Do you want to discuss boring politics? (23 Viewers)

[Sky Blue Pete]

Happiness and a prosperous society go hand in hand...

Most people just want enough money to buy a house, run a household and start a family. Particularly the latter is seem out of reach for many ordinary people which fuels our tanking fertility rates and exacerbates our future demographic crisis.

Economic growth doesn’t necessarily mean prosperous

 

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[Mucca Mad Boys]

Economic growth doesn’t necessarily mean prosperous

We don't have economic growth and the country doesn't feel prosperous... It tracks quite well with declining GDP per capita.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

https://www.weforum.org/stories/2018/01/gdp-frog-matchbox-david-pilling-growth-delusion/

 

[mmttww]

Isn't Pete just talking about how GDP as 'the' measure of success might not be the way to go, rather than saying growth shouldn't be a goal? I've thought the same thing for a long time. Feels too crude a measure and totally detached from reality for people, at least as a headline measure in isolation.

 

[Captain Dart]

In Denmark the retirement age moves with the average age expectancy. It’s 15 years short of it. Sensible I think

So do men get their pensions a few years earlier?

 

[SBT]

Lol at Corbyn and Sultana’s party already coming apart at the seams

 

[chiefdave]

Lol at Corbyn and Sultana’s party already coming apart at the seams

Winner of the least surprising news of the year award.

Was listening to a podcast the other day and they had someone who was a supporter of Reform and went on Tommy Robinson marches who was talking about how those groups are happy to unite behind a vague idea of having some things in common and wanting to move in roughly the same direction. Therefore you can end up with people with pretty wide ranging views happily co-existing and in the main putting sometimes big differences aside for the benefit of the bigger picture.

But on the left as we all know the opposite is true. Any slight difference of opinion over policy becomes an issue which sidetracks everyone from the bigger picture. So much time and energy is spent dealing with shit that is in the grand scheme of things largely irrelevant that things never move forward.

There's clearly an appetite for a party on the left but nobody ever seems able to get their act together. Although if they did it would just highlight the problems with a two party system. As we see with Reform it takes the collapse of an existing party to create the space for something new.

 

[Sky Blue Pete]

Good point I’m not sure I’m sure we could both look it up

Denmark to raise state pension age to 70 in 2040

The Danish Parliament (Folketing) has adopted a bill to increase the state pension age to 70 from 2040

www.europeanpensions.net

So do men get their pensions a few years earlier?

 

[CCFCSteve]

They have had 4 female leaders

Good timing from Corbo

‘Ex-Labour MP Zarah Sultana has accused Jeremy Corbyn of overseeing a "sexist boys' club" locking women out of the founding of a new left-wing party the pair announced earlier this year’

Corbyn and Sultana clash over new party membership - BBC News

MP Zarah Sultana says she is a victim of a "sexist boys' club" in row over setting up new left wing party.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[wingy]

What about manual labour as well?

 

[chiefdave]

 

[mmttww]

Lol at Corbyn and Sultana’s party...

It's full Life of Brian, ainnit! FFS.

 

[Earlsdon_Skyblue1]

Instead of Prime Minister's Questions we can just skip to a lie detector test.

Actually, come to think of it, that isn't such a bad idea!

 

[Mucca Mad Boys]

Winner of the least surprising news of the year award.

Was listening to a podcast the other day and they had someone who was a supporter of Reform and went on Tommy Robinson marches who was talking about how those groups are happy to unite behind a vague idea of having some things in common and wanting to move in roughly the same direction. Therefore you can end up with people with pretty wide ranging views happily co-existing and in the main putting sometimes big differences aside for the benefit of the bigger picture.

But on the left as we all know the opposite is true. Any slight difference of opinion over policy becomes an issue which sidetracks everyone from the bigger picture. So much time and energy is spent dealing with shit that is in the grand scheme of things largely irrelevant that things never move forward.

There's clearly an appetite for a party on the left but nobody ever seems able to get their act together. Although if they did it would just highlight the problems with a two party system. As we see with Reform it takes the collapse of an existing party to create the space for something new.

There some contradictory electoral coalitions out there… None more so than a Corbynista ‘Jezbollah’ party with pro-Gaza independents!

He’s been at their conferences / events lately, didn’t realise this was new information!

 

[Sky_Blue_Dreamer]

But people keep talking about cuts and yet the extra borrowing and tax this government have brought in should generate an extra £300-400bn during the parliament. Unfortunately spending is accelerating also

Nobody wants to take the tough choices, do we keep triple lock, do we allow an ever growing number to claim welfare, can we afford to keep making above inflation public sector pay rises unless productivity improves?

As I’ve said before, we’re not the only ones. Been reading about Frances state pension situation, they’re fucked

To be honest the triple lock is one thing we could get rid of. As long as it increases with inflation then that's acceptable.

 

[Sky_Blue_Dreamer]

The fundamental problem the country has is the lack of economic growth. It's fairly basic economics that a historically high tax burden is not conducive for growth. Previous governments have actually raised more revenue when cutting some taxes (notably, Osborne cutting corporation tax increased revenues). The goal of a tax system is to maximise revenue hence Italy is attracting a lot of wealthy Europeans (particularly from the UK) with attractive tax schemes.

Labour should just scrap it the triple lock, electorally they're in the toilet anyway and particularly with the 'grey vote'. Politically, Keir Starmer and his government are cowardly.



Frankly, the government needs to admit the truth that the pension wasn't built in the context of people living into their 80s. Rather than looking at pension pots as something to tax, government needs to do everything to push people to take ownership of their retirement and invest in their own pension pots.

We've been that for a little while now with DC pensions etc, but the trouble with that is it will have an horrific lag - decades probably.

And even then a lot of the problem is noone having the nerve to do it, or suggest it, due to the political fallback.