Snapshot of _GDP figures: UK entered recession in 2023, new figures show - BBC News_ :
An archived version can be found [here](https://archive.is/?run=1&url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/business-68297420) or [here.](https://archive.ph/?run=1&url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/business-68297420)
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/ukpolitics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
So, we are in a recession, it's all because of those migrants boats. I'm sure getting a few sent to Rwanda for millions of pounds will fix the problem.
Not sure how you have missed the fact that we need to "**Stop the Boats to Start the Fights.**"
After all, we have only spent **£250 MILLION +** of our taxes on sending 3 Tory MPs to Rwanda for a holiday. Pathetic.
I am less than 20 years old. I’ve lived through 3 recessions already. Is this normal? It feels like “once in X year” events are coming round too frequently.
It's called end stage capitalism.
Capitalism goes through cycles of boom and bust, but as the gap between rich and poor gets bigger, every bust the rich will buy up everything cheap and take more from the poor and make the gap bigger.
Capitalism is also based on printing money which is no longer based on anything physical so holds no value except that we give it as it's not scarce.
The central banks will lend it at interest to other banks and this is repeated. But as the money was lent at interest the banks must lend to pay that back and that is why inflation must always happen. That is why you hear them changing the base rate.
So inflation has to keep on going, lending has to keep on going and these cycles will keep on going getting more and more common until the general population have suffered enough and decide to change the system.
The system only works if you can achieve constant growth.
Even the British Heart Foundation has a CEO who's job is dictated by Law to consider financial growth as a KPI
We fucked
Fair and the monitory system keeps evolving, it's very different to the beast that caused the great depression and may be different again in soamy years.
It still boiled my blood, Brexit and this so much. I had a friend who voted so stupidly he voted Tory because and I quite "I want to buy a house and labour are too woke" mind you this was a 23 year old man.
I don’t think the problem with a recession is necessarily to do with any particular party, as I don’t know if any particular party would have the balls to tax the ones who should be taxed the most, and feed more disposable cash into the hands of consumers.
The GDP figures you’re looking at are representative of the companies that make the UK’s FTSE up; but by itself it’s not a reflection of an individual’s ability to spend money. There’s an enormous gap in wealth inequality, and the wealthy will just continue to grab assets to invest in, as opposed to spending what money they have (if you even **could** spend the millions they have access to, which you can’t).
It’s a bit lazy to blame one party over another; the two parties who are most likely to get in should both have enough of an understanding of economics to know the economy will flourish if more money is put into the hands of ordinary people. B/millionaires having more money, which is a consistently growing overall figure, isn’t a reflection of a successful country.
**TLDR:** The difference between Tory/Labour is basically Coke/Pepsi. The governing party needs to realise the power is in the hand of the consumer, and more wealth needs to be distributed to them through tax. The rich have money they realistically can’t spend; they can only invest it.
I can’t be arsed at this point to reply - as someone who supports reducing income inequality as a main priority there is so much incorrect in this post it is best ignored.
I don’t think this was intentional, and no disrespect.
Do you not think that reducing wealth inequality should be a far bigger priority in principle than reducing income inequality? Feasibility is another matter of course
The GDP figures we are looking at are not a representative of the companies that make up the FTSE - they do contribute. It is the total monetary value of all the final goods and services.
This government published document shows that there is a very weak correlation between FTSE growth and economic growth
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5c6c1db0e5274a72b55d58ea/Jan_2019_update.pdf
Services - which corporations, owned by the wealthy, provide to consumers… who have a limited ability to spend.
This bulletin shows the relationship of investments with relation to GDP, and with respect I don’t need a reminder of the GDP formula. It doesn’t do anything to disprove my point that these GDP figures don’t reflect any meaningful positive impact for a majority of the people living in the United Kingdom. If anything, the figures in the document prove my statement: that people who have the means to purchase these assets now have the opportunity to do so at discount - in preparation for when they inevitably grow again.
For someone who claims to advocate for a reduction in wealth inequality, you come across as somebody who’d rather flaunt that they know how to read a simple chart.
