EU referendum are you in or out

[F-ZeroOne]

You never discuss the way forward for the UK?

I see this relative a few times a year, at family social gatherings. Its not like an in-depth academic debate. I've never thought about the UK adopting the Euro in the context of Brexit, which is why I've never discussed it with them (and to be honest the last time I even considered that would have been during John Majors tenure); I'm also kind of confused as to why you're asking about that subject specifically in the context of Brexit - if the UK is leaving the EU, why would the UK adopt the Euro?

[snaff]

The pound falling again today, when it should have been going up after the interest rate rise.

This is the typical socialist fallacious thinking. The government does this, therefore that should happen. We need the government to get out of the business of screwing with things like interest rates, imagining they know what the price of everything should be. These schemes never work because they are misguided from the beginning.

But you think that the British government's failure to move markets with its interest rate manipulation is because it hasn't interfered enough, and that we need an even bigger government controlling bigger rates over the whole of Europe until finally this magical success will be achieved. Instead what will happen is the failures will just get bigger and bigger and you'll demand more and more central control to remedy it.

[zip accident]

I don't see anything wrong with building industries that create real wealth, rather than ones which rely on lots of dodgy EU schemes to shuffle money around the friendly in-groups.

I strongly suspect that the "friendly" in-groups will stop that idea dead, Brexit or no Brexit, that's where the power is sfter all.

The pound falling again today, when it should have been going up after the interest rate rise.

This is the typical Tory fallacious thinking. The government does this, therefore that should happen. We need the government to get out of the business of screwing with things like interest rates, imagining they know what the price of everything should be. These schemes never work because they are misguided from the beginning.

Fixed that for you.

But you think that the British government's failure to move markets with its interest rate manipulation is because it hasn't interfered enough, and that we need an even bigger government controlling bigger rates over the whole of Europe until finally this magical success will be achieved. Instead what will happen is the failures will just get bigger and bigger and you'll demand more and more central control to remedy it.

So, you're a Marxist? That sounds like their style of rubbish, "it's got to get worse before it can get better" is one of theirs, and another favourite is "cascading failures of capitalism".

All joking aside, the idea that the market has any sense to it is silly. Markets are the cult of the random, they don't do anything rational.

[Little stoned kiwi]

I'm also kind of confused as to why you're asking about that subject specifically in the context of Brexit - if the UK is leaving the EU, why would the UK adopt the Euro?

I'm not. I'm trying to gauge if there has been any discussion or action while in the EU, and hypothetically if it stayed. First thing I asked in this thread was if the UK would go all the way.
Why hasn't the UK gone all the way and adopted the euro? Why hasn't the pro-EU crowd ever called for it?

[KlaxonCow]

Why hasn't the UK gone all the way and adopted the euro? Why hasn't the pro-EU crowd ever called for it?

Well, we were going to under John Major.

There was the "exchange rate mechanism" which was about levelling the currencies before adoption - the pound and Euro needed to be somewhat level to make the switch without any great loss of value anywhere.

But, well, reality got in the way. "Black Wednesday" and things like that meant that the pound and Euro went in opposite directions. It never met the conditions. Then things "got good" for the pound, while Euroland had its issues - and everyone gave up on the idea at that point, as adopting the Euro would have been seen as a "backwards move" when we're doing well and Eurozone is doing poorly. So it got pushed onto the back burner. And then the whole world economy went down the shitter with the banking crisis, so that was no time for anyone to be messing around with currencies. And then we all got to witness the bullshit of how Greece was fucked over for the sake of the Germans and then it looked like a terrible idea - and absolutely no-one wanted to go there, if that's the sort of nonsense that happens in the Eurozone. And so forth.

It was intended to happen. But economic realities kept putting it off and then events started to make adoption of the Euro look like an increasingly bad idea, so everyone gave up on the idea and stopped talking about it (the pro-EU crowd realising that it was a poor moment to be making such a case).

