Currency vs Brexit: GBP Losses

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mrclt1994 said:
The original message from yourself was stating that free trade would be difficult, but as you explained some countries were trading without freedom of movement yet coming into play, therefore they can mimic what they did at that time.
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They had free movement with some countries in the union from the start, with the promise of all the others a short while down the line. Combined with the fact that they were only just entering into free trade (which can take a while for all the effects to kick in) that is a very different situation from a country that has had free movement and free trade for decades.

As for the other part, I had a feeling you might take that route (after posting). It is the only approach that I could think of at any rate that leaves at least some of your earlier arguments free from logical inconsistency. And it's certainly true that Romania has a much lower minimum wage than the UK. But does that not also mean that countries that have similar minimum wages should have free movement of labour between them? For instance, Germany's minimum wage is very similar to ours. Would you thus support free movement between the UK and Germany? Although of course this would require cooperation between countries to maintain the similar minimum wages, which is easier within the Eurozone than outside it. After all, our minimum wage was quite a bit higher last year than it is now, due to the currency crash.

And this doesn't change the fact that, absent a severe case of information failure, any economic migration will create a net benefit - that is to say, the gain from the gainers will be bigger than the loss from the losers if the loser exists at all. Nor does it change the fact that governments (and lobby groups) are not nearly efficient and effective enough for your proposed solution to work anywhere near as well as it would need to in order to turn a major worsening of the situation into merely a minor worsening. (Susceptibility to political pressures, the unwillingness or inability of firms to make the government aware of existing shortages, the fact that the government may not see a shortage as significant enough, the time lag between the shortage coming into existance and it being noticed and acted upon and take effect, the fact that there doesn't have to be an outright shortage for a firm to be willing to hire more people than they are able to locally etc. etc. etc. etc. etc.) But I'm never going to convince you of this am I? So there's no point even trying.
 
HellCat said:
I agree there are absolutely massive issues with western governments, but that doesn't really change Brexit is proving to be an absolute shambles. Reports have emerged in the last few days that May (a PM who the population have basically had forced on us after Cameron resigned and she scared off other competitors before an actual internal vote at the very least) feels she has absolute single right to trigger Article 50 without parliament and that she can decide what acceptable terms are. That's frightening for a ton of reasons and highlights the short sightedness of the Leave campaign. We've 'escaped' supposed tyrants only to have one forced on us and one who thinks it's down to her personal preference how one of the most massive undertakings in UK history should play out?

To say nothing of the fact hidden in recent documentation that our membership of WTO is only part of our EU membership, that without it we aren't in the WTO and there is no prior model for how this would play out beyond seemingly leaving us with no position for trade with anyone.
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May wasn't forced on the UK people. Please remember that it is MP candidates in their seats/constituencies on a ballot paper for general elections, not the leader of said MP candidate's party as that is now what we vote for. People voted for Conservative MPs in their areas therefore the Conservative party was voted in, it just so happened that Cameron was the leader and that now there is a different one, I'm not really sure how things have been forced - or are the Conservatives meant to operate without a leader? Also, how did she scare her competitors off? They either gave up, were eliminated as per the rules of the vote or said stupid comments that meant they had no choice but to pull out.

Parliament voted to have the referendum, why must parliament vote again after the parliament has happened, I thought this was a question for an instruction rather than an assessment whereby parliament must now double check the public's answer? Theresa May and her government are in power, I'm not sure who else is meant to make the decisions on how things play out.
 
kuuderes_shadow said:
As for the other part, I had a feeling you might take that route (after posting). It is the only approach that I could think of at any rate that leaves at least some of your earlier arguments free from logical inconsistency. And it's certainly true that Romania has a much lower minimum wage than the UK. But does that not also mean that countries that have similar minimum wages should have free movement of labour between them? For instance, Germany's minimum wage is very similar to ours. Would you thus support free movement between the UK and Germany? Although of course this would require cooperation between countries to maintain the similar minimum wages, which is easier within the Eurozone than outside it. After all, our minimum wage was quite a bit higher last year than it is now, due to the currency crash.
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Yes, if all the countries in the EU had similar worker's rights, economic position, benefits on offer and minimum wage, free movement would be fine. The pull factor of the UK would not be such an issue. Before 2004, the net number of migrants from the EU to the UK was 15,000 (2003), but in the next year, was 87,000 which is quite a big jump and this continued to rise until 2007, where it took a dip but after that, has been increasing. From this, I conclude that because the countries that made up the EU before 2004 were a lot closer to each other in terms of economies etc., people were not flooding into countries because moving to another was not SO much more attractive. And, that since 2004 and the enlargement of the EU to include countries that had economies a lot smaller than our own and that simply could not compete with our citizen's worker's rights, pay and quality of life, people from those countries have come into the UK for example and, having experienced a lot worse working coniditions/pay, will accept lower pay than locals and compromise their rights which undercuts locals who cannot simply offer themselves to employer's for a lower wage as it would, aside from being illegal (if they're on minimum wage already). decrease their quality of life.
 
mrclt1994 said:
May wasn't forced on the UK people. Please remember that it is MP candidates in their seats/constituencies on a ballot paper for general elections, not the leader of said MP candidate's party as that is now what we vote for. People voted for Conservative MPs in their areas therefore the Conservative party was voted in, it just so happened that Cameron was the leader and that now there is a different one, I'm not really sure how things have been forced - or are the Conservatives meant to operate without a leader? Also, how did she scare her competitors off? They either gave up, were eliminated as per the rules of the vote or said stupid comments that meant they had no choice but to pull out.