Both sides sucked in 2019, Tories at the time seemed like the less shit option (especially given the other choice was an antisemite that sides with Hamas), but still a really bad option
I honestly don’t understand how a fifth of the people intending to vote still have any desire to back this party. Fingers crossed that Labour sees the undoubtably incorrect and harmful methods of the Tories and stops pivoting towards them.
A lot of people have decided to stick with the decision they made over Brexit and won't be swayed from it ever, ever, ever because it would mean admitting they might've got it wrong. Voting for insane/inept Tories is part of that pact they've made with themselves.
>I honestly don’t understand how a fifth of the people intending to vote still have any desire to back this party.
Simple - because this party have protected *them*, at the expense of *everyone else*...
If Labour get in, they have to break the triple lock, probably means test pensions, raise the pension age, and so on and so forth.
A childless, home owning, asset possessing, cash rich, pensioner can qualify for Covid low-income council payments of **£450 (per individual).**
If you and your spouse, with a soaring mortgage and several kids and so on, both lose your job *at the same time*, you're entitled to **£500 per month (combined).**
Older pigs are much, more equal than younger pigs, while uber-wealthy pigs at the most equal of all.
Any party breaking the triple lock or raising the pension age will doom itself to electoral oblivion.
It's expensive, but universal pension and a pension age is how we look after our elderly. Other countries such as India, the parents move in with the kids when they retire. It's a price worth paying.
Yeah but the only way to raise the money to pay for that is to tax the everloving shit out of current workers and cut to money spent on other things, like public transport, infrastructure and the rest of welfare. I see why you're ideologically married to it but with the aging population it's actually effectively a Ponzi scheme and collapses once there aren't enough people on the bottom.
If birth rates keep declining how do the people currently paying for the last generations pension get their pensions paid out? Without constant growth the system doesn't work, and "we need to look after our old people" doesn't explain where the money to do that comes from?
>It's expensive, but universal pension and a pension age is how we look after our elderly. Other countries such as India, the parents move in with the kids when they retire. It's a price worth paying.
My view is that we are already several years *past* the point where it was a choice to keep it.
The UK has a structural fiscal deficit, structurally dependent on borrowing and marginal tax rates of over 60% in some cases.
Starmer will be handed a burning wreckage of an economy, looking something like this:
|Health and Social care|£176bn|
|:-|:-|
|State Pensions|£124bn|
|**Debt Interest**|**£120bn**|
|Universal Credit|£83bn|
|Education|£81bn|
|Defence|£32bn|
Even if the economy *never* contracted further - we are already heading for IMF intervention - we have no growth mechanism and drowning in debt just to stay afloat.
We are going bankrupt - a slow motion car crash - and that's assuming UKGov do *not* repair the hazardous schools, or ramp up defence spending in preparation for another Russian invasion - both of which already look unavoidable.
Everything has been slashed and burned to shield the OAP demographic from any of the economic pain - and that demographic continues to grow.
We are currently sitting ducks for another serious economic shock such as currency crisis etc.
I'm elaborated on my view somewhat [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/ukpolitics/comments/1apqq50/comment/kq8ra1c/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
>Any party breaking the triple lock or raising the pension age will doom itself to electoral oblivion.
Indeed.
The questions for Labour are -
* Can they politically *afford* to change the winners and the losers?
* How *fast* can they go?
* *How radical can they be?*
For any UK government to fix the existing problems and restore the UK to a stable footing, they're probably going to need about **15 years** minimum.
Unfortunately, no UK government ever does anything that won't pay off within a 5 year cycle (see Nuclear power plants etc.)
Unless Labour are prepared to bring in PR - then we are at the Last Chance Saloon - the next government will not be Conservative or Reform led, it will be IMF led - and they will cut through bone.