[Little stoned kiwi]

Is the Euro a mistake? Exchange rates from countries would complicate a number of schemes, change others, and make some impossible. But that makes it sound like the inequalities are pushed to other areas of local economies instead of being directly realised.
By having the pound the UK demonstrates it's not needed for the EU to function. Have any other members retained their own currency?

[korruptor]

The Euro is a great idea, put in the context of the original political aim of the EU; "United States of Europe", but it's a totally shit idea, as (half) implemented.

Until there's a debt union, as well as a currency union, then the EU as a whole, and smaller member states in particular, are destined to struggle. The German banks (and German politics in general) need to move quite a distance for that to happen. But I suspect it will, and probably within my lifetime.

I also think it would have happened sooner, had we actually joined the euro, as it's impossible for the european central bank to pull the sorts of levers the BoE did during the banking crisis. They had to break their own rules (and fuck Greece) to re-float the French banks, so that's an area under a lot of scrutiny for further reform.

[merman]

The pound falling again today, when it should have been going up after the interest rate rise.

This is the typical socialist fallacious thinking. The government does this, therefore that should happen. We need the government to get out of the business of screwing with things like interest rates, imagining they know what the price of everything should be. These schemes never work because they are misguided from the beginning.

But you think that the British government's failure to move markets with its interest rate manipulation is because it hasn't interfered enough, and that we need an even bigger government controlling bigger rates over the whole of Europe until finally this magical success will be achieved. Instead what will happen is the failures will just get bigger and bigger and you'll demand more and more central control to remedy it.

So much wrong.
The Bank of England Monetary Policy Committee sets interest rates, NOT the Government.
It is politically independent.

Raising interest rates should have restored confidence in the pound.
It didn't - because the Governor of the Bank of England Mark Carney (another politically independent person) said that a "no deal Brexit" was now more likely.

When the pound was close to parity with the Euro in the 1990s it would have been ideal timing to join it. However that decision was not taken - because the European and British economies were in different phases of the economic cycle. Because the Tories had borrowed heavily, New Labour in its first term under Tony Blair and Gordon Brown had to practise financial restraint, leave interest rates high to combat inflation and pay off the debt.

Gordon Brown took two key decisions - not joining the Euro until certain financial conditions were favourable, and making the control of interest rates INDEPENDENT of political control.

Then the credit crunch - a lovely capitalist-engineered crisis - struck...

[F-ZeroOne]

I'm also kind of confused as to why you're asking about that subject specifically in the context of Brexit - if the UK is leaving the EU, why would the UK adopt the Euro?

I'm not. I'm trying to gauge if there has been any discussion or action while in the EU, and hypothetically if it stayed. First thing I asked in this thread was if the UK would go all the way.
Why hasn't the UK gone all the way and adopted the euro? Why hasn't the pro-EU crowd ever called for it?

This is the previous logo of UKIP:



It would probably explain why about 52% of the population would not want to adopt the euro. For the pro-side, the others here have already replied far better than I'd be able to.

[Little stoned kiwi]

You can be a UKIP opponent, be pro-EU, and want to retain the pound.
If their membership figures and election results are anything to go by then not many people support UKIP. They have a disproportionately loud voice I suspect is due to a level of private funding. It wouldn't surprise me if plenty on the left-wing side of the political spectrum are opposed to the EU or adopting the Euro.

[KlaxonCow]

They have a disproportionately loud voice I suspect is due to a level of private funding.

A bigger influence, I'd say, is the broadcasting rules.

You could not have Fox News or Infowars in the UK, as the broadcasting rules insist that there must be "a political balance" in news coverage. That's the upside - even though Murdoch part-owns Sky, this means "Sky News" is actually a pretty decent news channel and isn't the propaganda machine that Fox News or Murdoch's papers are.