Parliament voted to have the referendum, why must parliament vote again after the parliament has happened, I thought this was a question for an instruction rather than an assessment whereby parliament must now double check the public's answer? Theresa May and her government are in power, I'm not sure who else is meant to make the decisions on how things play out.
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Indeed, each constituency that elected a Conservative MP (including, unfortunately, my own) elected that Conservative MP, under the Conservative Party's manifesto. Not the leader of the party. So long as Theresa May continues to implement the manifesto of the party, this is still essentially the same government. The only issues are:
- Firstly, and for understandable reasons, Theresa May is not intending to implement even some key parts of the Conservative Party's 2015 manifesto.
- Secondly, the whole thing stinks of hypocrisy as most of the Conservatives now in government attacked Gordon Brown for becoming PM without a vote and then deciding against holding an early general election.

Yes, parliament voted to have a referendum which was non-binding (unlike the last two referenda the country had). Thus there should be a vote on making the result of the vote binding, as it currently isn't. I would expect this to mostly be a formality, although it would allow individual MPs or parties to oppose it. There also needs to be many many parliamentary votes at each stage further down the process on the direction to be taken, which the vote said nothing about.
 
The issue of who was in charge of the party is key to a referendum like this. We might not vote for the PM directly but it's certainly the case that on issue the parties push it as such. Tabloids like The Sun pushed 'Cams Our Man', not a buzzword rhyme for each local candidate.

Indeed when Cameron promised this it was said he would honour and enact it, only to run off when his cocky gamble completely went against him. Gove, Johnson and co did likewise and the 'a new PM in the autumn' went out the window quickly. Everyone tried to position themselves to personally recover from this and while much of this was public May kept her actions private. The whole narrative is quite transparent and easily documented.

I know plenty of people who while they find Cameron an out of touch twit trusted him with implimenting this more than they do May, who has been called a second Thatcher more than once. Who you are led to believe will be calling the shots is a huge influence on a decision people will make with a vote like this and here we have a case where quickly said person changed once the result was in. May likewise made short work of differentiating herself from Cameron with her cabinet changes and the things she's now trying to push through because she prioritises them over what were his own preferences. Given these preferences include hugely worrying stances on human rights and the environment, there's every right to be worried. May criticised Brown taking over without an election when Blair resigned, but now in one of the most critical moments for generations she doesn't hold herself to the same standard and is claiming she carte blanche to interpret a 'yes or no' ballot to mean what she alone interprets.

What was that line about 'taking our country back' again?
 
I think that will sadly be the standard going forward. The new status quo penalises anyone with sights beyond the UK's borders.
 
Still costs around £8 more for Akito the Exiled Part 5 than it did before all of this lol add in Persona 3 movie 4 too and I'm reluctant to buy just now, which is silly as it's not getting better any time soon.
 
That 'soaring' in context:

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I know the rate isn't going to go back to where it was years ago but I would like the $1 to at least be around 72-73p before the end of the year. That way it'll only be a small difference compared to what it was back at the beginning of the year.
 
Obama says the pre vote warnings on trade still stand and Japan has delivered a dossier which amounts to "if you screw this up, we're taking all our business and investment out of UK".
 
HellCat said:
Obama says the pre vote warnings on trade still stand and Japan has delivered a dossier which amounts to "if you screw this up, we're taking all our business and investment out of UK".
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I'd be tempted to tell them where they can stick their dossier. I don't like countries threatening others regardless of the situation.
 
I don't view it as threats. We shat the bed and now every other country is reminding us what being part of a global community means.

This thread has been one of the most respectable takes on the debate I've seen but unlike the self serving MPs foreign powers don't need to coddle over the fact Johnny UKIP doesn't like brown people.
 
Every now and then the anger just bubbles up in me for this vote though. This referendum wasn't based on economics and for the good of this country. This was about racism and inequality.

The older generation that couldn't accept more racial diversity and an inequality caused by the banks, government, baby boomers and the rich in general. All those responsible have buggered off and rather than doing the sensible thing the government is going along with it.

I do believe the sterling will eventually recover but it could be a very very very long time and in the end I doubt it'll of been worth it.
 
I'm hoping the G20 comments give May some much needed perspective. I doubt they will but the rest of the free world saying "We don't want any of this nonsense you're building and will take our money elsewhere if you expect us to take orders" is hard to ignore. Does May want to be the Prime Minister of Craggy Island?

I feel strongly enough about this that I was at the march in London yesterday. Many of the speakers there spoke of the failings of UK government, what a farce the 'debates' were and admitted the EU isn't perfect. Which is impressive for the side that have been painted as crybabies for the last two months.

An old woman actually verbally attacked me later. When it ended I went to a quiet side and covered my sign up again so I could transport it without fear of someone sucker punching me. She demanded to know why I felt I was more important than democracy. I said I wasn't and that people like me felt valid concerns were being ignored. She finally resorted to telling me my problem was my generation have never known hardship and have too much free time to waste on subverting democracy.
 
HellCat said:
She demanded to know why I felt I was more important than democracy. I said I wasn't and that people like me felt valid concerns were being ignored. She finally resorted to telling me my problem was my generation have never known hardship and have too much free time to waste on subverting democracy.
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Uh, did she not stop to consider why she felt HER opinion was more important than democracy?

Seriously, there's a disturbing number of dickheads out there who seem unaware that it was only a margin of 2 - 3 % that won the vote. Any arguments along lines of 'shut the f*ck up and deal with it, leave won so get over it' are REALLY spoiling for trouble.

The whole POINT of democracy is that it enables the people to have their voice and speak up with their opinions about issues of governance. Folks suddenly deciding they don't like that, because their democracy is better than anyone else's, have really missed the point of the entire process.
 
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The act of democracy has given 48% of the country something they didn't vote for, including the will of two countries. I'd also be willing to wager Remain would win quite comfortably now people understand what they were voting for. Unless the older lady is in her 80's I'd argue that she has never known the hardship she claims either. Especially in terms of housing.
 
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