It's fairly obvious they've been fudging the numbers since the pandemic to delay the inevitable. A few months back we only 'technically' avoided recession because we had a supposed 'flat' growth rate in the second quarter. In truth, there had been a contraction of something like 0.04%, which they were allowed to round up to zero, despite it still representing £100 million + or so wiped from the nation's wealth. It's there to see on the [graph the BBC have posted while aggressively trying to downplay the significance of the news.](https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/1178D/production/_132656517_1db22b63-942c-450a-bed1-660d100dd7ac.jpg)
Weirdly, the ONS site still says we [grew by 0.2% in the same period](https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/grossdomesticproductgdp/bulletins/quarterlynationalaccounts/apriltojune2023) while their other reports match the BBC's graph, though that's an unrevised figure. Not sure how that works, I'll admit.
So the reality is, the economy has been shrinking for 9 months now, but the government has wilfully buried its head in the sand and tried to fool us all into believing it isn't happening.
That's why Labour ditching it's 28 billion in green spending is shortsighted. We need to kickstart growth somehow. Kill the Tory economic talking points dead.
I do think it was a tactical blunder for Labour to give an exact figure on that, because it gives the Tories a stick to beat them with about "extravagant spending".
Instead Labour should have focused the message on the OUTCOME of their Green Policy initiative, and then the figures can come out once they're in power and can provide accurate costings.
I think they've basically shifted to doing this now. They've dropped the top-line figure, but in reality plan to do pretty much all of it anyway.
Except the ONS has operational independence so that's just not possible. GDP revisions are a thing across all countries. The pandemic has increased the uncertainty associated with GDP estimates.
I've never bought much into the idea the BBC is a Tory mouthpiece but their live thread about this news just reads like some damage-control propaganda.
The BBC actually came in for a lot of stick in 2008 for being too negative about the recession and making it worse, like a self-fulfilling prophecy.
I think it was Robert Peston who said on the 6 o'clock news "things are so bad we might as well turn the lights off, get under the duvet and stay there".
Since 2008 they've been notably more cautious when reporting bad economic news.
the current gov. keeps them able to leech from the public, so they need to suck up. licence fee would be gone as soon as they arent on the side of the ones in power.
then the left for some reason acts like calls to get rid of the licence fee is some right wing nut job idea. never understood this, the bbc has on some whacky cultural people for the current trends and that seems to get it a pass from the left, like that liniker guy or what ever he is called.
its a weird place.
This BBC interview from 1996 shows how the media can be manipulated without any hands-on action:-
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pV85306K64w
The most important line is at the end:-
"If you believed something different, you wouldn't be sitting where you're sitting."
Now you can extrapolate that to every section of public service, from the media to the police to the politicians that are allowed to run, and you can suddenly understand where the fix actually is.
British Gas don't seem to be suffering, they are raking it in. I'm starting to think it's by design. The city is booming while nothing else works and everything is really expensive
Thing is the 0.1% still need doctors and schools that won't collapse on their kids, and police that will actually do something if they get robbed. If you have a mountain of money but the entire nation is a rancid shithole they won't be enjoying their riches very much.
Only thing it makes sense to do is leave
>Thing is the 0.1% still need doctors and schools that won't collapse on their kids,
The 0.1% don't send their kids to state schools, much less rely on the NHS. They are wealthy enough to insulate themselves from that.
They do rely on the NHS, if you get into a car accident or any emergency private hospitals can't help you.
If you have a private surgery and something goes wrong, they will ship you via ambulance to the general hospital.
Private health insurance won't cover chronic conditions like diabetes or any auto-immune conditions.
Even if you're rich, without health insurance, only the ridiculously wealthy people can afford to pay for things like numerous rounds of surgery and treatments
We aren't america (yet), everyone needs the NHS to be functioning otherwise all kinds of minor injuries and conditions become more lethal
tbh we probably should think of the shareholders, holding UK stocks is just like burning your money
fortunately most of the shareholders are pension funds so its just our pensions getting burned, who cares about that
If shareholders of FTSE 100 firms demanded growth over dividend payments we might see more of the business investment the country actually needs, and boost the economy and productivity.
I mean our growth companies are among the worst off, any growth company with a brain doesn't list in the UK anymore. It's a market of dinosaurs and the living dead.
