What will life be like under Reform?

[Easipeelerie]

I have accepted the likelihood of the next government being Reform. I don’t think the government after that will necessarily be Reform. But in the 4 Reform years, what do people think life will be like for the different groups in our country? Will we see very immediate changes?

That's a no then to higher wages and affordable housing?

It's not NMW workers who are leaving . It's high earners, probably already on higher rate tax age 30 and fed up of the government grabbing so much from that income range for no return.

They won't be eligible for affordable housing either.

You're addressing the wrong problem. The young people whose departure will sink us aren't the ones you're so eager to help. Now there's a surprise.

The influence the government can have on private housing cost is to loosen restrictions to encourage more house building (how is that going for Labour?), reduce the state intervention which is distorting the market as I said (totally anathema to the Left), and scrap stamp duty which disproportionately penalises the SE (Reeves is doing the opposite).

They could also stop destroying our energy industry, to bring the cost of living down. No, no, Miliband must follow his student-politics dream - even if no other country is.

If it does go that way I’m hoping for a hung parliament so some of their policies will have a hard time getting through. Not sure what the coalition will be maybe the tories.

I wasn't talking about NMW, I was talking about overall wages.

So what jobs are the people who are leaving doing?

But the only jobs the government is intervening to increase wages is NMW

They're causing downward pressure on all other salaries (as well as destroying some NMW jobs) through their increase in employers NI.

So some young people should be paid less in order to keep some higher paid young people in the UK?

Yep. It's the same old song: the poor must be made poorer to motivate them, the rich must be made richer. This is all the right has got. Einstein's definition of insanity seems to have passed them by completely.

Yes. Because otherwise in 20 years time, that same low-income tranche of the population will be far worse off... in fact the standard of living throughout the population will be much lower. There will be limited state services (public sector pensions will obviously be reneged on). You're stealing from the future, which is utterly immoral.

Sigh. I already explained upthread why there is no inconsistency, and that you're deliberately making a false equivalence. You clearly didn't read it last time, so I won't waste my time explaining again.

Trickle down economics?

Worked well for Truss....

Sigh. No, not trickle down economics.

Just understanding that a disproportionate amount of the UK's wealth - which remember must be made every year anew - is created by a small proportion of the population.

I don't know what work you do. I've worked in a shortage industry my whole working life. A concrete, real-things industry, which Reeves is desperate to bring skilled immigrants into. Anyone who is capable of doing the type of work I do - and who wants to - already is. Recruitment is hard! That may not sit well with your egalitarian world view, but it's the reality.

And it brings large amounts of GDP - as well as real-world benefit - to the UK.

That's true of most of the young people leaving. The reason they're welcomed into other countries is that they have shortage skills - ie not many people can do what they do.

In addition to innate ability, these shortage skills are generally built up over a working life in the industry. Without people with 20+ years of serious experience, real things fail. I spend most of my time solving problems and stopping things going wrong, and the rest of my time training the next generation.

So... if all our young people with the capability and with 5+ years experience decide to leave the UK and not come back... how do you think those industries will work - and continue to bring in a gdp of £3.46 trillion every year - in 20 years time? I'll have retired. It's that 25-40 year-old group who will need to be doing then what I do today.

But they won't be doing it in the UK. That GDP for the work they do will belong to another country, not the UK.

I hate a lot of what Labour is doing, but the exodus of our 25-40 year old young professionals is the thing that has me really, really worried for the UK's future.

But all of this is just your opinion according to your selected economic viewpoint which chimes with your politics. As I have explained several times already, there is no economic consensus on the best way to run an economy. So stop pretending there is, and that it's the one you favour.

And I already asked you to you give one historic example of a society of a similar size, developmental level and heterogeneity to the UK which has successfully used a different economic model.

You haven't.

We’ve had a couple of all-in attempts at full socialism which have spectacularly failed. China, USSR, Eastern bloc, Venezuela….

There are plenty of very similar economies which use a capitalist model - with better controls and regulation. Are you really saying that places like France, Germany, the Netherlands and other European countries are so completely different to the UK that with some changes their models couldn't be emulated? I wouldn't even rule out the Scandinavian model, if people in the UK weren't so focused on themselves. I'm not saying that change would be easy, especially given how far the UK has gone on its path to self destruction, but carrying on as we are and pursuing the same economic policy that has brought us to where we are (only harder) is folly of the highest order.

Nobody is suggesting that model... The endless zero sum thinking is exhausting.

