Balanced Question Time panel tonight - of course not!
Discussion
iphonedyou said:
But (as you allude to, and I think it's important) it's not all service centres. I would class myself as working in a service industry - I'm a Chartered Surveyor - and without the QS role very few of the houses you mention would get made, and those living in them wouldn't have factories to work in, in which they can make 'stuff'. We provide a service, all we're essentially paid for is ability, intellect, whatever way you want to put it - we produce, directly, nothing tangible.
Apropos of construction alone, there are lots of service roles in the same vein - structural engineers, civil engineers, project management et al.
I don't think we're just circulating money around, though.
as an industry, no, you make stuff, in every industry some of the people in it 'service' the industry - like yourself.Apropos of construction alone, there are lots of service roles in the same vein - structural engineers, civil engineers, project management et al.
I don't think we're just circulating money around, though.
the issue is when the entire economy is service related.
Scuffers said:
the issue is when the entire economy is service related.
But why? I agree it would be better to have a balanced economy (by any description of the word) in the same way you should have a balanced portfolio of investments, but why this inverted-snobbery about making stuff out of iron rather with silicon. Why is a call-centre any worse than making low-end widgets?I'd argue they are both as bad as they produce low returns on capital.
But tis is exactly the sort of attitude that killed off the fledgling computer industry in the 90s - we could have had an Apple/Microsoft if we spent less time worrying about sending people down pits or making things out of metal ..
Edited by fido on Friday 23 October 15:27
fido said:
But why? I agree it would be better to have a balanced economy (by any description of the word) in the same way you should have a balanced portfolio of investments, but why this inverted-snobbery about making stuff out of iron rather with silicon. Why is a call-centre any worse than making low-end widgets?
I'd argue they are both as bad as they produce low returns on capital.
But tis is exactly the sort of attitude that killed off the fledgling computer industry in the 90s - we could have had an Apple/Microsoft if we spent less time worrying about sending people down pits or making things out of metal ..
I would be ecstatic if we actually made some silicon! (as opposed to doing the R&D and then giving it away to the Yanks etc.)I'd argue they are both as bad as they produce low returns on capital.
But tis is exactly the sort of attitude that killed off the fledgling computer industry in the 90s - we could have had an Apple/Microsoft if we spent less time worrying about sending people down pits or making things out of metal ..
apart from some notable exceptions (ARM etc) we always end up with stuff all.
The problem is that if you're not making stuff and just selling services, unless your paying customers are predominantly oversea's, then it's just money going round in circles.
The other problem is that it's all to easy to then off-shore the call centre at which point, we have lost everything.
The kind of service jobs that is being talked about in context of QT tend to be in low skilled, easier to outsource, lack scalability and more difficult to export. So, you can start-up call centres, car washing, coffie shops... but where’s the future in jobs with those attributes?
You cant just have everyone in the industrial north run out to jump into a call centres and then in 5 years time when we need our own steel making facilities, or its profitable, hit a switch and crack on. And it probably wouldn’t be profitable anyway because the plant would need recommissioning.
Decades developing industrial processes are harder to copy, catch up, and/or restart when the guys with the knowledge or who have pioneered them have retired. And such industry requires low skilled and skilled workers where the low skilled have a chance of a highly skilled career; a future!
Our economy is ~80% services; not very diverse/mixed which IS a risk and the reason why hundreds of billions of bailout were required in 2008+. Are people not at all concerned that we don’t have a long term industrial policy?
You cant just have everyone in the industrial north run out to jump into a call centres and then in 5 years time when we need our own steel making facilities, or its profitable, hit a switch and crack on. And it probably wouldn’t be profitable anyway because the plant would need recommissioning.
Decades developing industrial processes are harder to copy, catch up, and/or restart when the guys with the knowledge or who have pioneered them have retired. And such industry requires low skilled and skilled workers where the low skilled have a chance of a highly skilled career; a future!
Our economy is ~80% services; not very diverse/mixed which IS a risk and the reason why hundreds of billions of bailout were required in 2008+. Are people not at all concerned that we don’t have a long term industrial policy?
fido said:
Scuffers said:
the issue is when the entire economy is service related.
But why? I agree it would be better to have a balanced economy (by any description of the word) in the same way you should have a balanced portfolio of investments, but why this inverted-snobbery about making stuff out of iron rather with silicon. Why is a call-centre any worse than making low-end widgets?I'd argue they are both as bad as they produce low returns on capital.
But tis is exactly the sort of attitude that killed off the fledgling computer industry in the 90s - we could have had an Apple/Microsoft if we spent less time worrying about sending people down pits or making things out of metal ..
Edited by anonymous-user on Friday 23 October 15:27
It's amazing, though perhaps shouldn't be, that so many don't know the difference between an 'industry' that adds value and those that don't.
I still can't believe that a Chartered Surveyor didn't realise that he was in a manufacturing industry......
economicpygmy said:
The kind of service jobs that is being talked about in context of QT tend to be in low skilled, easier to outsource, lack scalability and more difficult to export. So, you can start-up call centres, car washing, coffie shops... but where’s the future in jobs with those attributes?
You cant just have everyone in the industrial north run out to jump into a call centres and then in 5 years time when we need our own steel making facilities, or its profitable, hit a switch and crack on. And it probably wouldn’t be profitable anyway because the plant would need recommissioning.
Decades developing industrial processes are harder to copy, catch up, and/or restart when the guys with the knowledge or who have pioneered them have retired. And such industry requires low skilled and skilled workers where the low skilled have a chance of a highly skilled career; a future!
Our economy is ~80% services; not very diverse/mixed which IS a risk and the reason why hundreds of billions of bailout were required in 2008+. Are people not at all concerned that we don’t have a long term industrial policy?
It strikes me that if we are not careful, the birth place of the industrial revolution may, with a few exceptions or speciality manufacturers, be the first post industrial economy.You cant just have everyone in the industrial north run out to jump into a call centres and then in 5 years time when we need our own steel making facilities, or its profitable, hit a switch and crack on. And it probably wouldn’t be profitable anyway because the plant would need recommissioning.
Decades developing industrial processes are harder to copy, catch up, and/or restart when the guys with the knowledge or who have pioneered them have retired. And such industry requires low skilled and skilled workers where the low skilled have a chance of a highly skilled career; a future!
Our economy is ~80% services; not very diverse/mixed which IS a risk and the reason why hundreds of billions of bailout were required in 2008+. Are people not at all concerned that we don’t have a long term industrial policy?
Question time has been poor for months, I haven't watched a full program in ages. At least you could laugh uproariously or throw things with intent when they invited the likes of Charlotte Church, Will Young, Joey Barton or other token thickheads. This lot however, I wouldn't give them the steam off my piss.
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