But the "unintended consequences" are that, whenever the BBC's "Question Time" was fielding questions about Europe, they needed - per broadcasting rules - to have representatives of both sides of the argument. So they call UKIP as the obvious "other side of the argument" to comply with "balance" broadcasting rules. And Nigel Farage would always repeatedly offer himself up as the UKIP representative (which I suspect is more due to narcissism than an intended clever political strategy but, well, we are talking about "unintended consequences" here).

This meant that Farage ended up being a near permanent guest on Question Time - and other political shows, on the BBC and elsewhere - given wall-to-wall coverage.

They, in fact, didn't need much private funding because the broadcasting rules insist on a "political balance" that gave them all their wall-to-wall coverage and advertising for free. Farage showed up on every political show, every single week, for months on end. They should have just renamed "BBC One" to "BBC Nigel Farage", as that's what you were basically getting.

The problem with the "everyone must be represented" version of "political balance" is that this doesn't take into account how representative each side is of general overall opinion or, you know, the actual known facts of reality.

For example, the BBC want to report on whether the Earth is flat. So they'll have a scientist to represent the "round Earth" side and a flat-earther to represent the "flat Earth" side and then will ensure both sides have equal time to talk.

In one sense, this is balanced. Both sides are represented and they get to have an equal voice in making their case.

But, in another sense, this is horribly misrepresentative. To balance in a more properly representative way, you ought to have 9999 scientists for the "round Earth" opinion (including astronauts who've been to space and seen that the Earth is round with their own two eyes) against one flat-Earther on the panel, and then give everyone equal time.

Indeed, I'm being too kind there. Actual belief in a flat Earth isn't even a ten thousandth of the overall population, but you get the gist of what I'm saying.

Like, if the BBC were to conduct a "vox populi" on the streets about whether we should rape and eat babies, to comply with broadcasting rules on "balance", they'd scour the streets to find that one psychopathic idiot who'll say "yeah, sure, why not?" to the raping and eating of babies, one person to give some kind of a vague and apathetic "I don't know" and then one person - just one person - to represent the "oh my god, what the fuck is wrong with you? You can't go around raping and eating babies, you monsters" side of the argument. As if "yes", "no" and "I don't know" are absolutely equal third opinions in the public sphere on this issue.

Jeremy Clarkson is very often a cunt. But he did brilliantly satirically highlight the stupidity of the issue of "balance" on the One Show:



Asked about his opinion on all the strikes, he thought it was excellent. Admittedly, for a rather superficial - although not inaccurate - reason that it reminded him of when we had a smaller population and how, at a lesser scale, everything operates so much more smoothly and the roads and airports are relatively clear.

But then, to poke fun at the "political balance" that the BBC are obliged to maintain by broadcasting rules, he then went on to satirically give "the other side of the argument" in an exaggerated form that they should be taken out, in front of their families, and shot.

I'm not his greatest fan, by any means, but I think a good point well-made with humour.

Amusingly, though, there was almost no "balance" to be found in the coverage of him doing this, as everyone jumped on the "Clarkson says strikers should be shot in front of their families!" angle, because you get better ratings and sell more, when you pull it out of context and act like this was his actual opinion, not an "in the interests of balance" joke he was making about the stupidity of the broadcasting rules on "balance" being such crude instruments that do, in fact, push a minor extremist view up to seemingly the same importance as the widely-held reasonable opinion of 99.99% of everyone.

The rules demand "balance". But, really, they ought to demand "a representative balance". You don't have to wheel in the representative of "the Queen is a lizard alien, controlled by the Illuminati, using chemtrails" belief during the fucking royal wedding, for example.

Unintended consequences. "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions" and all that jazz.

[tufty]

You don't have to wheel in the representative of "the Queen is a lizard alien, controlled by the Illuminati, using chemtrails" belief during the fucking royal wedding, for example.

and anyway, Mr Icke was far too busy doing online videos to go to the BBC and risk being abducted by the lizard controlled illuminati.