Our entire growth sector remains in private equity, even large companies like Dyson just decide to never list publicly. Listing publicly in the UK is just the kiss of death.
Ok I have a question that I can't figure out about the UK. It might link into this too.
We have 2 repeating narratives going on.
The first, bosses screaming that they are having a nightmare finding staff & that especially professional staff are impossible to find.
The second is people saying they can't find work & have been out for months, including professionals from tech industries.
I know we've got 2.5 million people off sick waiting to be treated but WHAT is causing these two risky different stories? Because entering a recession means people aren't spending because they're scared of which way the economy is going.
The job boards i visit ARE empty & I'm bloody lucky I'm in a position at the moment but where are all these jobs that CEOs are complaining they can't fill?
Also Jeremy hunt and Sunak, both millionaires going on about "staying the course" really makes me want to puke
A lot of companies want a relevant degree, 3 years experience in the industry and to pay you £25K for an entry level position. So many jobs out there that pay the same as a cashier at Aldi but require 6 years of effort to get.
People do want to work, companies just don't want to pay them a fair wage.
>WHAT is causing these two risky different stories?
They're not necessarily contradictory...
I've explained why in more detail [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/ukpolitics/comments/1aqir5q/comment/kqdj8hc/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3).
TLDR;
Broadly speaking, UK Pharma salaries currently appear to be **20%-40% lower** than they were 3 years ago. The sector has been flooded by migrants who undercut British workers. They're also not qualified to work in a regulated industry.
Most people with their head screwed on straight have left UK Pharma and retrained, or just left the UK - hence most of the big investments planned for the UK over the last several years went to Republic of Ireland instead.
There is a mismatch between which jobs are available, and which jobs people want to take. We lack qualified people in some sectors, such as healthcare, science and technology, and retail. We have too many qualified people in other sectors, such as clerical staff (HR is especially bad; the average position gets 3000+ applicants).
With that said, unemployment is at 3.8%, which is a record low. The people saying they can't find work are not representative of the average brit.
I think this is the answer, we've become a country that expects specialisation in work and so you end up with a mismatch between what work people are looking for and what is available. It also forces a lot of people to get low level work they are overqualified for.
And instead of helping educate your local population, you're relying on importing already trained skilled workers (like almost every country in the first world). This approach has personally benefited me, but it's very shortsighted and stupid. Governments should invest (heavily) in local's education rather than rely on importing us 🙄.
Edit: actually, every penny saved importing us should be invested in educating the local population so importing us becomes less and less necessary
Yes, and because some of the underlying basic skills are missing (we do poorly on numeracy and GCSE maths), changing to adjacent specialisations is harder than it should be.
I get the impression from "the internet" - which probably means Americans - that the employers are saying "nobody wants to work " and the employees are saying "nobody's hiring ", so there's a disconnect on both sides between what they're looking for and what is available.
And yes, I did try to write that without bias to one side or the other!
The other possibility is that there's a labour shortage in one area, role or other category, with a job shortage in a different one. If there's plenty of software engineers but not enough hardware engineers, there could be visible shortages in both labour and jobs at the same time.
I think it's a combination of both, plus location as it's very possible there might be loads of jobs in a certain sector in London but virtually none in Leeds or vice versa. Getting on your metaphorical bike might be okay if there's a suitable job half an hour away but not at the other end of the country, especially if the employer asks for a local address because long commutes mean transport disruption is more likely.
Another issue is some employers wanting very niche skills which aren't part of the contemporary general education for that field but also not wanting to have to train staff. One example is that a decent number of military and finance systems are running on hardware and/or software which is now so old that the people who know how to maintain it are retiring, and they can't find replacements because modern software developers aren't routinely being taught COBOL and are unlikely to spend time teaching themselves a 65 year old programming language just on the off chance a suitable job which pays enough to make it worthwhile pops up nearby.
> The job boards i visit ARE empty & I'm bloody lucky I'm in a position at the moment but where are all these jobs that CEOs are complaining they can't fill
There will be some parts of the UK that are doing ok, and much smaller cells that are doing well. The rest, and vast majority, is either on its knees or falling to that point.
