To think Rishi is right - the government cannot be everything to everyone?

[Cuppasoupmonster]

Don’t get me wrong, the Tory government hasn’t tried to be anything let alone everything.

But I think he was right when he said there’s too much reliance on the state to provide for each and every issue the public face.

We could free up a lot of funds by taxing big corporations properly, cracking down on non doms etc. But even then, I’m not convinced the socialist utopia of generous benefits, a five star NHS, cheap and available high quality public housing, instant mental health support etc that is often discussed on here could ever be financially viable.

AIBU?

What about corporations? You can only tax corporations who are based in the UK. Corporations are footloose. It’s not hard for them to up and base themselves anywhere and route all profits through low tax jurisdictions.

By the way, oil and gas sector already pays 30% in tax, more than any another sector. And also the windfall tax.

NHRTT but perhaps OP might have a look where anyone recently has asked the government 'to do everything' that might make this response reasonable instead of being a cynical media management exercise. Just repeating the same unreasonable statement Liz or Boris said a few months ago?

Perhaps what people wanted was the bare minimum government competence instead of the lowest economic growth and productivity amongst comparable nations, highest inflation and 12 years of deliberate decisions that has led to the relative impoverishment of the majority (c 33% cut in real incomes) while enabling the richest 1% to accrue an additional £2.5tn in wealth.

All features rather than side effects of a series of policy decisions.

Where it will now get interesting is that the absence of competence has impacted on the wealth of the richest by a reduction in asset prices and pensions and because the recession is impacting on the larger corporates who used to be the primary focus of government priorities but now are second order stakeholders but still important enough to shake the government tree.

The government's preference will be more austerity and erosion of incomes of the majority but their stakeholders are perhaps thinking what the effects of this on consumer spending might lead to in corporate turnover and profits.

Perhaps people might look at the per capita GDP and relative spending power in comparable economies to wonder whether austerity the return will improve the UK economy? Just remember we can't pay what we can't afford, there's no such thing as a magic money tree, the government can't do absolutely everything and all the other apparently reasonable marketing statements dreamt up to hide monumental incompetence.

What was the Daily Mail;s headlines the day of/the day following Liz's fiscal event statement before even the rich realised the adverse effects on their wealth?....... Bonanza.

Privatisation was a big mistake, as was PFI, as was right to buy. The government has spent too long being everything to the private sector. Somehow though it’s always working people at fault, never the rich ones who have been ripping off the public purse for years. They need to stop giving public money away and use it to build infrastructure everyone can use

What do you mean take money for elsewhere? Where is this elsewhere? They sell services and goods and are paid for doing so? They’re not taking it from under people’s mattresses.

And your magic money tree analogy really doesn’t work here. Private sector actually creates wealth. The magic money tree is the government printing press that’s printing away for 14 years, causing this inflation.

There is a difficult line to walk between ease of access and the possibility of fraud. Can you imagine the fall out if people could not get approved?

Other countries did have some of those same problems, or issues where people claimed and it was later clawed back. I know someone here in Canada, a person who is fairly close to being indigent, who claimed income supplement, and was then dinged with a $30.000 bill when tax time came. They garnished his welfare payment which made it far too tiny to live on. He wasn't being fraudulent, they encouraged people who thought they should qualify to apply.

I'm not sure why you think an earlier lockdown would have made any difference, it didn't anywhere else.

Did we have a glorious time under the Labour government?

Comparatively yes.

This thread is indicative of everything that is wrong with what we expect from government. People here are falling over themselves demanding that government should tax the rich and corporations more. The hammer and sickle crowd are protesting that the government isn’t getting enough taxes.

Rather than demanding to know where the existing taxes are being spent, since we have the highest post war tax burden right now. There is no moral outrage about the fact that the latest round of borrowing is to pay for people’s energy bills because the government failed to build nuclear power 10 years ago. No moral outrage that they printed half a trillion pounds to lock up healthy people at home and destroy the economy. No moral outrage that the tax burden is about to go up because growth has been so weak.