As for the Euro, it's my opinion that the UK, in its position at the time (1999->2012 or so) and for totally "selfish" reasons, was absolutely right not to join the Euro. The "one foot in, one foot out" position enabled the UK's pretty much dominant financial services industry to be hold a position of power both in Europe and the rest of the world as an easily accessible bridge between the two. Joining the Euro would probably have meant a significant part of that market moving to Hamburg, and / or Zurich taking the "one stop shop" place.

This does not mean I'm anti Euro. Far from it. And ironically, now the UK has fucked its economy up the arse by deciding to leave Europe, it could probably benefit enormously by being part of the Euro zone. Except that you have to be part of Europe to be part of the Euro zone. Whoops.

[KlaxonCow]

(Anyway, yes, the actual reason I came to this thread, before I was distracted away by that tangent on Farage and Clarkson, of all people.)

The CBI have joined in and are calling for the scrapping of immigration targets post-Brexit:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-45136390

Just to further emphasise my earlier point about how those who voted for Brexit on the strength of "immigration" are in for a very nasty shock. They might well find that they've actually been a turkey voting for Christmas on this.

Every country we do a future trade deal with is bound to ask for easier access to our markets and their people to set up businesses and get jobs over here. Every business - represented collectively here by the CBI - also wants to not have their operations curtailed because some "immigration quota" says that they can't bring in the world's best experts to work for them, or seasonal workers to harvest the crops.

Jobs that actually wouldn't otherwise go to a British worker anyway - if we're prepared to face realities on this - as we're talking about jobs that British people are either under-qualified or over-qualified for.

Of course, this is not to say that the world's best expert in a particular field might not be British. But when they're not, businesses want to be able to grab the best person for the job, not be forced - by a form of positive discrimination - to hire a British person, regardless of whether they're any good or not. And for the over-qualified jobs - harvesting crops, serving coffees and burgers - then the simple fact is that they can't otherwise get sufficient numbers, as British people - considering themselves "above it" (which may or may not be justified in any individual case) - just won't take these jobs.

So the whole "British jobs for British workers" thing is often, in pragmatic terms, complete nonsense. As the British jobs going to non-British workers almost always are going that way for a reason. Either that British workers simply are unqualified to do it - so look to our educational system, folks, and question that instead - or British workers will not take these jobs, harvesting crops, for love nor money, even if they've been 7 years unemployed, they'll still turn it down as "beneath them". Again, whether a justified opinion or not, that's what practically happens here.

The real underlying point, I'd say, is that it was never "foreigners" stealing "our" jobs anyway.

In a globalised world, China can dump cheap steel onto the markets and bring the steel industry - around the world - to the brink of bankruptcy, putting everyone out of work, without a single Chinese person setting a single foot outside of China.

Or, as telecommunications makes it irrelevant where someone's located, all the telephone support and sales jobs now ending up in Indian call centres.

These people do not need to set a single foot on UK soil. They can increasingly steal your job anyway.

But the real "enemy" here is so subtle, folks just don't see it. The real job killer has been automation. It's the machines that are increasingly taking your jobs.

But the reason why this is much harder to see is that this isn't a 1:1 replacement. You don't show up on a Monday morning to be introduced to "Robbie the Robot" and are asked to train him up to take over your job from next week, and, by the way, you're fired.

No, it's more subtle and insidious than that. It's folks in an office sending each other emails. Pulling up documents from the network servers. That sort of thing.

Well, we no longer need a mail department - because who sends actual printed letters anymore? - and we don't need a printing department - as the office has "gone digital" and become a "paperless office" now - and, with a decent online booking / calendar system, then you can deal with your own schedule and don't need a secretary to do that for you.

Oh, it's much more subtle - in this global technological world - than "brown person took my job". It's that, through technology, one person now does what previously required multiple departments, full of people, to pull off.