Those CEO need to be brought out onto the streets to address the tens (hundreds) of thousands of tech sector unemployed, and the government should be standing behind them with a bat in hand. Something has gone horribly wrong and it's not showing in aggregate data such as GDP or even GDP per capita.
OK, so the country is in recession, NHS in ruins, cost of living is astronomical, prisons full to bursting, not enough houses. But have you considered how woke trans people existing is!
Also city councils are broke and those babies are what's keeping founded a lot of welfare stuff that keeps people away from doing really desperate stuff. Just look at Bristol stabbings to have an idea what happens when those social nets disappear
It's not the decades-long real terms wage stagnation leading many to look at strongmen anti democratic leaders in a more favourable light that's the long term (or short term, if Trump wins) threat to the West.
No, it's the wrong kind of people being able to use bathrooms that is the real threat.
I have been wondering why Labour did this. Maybe we should all vote in a party that's good with the economy like the Tories. A few years of a Tory government would sort this whole problem out.
/S obvs
We’ve had one recession yes, but what about second recession?
*based on [this wiki page](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recessions_in_the_United_Kingdom) that shows two recessions since the Tories came to power
>GDP per capita began to fall in Q2 2022, the longest run of falls or stagnation by that metric since 1955. By February 2024 GDP per capita had shrunk by 4.2% compared to its pre- cost of living crisis peak.
That's quite brutal..
Sponsor what war?
The UK (along with most of the western world) is defending international shipping lanes that were being targeted from Houthi Rebels which are financed and directed by Iran, which in turn is being directed by Moscow. It’s a predictable distraction dead cat strategy to divert attention from Ukraine. See: lead up to WW1, small incidents were popping off everywhere before it finally started.
FYI - Chinese Navy ships are also there, but not engaging….
I’m not a fan of Rishi in the slightest, but our Military response has been well within reason.
And I'd much rather send tools to another country at war than send our own troops in and escalate.
Or sit and do nothing waiting for the war to take over Europe and be at our doorstep.
Liz Truss’ government did call Sunak a socialist, so they clearly tried to warn us.
Though, Sunak did call Liz Truss a socialist too.
Either way, it definitely demonstrates that it must be those damn socialist bankers’ fault. It’s no good, it’s socialists all the way down.
The problem with Conservatism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.
So under the Tories, we have high inflation, high interest rates, record rents, and a recession to boot. Why would anyone consider voting for them ever again?
> Why would anyone consider voting for them ever again
"To save us from Marxist leader Kier Starmer!" ...But then throw in a line towards the end saying the UK lacks strong opposition parties and that's bad for democracy.
I hate to say it but the economic climate isn't only directly caused by the current set of Tories.
High inflation caused by high food and energy prices caused by the war in Ukraine does have an impact.
The Houthis attacking boats in the Red Sea does have an impact on trade.
The record number of people who are long term sick because of long Covid does have an impact.
All while we have a slowly aging population that needs more healthcare spending year on year in real terms.
...
There are some decisions the Tories have made to make things worse. Leaving the EU caused trade friction, turning off coal power stations, not investing in nuclear earlier, low long term investment in R&D in general, record immigration (debatable) causing strain on housing.
There are also some decisions that the Tories made which have helped. Offshore wind expansion made us slightly more energy independent, housebuilding has actually gone up, tax loopholes on IR35 contractors and digital services taxes, NHS productivity has been improving every year.
I'm just saying this because I'm honestly not sure if Labour will actually do anything differently. For instance they're backing down from their previous goals around house insulation (which should be the easiest win in the world) & there's no sign of any long term investment.
It's also to stress to people that we can't stop being involved in world politics because it does have an impact at home.
The first four things you mention are problems in all of Western Europe too.
The Houthis attacking ships won’t even be impacting GDP yet. The problems there picked up in October/November when they started firing rockets north. Attacks on shipping started later, the first notable one being in mid December.
