Westminstenders: PreGrades (Minority Report comes to the UK)

[RedToothBrush]

In Aug 2020, London, DC's prototype 'PreGrades' launched from the education department stops plebs before they go to university, reducing the social mobility rate to zero percent. Social mobility is predicted using specialized mutated humans, called "Teachers", who "predict" grades by marking shit lots of course work and exams over a period of years. Would-be social climbers are knocked down in a computer algorithm which distorts reality and hits the disadvantaged hardest. Central government is on the verge of adopting the controversial program nationwide by applying it in all departments from the DWP, the Home Office, the Department of Health and the Department of Justice to predict benefit fraud, getting sick asylum seeking and crime before it occurs.

DC's vision of the future is based on excellence being genetically ingrained into the elite but he must sell this vision to the unsuspecting public in a series of public votes which rely on the idea of the 'undeserving'. Little do they know that they too will be the victims of this plan until a mysterious bug appears and only the wealthy and well connected are able to get hold of adequate PPE and they are no longer able to buy bog roll nor retire to Spain as they had previously and endless queues for pizza form near Kent.

I'm 52 and I'm also not happy about the amount of debt my DDs and foster son are having to take on for their studies, but it is what it is. My late husband and I paid off our mortgage halfway through the term because we could and were overpaying before that. I did have a car on a PCP, but always treated that as long term car hire - and that is also paid off now. I actually have no debt at all, pay off my credit card as soon as I get anything on it because I'm not comfortable with debt.

I'd definitely say there is a generational split.

Interesting pointy. I remember people of my age having credit cards in the 80s and 90s, and using them a lot. (Remember Access cards?) Running up monthly debt but trying to pay it off at the end of each month. Having the company increase the credit limit frequently (to amounts way higher than your monthly salary) without being asked.

But my DC, in their 20s, don’t even have credit cards, and nor do their friends. They don’t seem to want to get into further debt than their student loan.

Incidentally, my family are all very aggressive Brexiters, who keep saying how they voted against the "mc elite" - they've no positive reasons at all for Brexit, just anger

Can you tell us more BigChoc. How are they faring now with Boris and chums who clearly don't give a stuff about anyone but themselves. There is little evidence that I can see of any "levelling up" going on. Are your family still making excuses?

I'd definitely say there is a generational split.

Not necessarily - DB always frittered his money, when I saved mine. I see the same traits with my own children - one cautious money wise, one with a 'live for today' attitude.

Remember Access cards?

The New Statesman used to run competitions. Back in the seventies they had one about acronyms. A winning entry was: Access - a credit card encourages silly spending.
So very true.

The thing is they’ve got no choice but to take out that debt have they? More and more jobs require degrees, it’s not so much the equivalent of a-levels as GCSEs now. My parents’ generation could get by on no qualifications.

Kids from my kind of background (and BCF’s) have so few options now to get away. Can’t afford private rent, can’t claim housing benefit or much else, council houses pffft. Kids who do not come from fully supportive, nice MC backgrounds with parents owning a house they can live in on low or free rent, are absolutely stuffed now. It’s not even possible to try to make an alternative ‘influencer’ living (which I despise) if you have no internet access. My generation x is similarly locked in to trying to provide a living for kids as well as ourselves in a dying economy.

I don't think it's solely generational either. There is an individual aspect to it, too.

I hate being in debt, but my first boyfriend (early 1990s), who is now about 53, I guess, always had a maxed out credit card and was constantly being bailed out by his dad, while I lived on a tight budget.

But I think student loans have normalised debt. The fact that you don't actually have to pay them off somehow makes borrowing seem a bit innocuous.

I was really struck last year by the incredibly expensive cars, often 2 per driveway, in some Edinburgh streets where 30-40 years ago there was at most one average car, often fairly clapped out, per MC household. I was told many of them will have been bought on credit.

They check the status of grandparents for citizen status now - they might as well start checking it for finances too, in which case my kids have had it.

Or rephrased - access to grandparents’ money will prove decisive as the baby boomers die off. Many who’ve done nothing to earn it will benefit hugely, many of those of us who work will get nothing. Fairness and justice, in Britain? What a laugh. We have worse to come.

access to grandparents’ money will prove decisive as the baby boomers die off.

Unless of course the money gets swallowed up by care home fees.

The money will be swallowed by care home fees I expect.