I'm doing web design these days. Most of our customers are small businesses at the moment. All of them, when they're asking for something more than a simple "shop window" on the web, always ask me if I can sort them out a calendar / booking / inventory / sales system on the backend. An e-commerce shop that'll handle it all automatically.

Because, indeed, with a good automated system in place, a small handful of employees can exploit the "one man army" that is a computer system to operate at a level, on a global scale, that, previously, would have required building up your business to a large multi-departmental monster before you could even consider it possible.

It's not brown people. It's the machines that are "stealing our jobs" and, one day, they'll eventually steal them all.

And I don't remotely think that humanity is even talking about this coming problem - how the hell do we transition smoothly, and without pain, to some Star Trek "money-less" future, where the tech does everything, from where we are now?

It's already happening, in truth, and all people are doing is screaming "Brown people!!", completely missing the point as they've not even noticed that the rules of the game have been changed, so they don't even realise the nature of the problem, let alone have ever uttered a single word towards any possible solution.

(And, no, Mr. Elon Musk, simply saying "universal income" isn't good enough either - but I guess at least he's seen the direction the wind's blowing to be talking about it - as you'll eventually hit the problem of there being more claimants of "universal income" than there are human beings left working, to pay their income taxes, in order to fund it. Robots don't pay taxes. So when there's more machines than people, how do we raise the taxes to offer everyone a "universal income"? Indeed, how do we raise enough taxes to fund anything at all?

One can imagine a "money-less" future of abundance, where the machines do everything, and humans are free to do whatever they like, just because they fancy it and not to earn a living, and this future can, on its own terms, function. But how the hell do you get to "money-less" from a "moneyed" world? How do we manage the transition smoothly, as the half-and-half transition state doesn't make sense? When people still need money for food or rent - that's not been made "money-less" yet - but no-one has got any jobs anymore because that bit has been automated already.

There's a big brick wall there. And, as we hurtle towards it, folks are moaning about brown people and SJWs and who's making payments for Mexican walls or something instead.

I don't pretend to understand my fellow human beings.)

[Cloudane]

Just to further emphasise my earlier point about how those who voted for Brexit on the strength of "immigration" are in for a very nasty shock. They might well find that they've actually been a turkey voting for Christmas on this.

As the cool kids say: "fucking lol". I love it. Maybe it will be good for us after all as we become a more diverse melting pot of cultures
If it doesn't ruin us in the process...

Interesting points regarding automation. I think we're really starting to get into an era where not everyone has to work, or where someone's input into society can be more artistic and creative etc. But as long as we have the attitude of "everyone needs to work even if they've got no legs and one arm and have to claw their way in, or else they're a layabout burden on society", and treat even people who genuinely can't work with utter contempt and systematically attempt to kill them off via starvation, freezing and depression then we'll never make progress towards that Star Trek future.

Mind, another part of me theorises that people need something to do for their mental health, it's just that a lot of the time what they want to do, for example a lot of people I know in online circles try (and fail) to get by with artwork commissions, is not what people in general are willing to pay enough for to put food on the table.

[Harlequin]

(And, no, Mr. Elon Musk, simply saying "universal income" isn't good enough either - but I guess at least he's seen the direction the wind's blowing to be talking about it - as you'll eventually hit the problem of there being more claimants of "universal income" than there are human beings left working, to pay their income taxes, in order to fund it. Robots don't pay taxes. So when there's more machines than people, how do we raise the taxes to offer everyone a "universal income"? Indeed, how do we raise enough taxes to fund anything at all?

The owners of the machines can be taxed, which might require a tightening of corporate tax law.

Mind, another part of me theorises that people need something to do for their mental health, it's just that a lot of the time what they want to do, for example a lot of people I know in online circles try (and fail) to get by with artwork commissions, is not what people in general are willing to pay enough for to put food on the table.

I find that about the only activities to effectively counteract my depressive apathy, lethargy and fatigue are in the performance arts. Unfortunately, these are tricky to make a career out of when one's CV has no professional work listed for over a decade.