It IS a recession, but it COULD be a depression
Discussion
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/r...
Well done Gordon, you slack faced, one-eyed Scottish nonce
Well done Gordon, you slack faced, one-eyed Scottish nonce
kedFezant Pluckah said:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/r...
Well done Gordon, you slack faced, one-eyed Scottish nonce
I think what you mean is well done most of the population who run up debts they cant afford, to those businesses who just don't know how to run themselves properly and to the fact the world is a whole mess. However the British people are morons, so the situation is going to continue to worsen for the time being. There are no actions that could be done to sort the situation out quickly. Well done Gordon, you slack faced, one-eyed Scottish nonce
If you think you have the ultimate answer why not enlighten us?
Your comment is as dumb as "Damn, I burnt my toast this morning. Gordon Browns fault."
He is trying to take actions to stop it, but as no one knows what actions will sort it. There is only one method, trial and error. All the politicians would be exactly the same.
Cheer up allelster said:
Fezant Pluckah said:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/r...
Well done Gordon, you slack faced, one-eyed Scottish nonce
I think what you mean is well done most of the population who run up debts they cant afford, to those businesses who just don't know how to run themselves properly and to the fact the world is a whole mess. However the British people are morons, so the situation is going to continue to worsen for the time being. There are no actions that could be done to sort the situation out quickly. Well done Gordon, you slack faced, one-eyed Scottish nonce
If you think you have the ultimate answer why not enlighten us?
Your comment is as dumb as "Damn, I burnt my toast this morning. Gordon Browns fault."
He is trying to take actions to stop it, but as no one knows what actions will sort it. There is only one method, trial and error. All the politicians would be exactly the same.
elster said:
Fezant Pluckah said:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/r...
Well done Gordon, you slack faced, one-eyed Scottish nonce
I think what you mean is well done most of the population who run up debts they cant afford, to those businesses who just don't know how to run themselves properly and to the fact the world is a whole mess. However the British people are morons, so the situation is going to continue to worsen for the time being. There are no actions that could be done to sort the situation out quickly. Well done Gordon, you slack faced, one-eyed Scottish nonce
If you think you have the ultimate answer why not enlighten us?
Your comment is as dumb as "Damn, I burnt my toast this morning. Gordon Browns fault."
He is trying to take actions to stop it, but as no one knows what actions will sort it. There is only one method, trial and error. All the politicians would be exactly the same.
Brown is innocent in all this is he? He did nothing to ensure the FSA regulated borrowing sufficiently (the self-cert bubble was always going to burst) so the uneducated will always borrow if they can. Without sufficient controls the banks to play to the full exent of the system.
Now to suggest ways to move us forward we need:
- A genereal election. The country needs a new hope to stimutate trust in the government again. Hopefully this will also raise the value of the pound, as it's quite obvious international investers don't trust the current adminisatration.
- Massively cutting non-essential spend. I'm talking pulling troops out of the two wars (although that is happening to some extent), making the public sector more efficent, scraping the latest fad ideas (ID cards etc). Whilst this maybe small in the scheme of things everything adds up.
- Adopting sensible green policies, not jumping on the MMGW bandwagon. Allow car makers to produce cars not spend all their money developing stupid hybrid technologies. (I'm thinking of JagLandRovers employment of 600 engineering staff early 2008 specifically to work on hybrid technologies)
- Sensible benefits policy - if you can work you do work. Being able to work yet choosing to be "on the social" should not be an option
- Finally, but I belive this is very important, we need to address the education system. Too many people going to second rate poly's to study noone courses and racking up massive debts. They would be far better doing vocational studies and getting apprenciships. Those that would have gotten into uni 20 years ago should be ecouraged to study engineering, science etc. We simply don't have the calibre of graduates in this country and are suffering for it. Our expertise in R&D etc is based on those who graduated years ago with all the younger people coming from abroad. We need to fix the education system quick.
elster said:
I think what you mean is well done most of the population who run up debts they cant afford, to those businesses who just don't know how to run themselves properly and to the fact the world is a whole mess. However the British people are morons, so the situation is going to continue to worsen for the time being. There are no actions that could be done to sort the situation out quickly.
If you think you have the ultimate answer why not enlighten us?
Thats the problem though, its not personal credit that's the initial problem. The initial problem is that house prices were allowed to get so ludicrously out of control, that lenders were not lending money on the back of a spiraling market without doing due diligence, and that some of the mortgage debts have been sold are ticking time bombs, and no one quite knows which ones are said ticking time bombs.If you think you have the ultimate answer why not enlighten us?
So the growth in the nations wealth has been on the back of all the above. The personal debts that people have run up is just an added kick in the balls to the economy.
In my opinion, and I'm just guessing, the only way out of this is the long term that people will slowly pay off their debts, the banks will become recapitalized from that, and if anyone has any sense we'll move back to the days where you couldn't just get a mortgage but were in a queue ready for the money to become available, which in turn will slow house prices down to something sensible that also reflects the market properly.
Gordon Brown is at fault personally as well. You can see this all the way back to 97 when he taxed pension companies. Many many people in their 40s saw what he had done, and invested a chunck of their equity into a second home for BTL. This then created one of the house price escalators. Another escalator is letting quite so many immigrants without a care which also adds to the rising house prices. There are probably 2-3 more things he did to help it along as well.
The banks work out a new way of financing mortgages and start lending huge amounts of cash.