I can't read all of that article about haulage. Although the first part gives enough of a hint. It is worrying.

I can't access the whole article, either. Its first line is one that I expect to see quite frequently in the coming months:

"Progress on a Brexit deal is being threatened by Brussels’s refusal to ..."

Oh yes, round here lots of very modest houses have very expensive cars out front. But it's Vimes Boots theory isn't it? People need a car. They can't afford £6k to buy a second hand one, but they can afford £200 a month to HP a nicer car. So they pay more in the long run.

@AuldAlliance

I can't access the whole article, either. Its first line is one that I expect to see quite frequently in the coming months:

"Progress on a Brexit deal is being threatened by Brussels’s refusal to ..."

... let us have our cake and eat it"

But plenty of voters think it's only fair that we do indeed get to have our cake as well as eat it, because we're British

The PCP on cars thing really does puzzle me. I guess it’s just a mindset difference but I just can’t get over personally committing hundreds of £ a month to “buy” an asset that a) I never actually own unless I pay some huge ‘balloon’ payment and b) depreciates in value rapidly.

I guess my main worry with PCP on a car is that if you hit hard times you don’t have an asset you can sell, but most people don’t think like that it seems!

@BigChocFrenzy

The Fail looks out for blood over the exams fiasco, another very aggressive front page

Yes, but the picture is of the Wrong Man who Won't Take Blame.

Really every headline needs to be Boris. The. Buck. Stops. There.

Meanwhile, a possible baby step towards the autonomous cars ..

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-53830947

Hands-free driving could arrive on UK roads by spring next year, the government has said, as it launched a consultation on the technology.

The Department for Transport (DfT) has issued a call for evidence into automated lane keeping systems (ALKS).

Such technology controls a car's movements and can keep it in lane for extended periods, although drivers need to be ready to take back control.

The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders claims it could cut accidents.

The technology could be given the go ahead for speeds of up to 70mph, according to the DfT, potentially making long stretches of tedious motorway driving a thing of the past.

ALKS technology has been approved by the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), of which the UK is a member.

(contd)

I do hope the motor industry has twigged the smarter cars get, the fewer we'll need.

I wonder how many people were surprised to learn that the reason that it's so hard to get into Med School is that places are capped by Government? Especially those who have been saying that we should train up more of our own medics often heard from Brexiters

@Peregrina

Incidentally, my family are all very aggressive Brexiters, who keep saying how they voted against the "mc elite" - they've no positive reasons at all for Brexit, just anger

Can you tell us more BigChoc. How are they faring now with Boris and chums who clearly don't give a stuff about anyone but themselves. There is little evidence that I can see of any "levelling up" going on. Are your family still making excuses?

.... Anger is not rational They voted for "revenge", to take the only chance they had of exercising power and hitting back They have got what they wanted emotionally with a victory over the mc Remainers and enjoying the anguish there They want cake / No Deal and will blame the EU and Remainers for any bad consequences

@borntobequiet

I wonder how many people were surprised to learn that the reason that it's so hard to get into Med School is that places are capped by Government? Especially those who have been saying that we should train up more of our own medics often heard from Brexiters

When I left Uni in the late 80s, the ratio of non-UK to UK students had shifted dramatically, since the Uni could charge overseas students full whack, but were capped on what they could (then) charge the students LAs for course fees. Obviously the immediate result was a decreased desire to take UK students.

Louise it's an economic pitfall - you need a car to keep your job, your job doesn't pay enough to buy a car outright but does pay enough for a monthly payment. And you need the job to keep everything else together!

I'm now in the fortunate position where I won't need to go PCP again unless I'm really stupid with my savings, but it was different back then.

I don't discuss Brexit with them, no point, but there is often an aside in the long newsy EMails

Looking to the more Hibernian edge of our island ... an interesting take on another IndyRef

www.thenational.scot/news/18656885.wee-ginger-dug-tories-want-new-independence-referendum/

Given that there's lots of things the Tories have promised won't happen have, then it seems a fair assessment.

@DGRossetti

Looking to the more Hibernian edge of our island ... an interesting take on another IndyRef

www.thenational.scot/news/18656885.wee-ginger-dug-tories-want-new-independence-referendum/

Given that there's lots of things the Tories have promised won't happen have, then it seems a fair assessment.

I think you mean Caledonian, not Hibernian...