To think there is no more money?

[Rainbowsponge]

And Labour have admitted this.

So many threads saying X or Y needs to be ‘properly funded’ (even though most of the time our spending is actually in line with comparable countries), but no acknowledgment of the fact there’s no money to spend.

And when you bring it up, posters completely ignore you or accuse you of being Jacob Rees Mogg

Wouldn’t the quality of debate be improved if we stopped burying our heads in the sand?

Your reading comprehension is very poor. Please read my post again before being confrontational and only quoting what you choose to.

It is poor, yes. Sorry.

We are 29th in the world but wanting public services of the top few.

A lot of these things can be partly to blame it is not either/ or

The only way is to completely alter the economy and that would take cross party support ( so never going to happen ).

People say means testing pensions will never happen because older people won't vote for it but what would happen if all parties put it in their manifesto?

You haven't got a clue how much money is there! Neither has anyone else except the government itself. Are you choosing to believe dodgy sources making a statement like that? Labour have been in power for only 3 weeks and they've already done a lot of good. I know it might suit some voters to believe the worse in them but after only 3 weeks it's ridiculous, I didn't vote Labour by the way

You're evading the point.

Even if not true of the past though, I think going forward everyone need to be slow to go to the state for help & try first to manage without

I just think there’s too much nuance. Is it wrong for the cash poor pensioner in the 1m house to claim pension credit? What about the nurse who earns a decent wage but is paying high rent so needs housing benefit. I guess I’m asking where is the line re getting help from the state?

Like many others I pay more into my pension to reduce my tax burden, Should I not do this?

People say means testing pensions will never happen because older people won't vote for it but what would happen if all parties put it in their manifesto?

Cant see the Tories turning off their core voters.

No, I’m really not.

There will come a time they will need to.

Means testing pensions would accelerate people early retiring who would just be over the means test. Spend pension, then get state pension. This is what i would do.
I would also sue for the extra NI I paid.

The OBR and ONS publish nearly all the data which analysts use all the time so Labour would have known what was going on.

@Mumoftwo1316

"A country's money is way more fluid, you can sell more bonds or tweak the interest rates or whatever."

Selling more bonds (which are effectively IOUs with interest) is simply increasing debt. Tweaking the interest rates is no longer possible since the independence of the Bank of England. And even if you did manage to tweak them then the exchange rate markets would drop the pound causing higher inflation.

I would also sue for the extra NI I paid.

How would that work?

@Circumferences

"Suddenly there is a fucking magic money tree for the pandemic and no one says anything."

The fucking magic money tree for the pandemic was actually called increasing the national debt by £500 billion from £2 trillion to £2.5 trillion. So much so that the interest bill on this debt is the same as the entire education budget.

To put £500 billion into context if you dropped a pound in to a very large jam jar every second it would take 11 days to get to a million. To get to a billion would take 31 years and to get to £500 billion would take 15,500 years or 13000 BC which was the Stone Age and a full 10,000 years before the pyramids were built.

People, mainly older women who worked part time or did not work when their children were little as there was no childcare support. Have been encouraged to pay extra NI to increase their state pension. If they were no longer eligible, these mainly women would want that additional NI reimbursed.

Well we have the wrong people in government then. Tax hikes yes, but the benefit system will definitely have more money thrown at it.

People, mainly older women who worked part time or did not work when their children were little as there was no childcare support. Have been encouraged to pay extra NI to increase their state pension. If they were no longer eligible, these mainly women would want that additional NI reimbursed.

What about everyone else who paid NI?

@Towelmode everyone who works pays NI. This was voluntary additional NI to make up for years you were not working. And it mainly affects older low paid mothers. Indirect sex discrimination if it is not honoured or reimbursed. I am pretty confident the court would agree.

Eventually, yes. But I get the sense that Reeves, Streeting, Milburn (as Streeting’s adviser) and Kendall will all try to cut spending, probably as stealthily as possible, in the short-medium term.

Labour are in a better political position to do this than the Tories were.

(Of course, if that does happen none of MN’s Labour Praetorian Guard will admit to any of it.)

According to 2023 statistics, there are only 165 billionaires in the UK, and they, having the most resources and homes overseas, can and do leave, very easily.

How much do you think you can tax 165 people before they get fed up and move away.

Taxing corporations is easier, but not much.

Exactly. Nobody would save for retirement if pensions were means tested. Why would you put away ££ every month for a pension, while your neighbour put away £0 and gets their pension provided by the state?

All the freebies were spent during Covid when people were screaming to be furloughed and stay at home to bake banana bread and watch Netflix.

Lockdowns cost the taxpayer £1 trillion. Yes that’s right. That’s a lot of zeros at the end of that number. The same people that wanted longer and harder lockdown and furlough for fun then squealed like trapped rodents when rampant inflation followed. They then wanted more freebies. Which they got. And now wonder why there’s no money left.

Money really does not grow on trees. There is only 3 ways to get it.

Earn it. This country certainly not doing that with 6 million people on out of work benefits. And less than half the population not being net contributors paying for everyone else.

Borrow it. The national debt is now more than 100% of GDP. The country borrow almost £20b a month to most for welfare and debt interest. A total Ponzi scheme.

Print it. The country printed so much free money since 2008 that printing anymore will turn it into Venezuela.

So guess what. There really is no money left. The freebies have run out.

And if they hadn't mismanaged the situation so badly in the early days they wouldn't have had to spend it. But they did, so they found the magic money tree and spent it. If they perceive that spending money is necessary or advantageous, they find the money. They just don't think that our public services are necessary enough.

Oh don't, you will have the people on soon saying we can print as much money as we want..cos we issue our own currency.