months. My salary doubled in less than 2 years. I was 19-21, living in a cheap rented flat and have never had so much disposable income ever since.

The bit of the public sector I worked in was gas supply. It was a nationalised industry and price rises had to be approved by the government. If operating costs rose to the point where prices wouldn't cover them, the price to the customer was subsidised by the government. If they made a "profit", it went back to the government unless it was used to fund infrastructure improvements.

Seems like an attractive concept now.

I fully agree. Rishi hasn't a clue. There are over 3 million self employed/freelancers/casual workers who weren't given covid support yet are now expected to pay more tax/nic and suffer the same inflation as those who were well supported. Out of what? Many have lost their savings, some lost their homes/businesses.

It's true, furlough is an inherent part of lockdown. That isn't an inherently pro or anti lockdown point either, just practicalities. If the state wants the population to stay at home as much as possible to reduce contacts, and is closing entire sectors to that end, that also requires enough of the population to be paid well enough to keep them at home and peaceful. Ie, not UC rates. Obviously this had consequences.

That's not to say there are no changes that could've been made. Rishi managed to enrich his mates, and excluded millions of self employed people from support. But inherently, if we were to have lockdown in March 2020 that meant fairly generous financial support was a necessity, and it also meant it was going to have to be a fairly cobbled together and thus inefficient scheme because we hadn't planned for it. There wasn't a way around that.

Fab post, and I totally agree.

I especially love this -

"blame the poor for its problems, while the rich dance a jig with the proceeds of crime"

Positively poetic!

@ApplesandBunions

But inherently, if we were to have lockdown in March 2020 that meant fairly generous financial support was a necessity, and it also meant it was going to have to be a fairly cobbled together and thus inefficient scheme because we hadn't planned for it. There wasn't a way around that.

At first, yes, they had to cobble together schemes in a hurry. But months passed and then we were into a second year of lockdowns/restrictions, but the Govt didn't revisit the schemes to help those excluded, nor did they act to stop the abuse/fraud of the loan schemes by criminals which was obviously happening that cost several billion that will never be recovered.

In the second year, some of the excluded were "included" after tax returns were submitted for the earlier year, but they were still excluded from getting back-dated support for the earlier year, and only got the lower grants for year 2, so were basically left without support for the first year, which it turned out, they were eligible for after all!

At the end of the day, billions of pounds were given to people who didn't need it and criminals. And 3 million people didn't get the support they should have been entitled to. They had months, in fact over a year, to sort out the fundamental flaws, but they didn't bother. To make things worse, Rishi lied in Parliament about it!

I agree with the flaws and the mismanagement part, but with the self employed a line has to be drawn. (And should have been for companies as well as people made a mockery of the loans and fraud)

if someone’s buisness (being self employed) isn’t stable, or financially viable it’s not the job of the government to prop it up. Where the argument stacks up for some businesses is that they would exist if it wasn’t for lockdown.

Some people got shafted hard especially those who just changed jobs prior to first lockdown and ended up on furlough with no payments

Serves "us" right. "We" voted like morons for Brexit and for Tory governments. What, did "we" really expect the Conservative party to give a crap about poor, or even ordinary people? How on Earth can anyone be surprised or upset or angry at how things are? The country is run by a tiny minority bent on lining its own pockets. The "people" are simply fodder for money making.
I pray my DC chose to live elsewhere.

Not for us! We got a house we could never have dreamed of affording which is already worth another 60k on what we paid.

Trades are one of the last bastions of the 'real' working class.
Work with your hands and head. They also seem to vote Tory now as well.
The trades atm are doing well, some costs are up, but bundling materials are popular. Costs are up but so rates.
If the demand for trade contracts then a recession is on its way. At the moment inquiries are still high.

UK plc has a free-riding problem at the bottom and the top of the income strata.

Yup but we've done what we can to prepare have taken out a 10 year fixed rate mortgage, bought a new car that will last 10years and is paid off in 5 so we don't have to get finance anytime soon. Decently paid NHS (not matching what I could earn privately but that's another argument) in an area we can't get qualified staff so not worried about job loses.

The only comfort is other than gas commodity prices are starting to fall which should help to slow inflation. I think for those working in normal jobs it's not a crisis between heating or eating it's more an issue of fairness. Why should we be forced to cut back on luxury or saving because we aren't getting an inflation linked pay rise yet benefits are going up 10%.

I also think some people are very liberal with the hearing, we have a 5 bedroom detached with a hot tub last month we paid £161 for both on the price cap. Winter normally adds £50 to the bill looking back. If I turned the hot tub off it would have been more like £90 a month in summer. We don't scrimp on gas or electric and I'm sure the 9 year old doesn't no what a light switch is!

It's also a question of how long 15% lasts if we can drive it down without stifling the economy it could be very short lived, be interesting to see how the government tackles it. The drive for low carbon could benefit us, rapid building of nuclear power and export of gas from the North Sea could help inflation and let us pay off some of the COVID debt. Be interested in a party that offer grants for air source heat pumps and solar panels to tackle higher bills vs the current stupidly of printing more money to chuck at the problem.

Politically putting money directly into bank accounts seems to not work. Now Johnson has gone we’re less likely to see it again.

It was a mn attempt to get favour but it’d never work

It doesn't work. Johnson was fiscally left of left. Handing money out for free. It was fine short-term. Long term it's a disaster.

The Ukraine War and Russia using Energy as a Seige tactic was highly predictable since 2014 when Russia invaded the Crimea. But our shortsighted style of politics hyped up my the media circus and leaping from one crisis to the next meant as a nation (and across Europe) we did nothing the prepare for it, or better still make it futile for Russia to invade the Ukraine. We have allowed ourselves to get into a weak position which has created this opening for Putin.

So no need for anyone to cool it complaining about the energy crisis and the precarious position it will be put many, of the most vulnerable, people in.

@Cyw2018 they won't stop tho it's click bait for the big news organisations