But the latest GDP data is only going up to December, and of course a recession means two negative quarters. So any Houthi impact would’ve been on the last couple of weeks of 6 months of data.
> The first four things you mention are problems in all of Western Europe too.
GDP growth has been sluggish across the continent also. I believe Germany has also been in a recession recently. I could be wrong.
France has been slightly insulated as they're more dependent on nuclear energy and less on gas. That's not necessarily "better". For instance issues in uranium mining in Niger could cause greater issues for them. Just not in this instance.
> The Houthis attacking ships won’t even be impacting GDP yet. The problems there picked up in October/November when they started firing rockets north. Attacks on shipping started later, the first notable one being in mid December.
Yes, you are correct. It shouldn't be counted.
I do believe the other issues are valid though.
i'm sorry, but if Hunt and Rishi stand there and pat themselves on the back when inflation went down, saying that their plan was working, then they should also shoulder the opposite when everything goes wrong. It can't be only one way.
Anything going well is entirely down to them, even if they just sat on their arses and waited for it to happen by itself (e.g. inflation going down), and anything going badly is down to absolutely anyone on the entire planet except them. It's the political capital equivalent of "privatise the profits, nationalise the losses."
Higher than ever immigration too, these guys can't even pull off being right wing properly. I hope we get a realignment and the Tories go extinct next election.
Pro immigration isn't really left or right wing. It's pro capitalism and pro-asset owning class - wage suppression, higher house prices, weaker labour laws, etc.
The people that continually vote Tory want a strong economy and less immigrants. Under the Tories, we have a recession and record immigration. It’s time for Britain to wake up.
It can wildly contrast with the actual election result. There are so many recent examples - Trump, Boris etc. I won’t be celebrating until it’s set in stone.
What’s wrong with it? There isn’t a strong trade union movement in the UK. There’s a trade union movement, but it has historically low membership and UK wages have flatlined for a decade. They aren’t in a position of strength.
Sunak Cost Fallacy.
At some point you're so invested in the "it'll all turn around eventually" narrative that it's too painful to admit you're wrong and that you've fucked it by waiting.
> Honestly I don't know why Rishi won't call an election?
The most recent poll I can find posted on this subreddit has the Tories winning 80 seats. That's why he won't hold an election right now.
Things might not get much better for the Conservatives, but they are probably not going to get massively worse than rock bottom either, and the people at the top will be out of politics by the time the next Conservative government is elected, so they would be mad to give up power early.
> but they are probably not going to get massively worse than rock bottom either
He better hope so.
I hope he ends up giving his party a Canada style wipe out.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Canadian_federal_election
Inflation expected to hit 2% by April and I guess from there he's hoping his tax cuts (funded by further cuts to public spending) will see him gain popularity.
The tax cuts he is capable of giving won't even scratch the surface of the inflationary damage to cost of living so it's not going to make anyone feel any better and it will further undermine the long-term economy so it's just a quick bung to harvest votes with no real benefit to anyone at all (save for those gullible enough to fall for it)
No matter how well meaning, any tax cuts will be also intended to punish the next government. It either leaves them with less money to do things and more debt, or means they’ll immediately have to increase taxes, both of which will spun as negatives.
TBF recessions are a tool to ease inflation, they are almost the goal when you raise interest rates, although rates at 5% aren't really that high historically speaking.
Economic orthodoxy would be "low productivity is entirely within expectation, investment has predictably been stagnant since the country voted to mangle its own business sector in the name of sovereignty". As we unfortunately cannot jump to the alternate reality where Brexit didn't happen, easy solutions are difficult to come by.
The classical solution to low growth is lowering interest rates, increased government spending and/or lowering taxes. This is, unfortunately, the polar opposite of the solution to high inflation and mainstream economic orthodoxy says that reducing inflation should be the priority when it's to far above 2%. (And it's almost certainly right)
This is stagflation made all the more worse by an overvaluation of the pound internationally thanks to Londons financial activities, discouraging foreign investment
Some sort of high speed railway line linking the biggest economic areas of the UK allowing people and goods to move easily and quickly around the country?