No, just tax people more. Which people? Anyone but us of course.

The only way to fix the issue with companies who earn huge amounts, but don’t pay their staff enough, is to alter or stop tax credits/UC. Many companies get away with only offering part-time hours, but equally, many employees refuse to work over the minimum hours too. I’m pretty sure that was suggested a while ago by the government, but quickly u-turned due to the outrage. Realistically though, a couple who are both able bodied adults only being required to work 16 hours between them per week is pretty ridiculous.

I think its just a lazy copout. From a government who are nothing to anyone who isn't one of their rich mates.

It is not about expecting the Government to provide everything - nobody expects that.

Actually rather a lot do expect that, and I think that is what the OP is getting at. Everyone thinks that whatever need/want it is that they are passionate about should be funded by the government, but the reality is that there is not an endless source of money for everything.

Not RTFT but I don't for one second expect the government to bail me out/prop me up.

I do expect the government to not make my financial situation worse through their actions and to fix any issues that they might have caused.

Agreed!

Altering UC will do fuck all to makes companies pay more.

And do you have any idea how expensive childcare is? It’s easy to see why people work 16 hours a week. When my dc were preschool age, childcare exceeded my mortgage. And that’s before we get to the huge levels of hidden unpaid care.

Most people do not expect that. It’s a minority - a tiny one.

Tax me more.

it’s funny how the best you’ve got is to make stupid references to communism.

says a lot.

If the cap fits….

It demonstrates a base/misguided understanding of politics. Like calling a Tory a Fascist.

I was thinking the bit where he shouts: "WELL YOU'RE NOT PERFECT YOUSELF".

Rishi is just trying to get everyone prepared for all the tax rises and austerity that are about to land on 17th November.

The government are, rather tragically, trying to portray themselves as the responsible saviours after the Truss/ Kwarteng disaster. This is jolly far from the truth as Rishi was the chancellor who presided over ridiculous levels of money printing during the pandemic. The Tory party has been in power for 13 years and made countless major errors which are also entirely glossed over (not that other governments before them were that much better). Why has there been no energy planning? Why was the money from the N Sea oil used on tax cuts for the city boys? Why was council housing sold off and the stock not replenished? Why was UK manufacturing closed down? Why was their grand plan for the UK economy to sell off all our assets to foreigners and put rockets under the housing market? Why was there so much 'temporary' QE and ZIRP?
So much greed and dishonesty and utter incompetence.

Neo-liberalism is the answer to many of those failures. A misguided belief that private is better for everything.

I don't want the state to do everything. I want them to sort out the health service and help people at the bottom of society and I certainly feel that food banks are a fairly recent development, bloody madness. Life wasn't a Utopia under Labour but waiting times were going down, Sure Start centres were bloody brilliant and quite frankly I'd rather be in the 90s than the 2020's.

YANBU at all

Agreed. Neoliberalism has clearly been a huge failure.

Government took taxpayer's money, or borrowed money that taxpayers will have to pay back, and handed it to their friends, e.g. failed Test and Trace, PPI, Serco given billions old pounds for covid testing contracts which could have stayed within NHS (although most of that is run by private providers now anyway). Completely careless and just spunking money away.

Rishi stupidly stopped stamp duty during covid, giving more money away and making house prices rise in a time of economic uncertainty, when they should have stagnated or gone down a bit.

Basically this country is being stripped bare by the Conservatives and they have money for their rich friends, and make decisions that fuck up the majority of the population.

We could free up a lot of funds by taxing big corporations properly, cracking down on non doms etc. But even then, I’m not convinced the socialist utopia of generous benefits, a five star NHS, cheap and available high quality public housing, instant mental health support etc that is often discussed on here could ever be financially viable

Yeah much better to keep everyone sick and sad, better for everyone. 🥱