Estate where only one person has a job. Enjoy
Discussion
rs1952 said:
supersingle said:
Kermit power said:
cazzer said:
Unfortunately this is capitalism at work.
I feel qualified to rant here as if you go and look at Egerton St in Oldham on google maps thats my old secondary school.
Towns like Oldham thrived on Cotton Spinning (Well over 200 cotton mills at one point), Heavy Engineering (Platts etc), Light Engineering (Ferranti etc).
If you look into the demographic of the owners of these businesses, in general, they didn't live locally. Had no real connection with the area. Couldn't give a s
t basically.
So when it became cheaper to manufacture this stuff abroad thats exactly what they did. All the cotton spinning has gone, 200 mills, 500 people+ per mill. Platts went. Ferranti went in a share dealing fraud.
None of these, and countless other businesses, went because the workforce was bad, or workshy. They went, in general, because the business owners found brown people to exploit.
In the ultimate irony, they imported a large number of indians and Pakistanis over in the late 40s and early 50s to staff the mills (because a lot of the workforce had died in the war) and within 10 years had shut the majority and sent the manufacturing to india and Pakistan.
Heaven forbid any new companies open anything outside the M4 corridor.
So what are these 1000's of people supposed to do?
To be more specific, it's capitalism being interfered with by trades unions.I feel qualified to rant here as if you go and look at Egerton St in Oldham on google maps thats my old secondary school.
Towns like Oldham thrived on Cotton Spinning (Well over 200 cotton mills at one point), Heavy Engineering (Platts etc), Light Engineering (Ferranti etc).
If you look into the demographic of the owners of these businesses, in general, they didn't live locally. Had no real connection with the area. Couldn't give a s
t basically.So when it became cheaper to manufacture this stuff abroad thats exactly what they did. All the cotton spinning has gone, 200 mills, 500 people+ per mill. Platts went. Ferranti went in a share dealing fraud.
None of these, and countless other businesses, went because the workforce was bad, or workshy. They went, in general, because the business owners found brown people to exploit.
In the ultimate irony, they imported a large number of indians and Pakistanis over in the late 40s and early 50s to staff the mills (because a lot of the workforce had died in the war) and within 10 years had shut the majority and sent the manufacturing to india and Pakistan.
Heaven forbid any new companies open anything outside the M4 corridor.
So what are these 1000's of people supposed to do?
The reason all the manufacturing went to China and India is because it's cheaper to manufacture there, even making allowances for all the extra shipping costs.
The reason that is the case is because labour is so much cheaper in China and India.
The reason that labour is so much more expensive here is because unskilled workers thought they should be paid more than they were being paid, so went on strike until they got paid more.
This was all well and good when it was expensive to import goods from the other side of the world, but now that it's cheap, all the unskilled labour jobs have gone from this country. Whose fault is that?
The biggest problem we have these days is the lunacy of comparing standards of living and saying that people are in poverty if they earn less than 60% of the average income or whatever it is. If the job you do doesn't generate a value for society equal to 60% or more of the average, how can you expect to be paid it?
If this were truly capitalism at work, then people would be paid what they were worth, and we would have real poverty existing alongside great wealth as we used to have in the past.
I'd rather see trade barriers tbh. I don't want to live in a country with Victorian levels of inequality.
:A couple of years ago I was in Johannesburg talking to some friends who could not believe how much we paid for petrol and diesel (the cost over there was half the price here). I asked them about the South African minimum wage - he didn't think thay had one, but he thought the minimum anybody actually got was about 6 rand (50p) an hour. The South African government don't pay pensions to the population either. There is no Health Service - you get ill, you pay for the treatment. Or don't bother and die. Just a few examples.
We could not compete on wage rates with China because our society is geared up with high taxes on income and expenditure, and there's isn't. We will be able to complete eventually (perhaps it'll take more than a generation) as China's living standards and wage levels catch up with western ones.
And trade barriers? My, that's a good idea. Put obstabcles in the way of other nations selling us things then wonder why they won't buy things from us
Perhaps we could reintroduce the Corn Laws - only made a few million people die of starvation in the UK last time roundOn the other hand when anyone in the West dares to suggest that we limit these artificially cheap imports they are branded a communist.
I don't think we should be competing with the East on wages or working conditions. The only people here who will benefit will be the elite. Ordinary workers are going to get crucified.
Victor McDade said:
There are lots of jobs in such areas. Okay sure they are not well paid and are un-skilled but they do exist.
However business owners prefer to employ non-natives for such posts.
Take the food industry for example. .
Hmm yes, lets take that as an example....However business owners prefer to employ non-natives for such posts.
Take the food industry for example. .
The mills (at their peak 360 of them aparently), assuming 100 people per mill, which is on the very low side, employed 36000 people.
Platts employed 15000 people.
Asa Lees employed 7500 people.
Average McDs or KFC employs about 20.
So as soon as they open 2925 fast food restaurants in the town unemployment will be sorted.
Seriously, anyone who lives within spitting distance of the M4 corridor just shut up because you haven't got a clue.
Edited by cazzer on Monday 10th January 18:46
anonymous said:
[redacted]
Thats where you'll see your asian immigrants hanging out. They aren't working either.
I would be very surprised if the figures for Waterloo St are much different from Egerton st.
Other than most of the people who live on Waterloo st aren't in the system as they shouldn't be in the country in the first place.
Edited by cazzer on Monday 10th January 18:52
cazzer said:
SplatSpeed said:
anonymous said:
[redacted]
but tonker is 100% right!
And I would be willing to wager £10 to the charity of choice, that if we did an un-official survey/surveilance there is at least one working adult at 50% of the addresses.