And then we have a BoE official saying that in hindsight they should have been worried about Northern Rock doing 125% mortgages. Hindsight? Hindsight? We don't pay huge amounts of salary for a BoE official to say "we didn't understand what was happening". We pay huge amounts of money to these people to see these problems a mile off and avoid them, not to make excuses. And I'm sure that all the people who "didn't" see this coming still have employment today.
Grrrr.
I think the focus on the banking problems is a bit of a diversion. These things are relatively limited in nature and there's a mechanism for sorting them out. Short term pain but no barrier to wealth creation in the long run. Similarly the focus on getting lending going again is at best misguided, at worst even more damaging. Safe bets will find still credit, and confidence would return.
The real problem though is the government's response of borrowing endless money and tipping it into bail outs to try and force lending. This has already devalued the currency and will saddle the economy with higher taxes for years to come.
My oh so clever solution would be to do nothing. Let it pass. Continue using interest rates to target inflation, which would probably mean putting them up a bit, and with a decent return some lending would probably return anyway.
This will turn into a depression if the government continues to do what it's doing.
The real problem though is the government's response of borrowing endless money and tipping it into bail outs to try and force lending. This has already devalued the currency and will saddle the economy with higher taxes for years to come.
My oh so clever solution would be to do nothing. Let it pass. Continue using interest rates to target inflation, which would probably mean putting them up a bit, and with a decent return some lending would probably return anyway.
This will turn into a depression if the government continues to do what it's doing.
elster said:
Your comment is as dumb as "Damn, I burnt my toast this morning. Gordon Browns fault."
He is trying to take actions to stop it, but as no one knows what actions will sort it. There is only one method, trial and error. All the politicians would be exactly the same.
I can't believe that there are still people who believe that Gormless Gordon bears NO responsibility for the state the country is in.He is trying to take actions to stop it, but as no one knows what actions will sort it. There is only one method, trial and error. All the politicians would be exactly the same.
(Apparently, he's got the hump because he doesn't feel he's getting the 'credit' he deserves from the international community. All this shows is that HE truly believes it's nothing to do with him)
Since a great deal of lending, borrowing, and trading is based on speculation and sentiment, does it not follow that if the press is constantly forcasting doom, that is what we'll get?
If the press spent more time reporting the news instead of telling us how bad things will probably get, would things be as bad?
If the press spent more time reporting the news instead of telling us how bad things will probably get, would things be as bad?
Fezant Pluckah said:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/r...
Well done Gordon, you slack faced, one-eyed Scottish nonce
Why add the scottish nonce part? Well done Gordon, you slack faced, one-eyed Scottish nonce
DJFish said:
Since a great deal of lending, borrowing, and trading is based on speculation and sentiment, does it not follow that if the press is constantly forcasting doom, that is what we'll get?
If the press spent more time reporting the news instead of telling us how bad things will probably get, would things be as bad?
Well media stocks would probably take a dive for one thing.If the press spent more time reporting the news instead of telling us how bad things will probably get, would things be as bad?
IMO sentiment can move things dramatically in the short term but it's very fickle and can turn around just as quickly. The collapse we've seen recently is more to do with the fundamentals, and no amount of positive talk in the press would pick things up.
jkennyd said:
Fezant Pluckah said:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financetopics/r...
Well done Gordon, you slack faced, one-eyed Scottish nonce
Why add the scottish nonce part? Well done Gordon, you slack faced, one-eyed Scottish nonce
) would feel about an English guy running scotland into the ground?Our power was off *again* this morning so I was listening to the radio, whilst I ate my breakfast, and had coffee boiled on the cooker.
It was a Radio4 article about how local councils are looking to set themselves up as lenders. The issue is that if they set up as lenders they don't have to register as banks, because they they don't take deposits. There was some debate on the risk associated with such financial practice.
Just a week back I was thinking about the looming quantitative easing (printing money), and thinking about Zimbabwe. What I was wondering was how in Zim, they actually distribute the money that has been printed. How might that map on to our own country. Out there, I think they just have people/machines that simply cross out the old value on the notes, and write in the new one, with an official government stamp.
The notable thing is that not everybody in Zim, has the opportunity to get the new currency. Essentially the government decide who's money is going to be worthless, and who has access to the revalued currency.
What I realised today is that not all councils are going to be offering the money lending services. Just Birmingham and Essex. That's when it struck me. The newly printed money will most likely be lent out through the council banks that they're considering setting up now.
Who wants to bet that if you get such a loan, you're going to have to pay it back? Perhaps the interest rate will be negative!!!
It was a Radio4 article about how local councils are looking to set themselves up as lenders. The issue is that if they set up as lenders they don't have to register as banks, because they they don't take deposits. There was some debate on the risk associated with such financial practice.
Just a week back I was thinking about the looming quantitative easing (printing money), and thinking about Zimbabwe. What I was wondering was how in Zim, they actually distribute the money that has been printed. How might that map on to our own country. Out there, I think they just have people/machines that simply cross out the old value on the notes, and write in the new one, with an official government stamp.
The notable thing is that not everybody in Zim, has the opportunity to get the new currency. Essentially the government decide who's money is going to be worthless, and who has access to the revalued currency.
What I realised today is that not all councils are going to be offering the money lending services. Just Birmingham and Essex. That's when it struck me. The newly printed money will most likely be lent out through the council banks that they're considering setting up now.
Who wants to bet that if you get such a loan, you're going to have to pay it back? Perhaps the interest rate will be negative!!!
Edited by dilbert on Saturday 24th January 14:01
Gassing Station | The Pie & Piston Archive | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff