Would everyone kindly stop complicating the problems the UK faces?
Reduce ALL public employment by 50% (it really is that overbloated cf Parkinson's Law) and put ALL the money saved into boosting private sector employment in companies employing less than 50 people. Reduce all tax reference to a max of 250 pages, and tell the EU "we'll get back to you when we can afford to".
Give the Post Office a combined eBay and PayPal role; carve a chunk off the BBC to take on Google search and advertising. Devolve BT to local control (could the dickheads running councils cope? probably not) and consolidate all street works to get real broadband installed.
Simple. So what's the catch?
Q: Where is the effective demand for the goods and services produced by all of these new enterprises? And BT is a private firm, how would a government "devolve it to local control"?
A: Where is the demand for the goods and services of the 50% of state "lard" we can safely cull?
And they're not new enterprises. It takes far too long to set up new companies, and failures are far too high amongst startups - we think this is only turbocharging the "get banks to lend" proposition.
China is quite quickly going to become increasingly uncompetitive as their home markets grow staggeringly quickly - and overnight if they were forced to adopt EU level H&S and employment practises.
BT has broken so many laws and rules over the past ten years that if all those who had been screwed were invited to complain and be heard, it could be tied up in regulatory legal hassles for ever. They'd have to settle.
Q: Obviously the demand for goods and services provided by the public sector is ineffective - not every individual could afford to pay privately for municipal, emergency services, healthcare, policing, etc.
A: We really can lose 50% of the public sector costs without affecting any of that lot. Really we could. Trust us, we are NOT politicians. With 50% less non-productive, tea-swilling, work-creating state to pay for, just imagine the tax cuts possible. Everyone would be able to afford Bupa and their own pension plans.
The biggest problem by far with this idea is that the 50% of state employees will need completely reprogramming in order to able able to resume a productive role in the community after years of institutionalised lead swinging. Hence pumping all that cash to bribe employers to do the gruesome task.
Q: Have you heard of the concept of transfer payments? The idea that low paid workers, the unemployed, the disabled, and pensioners would be able to pay for health insurance and the rest...
That sounds like another term for subsidies and the bureaucracy required to administer them. TMP needs people to earn and keep their own money, and make their own decisions with it. Nowhere in the history of the world has a bureaucracy spent money more wisely than the people that created the wealth in the first place.
We don't have the time or inclination to study fad political/economic trends and theories. They are a large part of what has screwed this country and most of the world where the political class has become grotesquely over self important since the 60s. As one economics professor observed, the questions for economics degree exams remain the same, only the answers change. They are no longer our obedient servants, they are George Orwell's Animal Farm pigs, writ large.
A big part of the solution is the resurrection of the family; this is one thing we could learn from many immigrant (religion/respect based) communities. Cameron's much derided "big society" - that for some reason is being systematically undermined by the out of control BBC who fears its grip on the social engineering agenda may be slipping , is a way to try and replace the nanny state by re-asserting family responsibilities.
Commuting strangles our pathetic transport infrastructure, but our new homes are the smallest in the developed world by some margin - so every new home should be built with a proper office and a parent annexe for starters. Our bonkers home costs are a factor of abysmal planning and population mismanagement over many years.
A solution to our present mess is much simpler than work-creating civil servants and politicians imply - but it's a revolution in modern terms, and needs proper leadership. So what is the political class currently gripped by? The debate over a voting system that would most likely guarantee paralysed leadership in perpetuity.
Monday, February 21, 2011
Thursday, February 17, 2011
PayPal: The global chugger
TMP is moving beyond "basic" politics to explore any topics that impinge on "the majority", and deserve to become part of a broader public awareness and debate. The impositions of globalisation are behind many of the ills that afflict the UK in particular - because we tend to be passive, supine and compliant as a nation - and the world in general.
But why do Brits tend to be so unquestioning and obedient in the face of nonsense from the likes of Brussels and global brands? Simple! From the 1600s to the mid 20th century, Britain lead the world in so many ways we did not need to think too hard about much that was handed down to us from above. It was pretty much guaranteed to be in the "national interest", and the ultimate interest of the people. On the other hand, of course Mr & Mrs Johnny Foreigner were right to be suspicious of just about everything anyone tried to impose on them - after all, the Brits had probably raped their great, great grandparents, and pinched all their natural resources. However, corporate America is now the steamroller of imperialism, and it behoves us all to pay closer attention.
Now then, would PayPal please stop trying to kid us that it is a benefit to mankind by trying leech cash from its users, and thereby blag a place in heaven at the expense of others? I am heartily sick of getting spammed with begging messages like this:-
Dear Mugged Punter,
Time is running out for you to give 100% to Oxfam and let PayPal pick up the bill for running costs.
• What's the deal? – PayPal are paying Oxfam’s running costs on your donations
• 100% Giving – Every penny of your money goes directly towards fighting poverty
• Only 11 days left to give – The chance to make 100% impact must end February
So what's stopping you?
Well, have you got a few hours? PayPal is part of an absolutely feckin' enormous US controlled operation that specialises in scalping punters who have absolutely no viable choice. The way the banks have allowed PayPal to exist without competition is one of the internet's greatest shames, and something every government should be addressing by setting up national postal services as competition. The country postal services de facto is obliged to have "peering agreements" around the planet, and ought to be the perfect place for rooting such an activity.
In the UK, allowing our very convenient but moribund Post Offices to become universal payment gateways could throw them a much needed lifeline. Especially if they also had the wit to become eBay packing/despatch and collection centres.
Bottom line, I am so annoyed by the recent Oxfam campaign on PayPal that I shall now never ever give anything the Oxfam in any shape or form. Instead, I shall buy a Big Issue form the next vendor I can find, for a fiver.
But why do Brits tend to be so unquestioning and obedient in the face of nonsense from the likes of Brussels and global brands? Simple! From the 1600s to the mid 20th century, Britain lead the world in so many ways we did not need to think too hard about much that was handed down to us from above. It was pretty much guaranteed to be in the "national interest", and the ultimate interest of the people. On the other hand, of course Mr & Mrs Johnny Foreigner were right to be suspicious of just about everything anyone tried to impose on them - after all, the Brits had probably raped their great, great grandparents, and pinched all their natural resources. However, corporate America is now the steamroller of imperialism, and it behoves us all to pay closer attention.
Now then, would PayPal please stop trying to kid us that it is a benefit to mankind by trying leech cash from its users, and thereby blag a place in heaven at the expense of others? I am heartily sick of getting spammed with begging messages like this:-
Dear Mugged Punter,
Time is running out for you to give 100% to Oxfam and let PayPal pick up the bill for running costs.
• What's the deal? – PayPal are paying Oxfam’s running costs on your donations
• 100% Giving – Every penny of your money goes directly towards fighting poverty
• Only 11 days left to give – The chance to make 100% impact must end February
So what's stopping you?
Well, have you got a few hours? PayPal is part of an absolutely feckin' enormous US controlled operation that specialises in scalping punters who have absolutely no viable choice. The way the banks have allowed PayPal to exist without competition is one of the internet's greatest shames, and something every government should be addressing by setting up national postal services as competition. The country postal services de facto is obliged to have "peering agreements" around the planet, and ought to be the perfect place for rooting such an activity.
In the UK, allowing our very convenient but moribund Post Offices to become universal payment gateways could throw them a much needed lifeline. Especially if they also had the wit to become eBay packing/despatch and collection centres.
Bottom line, I am so annoyed by the recent Oxfam campaign on PayPal that I shall now never ever give anything the Oxfam in any shape or form. Instead, I shall buy a Big Issue form the next vendor I can find, for a fiver.
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
We're all doomed
As the client state is unavoidably dismantled, the complete absence of any discernible incentive to create and maintain new businesses employing people, and the BBC-Guardian's continued efforts to pretend that it's all Cameron's fault, is going to lead to big trouble.
When those tipped out of work run out of money and benefits - and cannot find a generous local council still willing to offer non jobs - there is going to be indignation and trouble. As everyone starts to take it ever further up the arse from Broon's inflation legacy, things are going to get really grim.
The UK has got absolutely nothing in reserve, except 2 million unneeded state employees, and a brief glance around the rest of the world really does underline that the party is over as 13 years of socialist disaster has left the UK with precious few ways to escape a decade of decline.
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