Edited by NoNeed on Monday 10th January 19:10
Edited by NoNeed on Monday 10th January 19:11
andy43 said:
Be interesting to find out what that one job is on the estate in the article. Bet it's public sector of some sort.
What is it with people who can't even be bothered to hit one click to find out the answer to their question?He's a forklift driver. Like it says in the article. OK, he might be a forklift driver for the council - it doesn't give us that level of detail - but even so it's a tangible, transferable skill.
cazzer said:
Unfortunately this is capitalism at work.
No this is welfarism at work.One of the places mentioned was Birmingham which was a sleepy country town before the industrial reveloution. People moved there to seek work, they stay in these estates once the work has gone because we pay them to do so.
Superspeed, I'm willing to be persuaded...
What is your plan to deliver on your stated objectives?
By my reckoning of what you've said so far, we're looking for a plan which limits Chinese imports and replaces them with products built in Britain by British workers on much higher wages, but which won't actually push up the price of anything, as you don't want the ordinary worker to suffer.
What is your plan to deliver on your stated objectives?
By my reckoning of what you've said so far, we're looking for a plan which limits Chinese imports and replaces them with products built in Britain by British workers on much higher wages, but which won't actually push up the price of anything, as you don't want the ordinary worker to suffer.
Kermit power said:
Superspeed, I'm willing to be persuaded...
What is your plan to deliver on your stated objectives?
By my reckoning of what you've said so far, we're looking for a plan which limits Chinese imports and replaces them with products built in Britain by British workers on much higher wages, but which won't actually push up the price of anything, as you don't want the ordinary worker to suffer.
This is the only advantage to the whole Man made global warming theory, That as people/industry tries to reduce it's carbon footprint goods will be made and sought locally.What is your plan to deliver on your stated objectives?
By my reckoning of what you've said so far, we're looking for a plan which limits Chinese imports and replaces them with products built in Britain by British workers on much higher wages, but which won't actually push up the price of anything, as you don't want the ordinary worker to suffer.
NoNeed said:
Kermit power said:
Superspeed, I'm willing to be persuaded...
What is your plan to deliver on your stated objectives?
By my reckoning of what you've said so far, we're looking for a plan which limits Chinese imports and replaces them with products built in Britain by British workers on much higher wages, but which won't actually push up the price of anything, as you don't want the ordinary worker to suffer.
This is the only advantage to the whole Man made global warming theory, That as people/industry tries to reduce it's carbon footprint goods will be made and sought locally.What is your plan to deliver on your stated objectives?
By my reckoning of what you've said so far, we're looking for a plan which limits Chinese imports and replaces them with products built in Britain by British workers on much higher wages, but which won't actually push up the price of anything, as you don't want the ordinary worker to suffer.
Kermit power said:
andy43 said:
Be interesting to find out what that one job is on the estate in the article. Bet it's public sector of some sort.
What is it with people who can't even be bothered to hit one click to find out the answer to their question?Kermit power said:
NoNeed said:
Kermit power said:
Superspeed, I'm willing to be persuaded...
What is your plan to deliver on your stated objectives?
By my reckoning of what you've said so far, we're looking for a plan which limits Chinese imports and replaces them with products built in Britain by British workers on much higher wages, but which won't actually push up the price of anything, as you don't want the ordinary worker to suffer.
This is the only advantage to the whole Man made global warming theory, That as people/industry tries to reduce it's carbon footprint goods will be made and sought locally.What is your plan to deliver on your stated objectives?
By my reckoning of what you've said so far, we're looking for a plan which limits Chinese imports and replaces them with products built in Britain by British workers on much higher wages, but which won't actually push up the price of anything, as you don't want the ordinary worker to suffer.
SplatSpeed said:
Kermit power said:
NoNeed said:
Kermit power said:
Superspeed, I'm willing to be persuaded...
What is your plan to deliver on your stated objectives?
By my reckoning of what you've said so far, we're looking for a plan which limits Chinese imports and replaces them with products built in Britain by British workers on much higher wages, but which won't actually push up the price of anything, as you don't want the ordinary worker to suffer.
This is the only advantage to the whole Man made global warming theory, That as people/industry tries to reduce it's carbon footprint goods will be made and sought locally.What is your plan to deliver on your stated objectives?
By my reckoning of what you've said so far, we're looking for a plan which limits Chinese imports and replaces them with products built in Britain by British workers on much higher wages, but which won't actually push up the price of anything, as you don't want the ordinary worker to suffer.
supersingle said:
rs1952 said:
And trade barriers? My, that's a good idea. Put obstacles in the way of other nations selling us things then wonder why they won't buy things from us Perhaps we could reintroduce the Corn Laws - only made a few million people die of starvation in the UK last time round
I don't know why free trade is such a holy cow. It's not like we really have it. China strictly controls it's currency and absolutely will not let it strengthen to the point where it's exports might be damaged. That's hardly free trade is it? Perhaps we could reintroduce the Corn Laws - only made a few million people die of starvation in the UK last time roundOn the other hand when anyone in the West dares to suggest that we limit these artificially cheap imports they are branded a communist.
I don't think we should be competing with the East on wages or working conditions. The only people here who will benefit will be the elite. Ordinary workers are going to get crucified.
China is being allowed to get away with having an undervalued currency at the moment because its surpluses are effectively keeping things going as it lends them back to the West.
And as I also said earlier, we could not compete with China on wage levels alone because of all the things we have and they haven't. In a nutshell, we need to pay higher wages to unskilled workers than they do so that those workers can earn enough to pay the direct and indirect taxes we levy, and also have enough left over to pay for the little extras in life. You know, like bread, shoes, pay the electric bill.....
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