China is doing quite well economically - it isn't a superpower for nothing. But also very much not to be emulated unless you don't want people to have rights and freedoms.

Thats BS, my DD works in the NHS and it provides non critical care daily.

As for waste, the Kings Fund has compared the NHS to other Healthcare systems and finds the NHS is one of the most efficient.

On Funding, look at per capita, UK is way down, esp considering our ever growing population.

I'm starting to think you re on a wind up now, Socialist Redistribution? the Tories were in whilst our economy went to the dogs.... they almost doubled the national debt and gave away 100s of billions in Covid and Energy support.... much of which went to fraudsters....
Created massive demands on public services by allowing in millions of migrants, post Brexit, from Asia and Africa, changing many towns and city areas forever.

Your lot caused the issues, not Labour during Blairs time and Labour haven't been in long enough... unemployment went to 8% after 2 years of the Tories by 2012... so perhaps, as you did then, give them a little more than the 4 hours you have given Labour ....

@Blossomtoes I don't know where you live that you are getting good NHS care. Noone I know locally is getting good NHS care. I think that this is linked to a 15% rise in the population in the last 10 years in my area without any change in infrastructure. I now use a private online GP because I can never get a GP appointment at my local surgery. The local hospital cannot cope either.

@Alexandra2001
The LSE and other financial bodies suggest that Blair allowed debt to rise too much during his tenure and failed in financial regulation. I also know that the conservatives in the last 14 years failed to keep control of debt. Both labour and conservatives have made big mistakes in the past. The key question is how can we improve things now.
I don't think your view that increasing spending can help us out of our current problems. The government needs to think about how to improve economic growth. If we have economic growth, then we can spend more on welfare but not if we have none. We cannot increase our deficit even more that it already is.

Cambridgeshire.

Their economic models are the same as ours, with some differences in implementation

The main one being that the UK is the most redistributive of these - with the highest difference between tax rate of high and low earners, and the least universal provision of state services.

I'm all for tweaking our policy to be closer to those - but it's the low earners who will have to pay more tax, and I don't think Labour could get that in.

You were suggesting that a fundamentally different economic model was an option - not a slightly different social market economy.

Investment in education and health services incl mental health, send would be a good start helping the economy grow.

As is rejoining the SM.

National debt under Blair reached all time lows in 2006/7, we had growth and he spent a lot of that on investment.

We know Govts that don't invest, don't get growth... we can cut taxes to try and stimulate growth but how is that funded? the growth has to come first (as Liz Truss found out)

Where as day to day spend can be moved around and markets will accept some limited borrowing to pay for capital expenditure, leaving it all to the private sector wont work, they wont build roads/schools/hospitals or train young people... all precursors for growth.

I think we should be spending less on Welfare or rather who and how it is spent.... i know personally of young people who are being paid to sit at home and smoke weed, it may only be £100 per week UC but they live at home and claim MH issues, hardly surprising given their drug habits.

But this is changing, again, someone i know was given work experience, after 2 years on benefits, he now has a FT job... we need far more interventions, will cost more initially but save in the long run.

I agree with this - if you want working age peopple off welfare, you have to repair the damage that austerity did to their chances. That means investing in their mental and physical health and in affordable housing. I don't actually mind if that is a shared housing model, as long as rents are affordable and the properties are fit for habitation and safe, warm and dry. Then there's the cohort of people who would like to work but find getting work difficult because employers will not employ people with disabilities - so we need more jobshares, more flexibility, more WFH opportunities for jobs where this can be done. That will take a mix of carrot and stick for employers, and it will take investment - but it will pay off in the long run.

@strawberrybubblegum when I suggested a different economic model, I was thinking of the social democratic one. To my mind that is quite radically different from what we currently have in the UK. Going full communist never even entered my mind - it doesn't work because human nature. Sorry if I confused you.

I'd love there to be no need for redistribution of wealth. As I have said many times on these boards, I have no issues with people being rich. I have an issue with people not being able to afford the basics of food, housing, transport, heating etc. while working to the extent that they are capable of - and that will not be full time for everyone.

Improve public transport and make it affordable, especially in more rural areas, similar with childcare and importantly social care overall.

Austerity, Brexit has cost us so much and was self inflicted

@Blossomtoes Maybe I need to move to Cambridgeshire!
@Alexandra2001 I think that national debt was lower under Thatcher than Blair. Although I would argue that this is partially irrelevant as each leader inherits a different legacy and has different issues to deal with.