Snapshot of _GDP figures: UK entered recession in 2023, new figures show - BBC News_ : An archived version can be found [here](https://archive.is/?run=1&url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/business-68297420) or [here.](https://archive.ph/?run=1&url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/business-68297420) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/ukpolitics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Thankfully we have a surplus of resources, responsible debt management, and a capable government at the fore. I'm sure we'll be fine /s
So, we are in a recession, it's all because of those migrants boats. I'm sure getting a few sent to Rwanda for millions of pounds will fix the problem.
Throw a thousand pounds bet in for good measure to make some back.
Not sure how you have missed the fact that we need to "**Stop the Boats to Start the Fights.**" After all, we have only spent **£250 MILLION +** of our taxes on sending 3 Tory MPs to Rwanda for a holiday. Pathetic.
I am less than 20 years old. I’ve lived through 3 recessions already. Is this normal? It feels like “once in X year” events are coming round too frequently.
Yes. Capitalism will have a recession every 4-7 years on average.
It's called end stage capitalism. Capitalism goes through cycles of boom and bust, but as the gap between rich and poor gets bigger, every bust the rich will buy up everything cheap and take more from the poor and make the gap bigger. Capitalism is also based on printing money which is no longer based on anything physical so holds no value except that we give it as it's not scarce. The central banks will lend it at interest to other banks and this is repeated. But as the money was lent at interest the banks must lend to pay that back and that is why inflation must always happen. That is why you hear them changing the base rate. So inflation has to keep on going, lending has to keep on going and these cycles will keep on going getting more and more common until the general population have suffered enough and decide to change the system.
The system only works if you can achieve constant growth. Even the British Heart Foundation has a CEO who's job is dictated by Law to consider financial growth as a KPI We fucked
Think you could define it the same as cancer. It's sole purpose is consistent growth even at the expense of killing itself.
We seem to have been in 'late stage capitalism' for a few decades now, as is the case with most millenarian belief systems...
We've been in it since the industrial revolution. Capitalism is about 10000 years old
Fair and the monitory system keeps evolving, it's very different to the beast that caused the great depression and may be different again in soamy years.
The Covid one doesn't really count as that was a political choice. Normally you could reasonably expect one recession every ten years or so.
Thank you 2019 tory voters, we could have been 5 years into a recovery but now we're even further behind.
It still boiled my blood, Brexit and this so much. I had a friend who voted so stupidly he voted Tory because and I quite "I want to buy a house and labour are too woke" mind you this was a 23 year old man.
I couldn't believe the results, but then again, they're still at 22% in the polls. One in five people. "Yeah, more of the same."
[https://i.imgur.com/ygyVeMi.jpg](https://i.imgur.com/ygyVeMi.jpg)
Moe Sizlak: “~~Immigants~~ Labour! I knew it was them! Even when it was the ~~bears~~ Tories, I knew it was them.”
I don’t think the problem with a recession is necessarily to do with any particular party, as I don’t know if any particular party would have the balls to tax the ones who should be taxed the most, and feed more disposable cash into the hands of consumers. The GDP figures you’re looking at are representative of the companies that make the UK’s FTSE up; but by itself it’s not a reflection of an individual’s ability to spend money. There’s an enormous gap in wealth inequality, and the wealthy will just continue to grab assets to invest in, as opposed to spending what money they have (if you even **could** spend the millions they have access to, which you can’t). It’s a bit lazy to blame one party over another; the two parties who are most likely to get in should both have enough of an understanding of economics to know the economy will flourish if more money is put into the hands of ordinary people. B/millionaires having more money, which is a consistently growing overall figure, isn’t a reflection of a successful country. **TLDR:** The difference between Tory/Labour is basically Coke/Pepsi. The governing party needs to realise the power is in the hand of the consumer, and more wealth needs to be distributed to them through tax. The rich have money they realistically can’t spend; they can only invest it.
I can’t be arsed at this point to reply - as someone who supports reducing income inequality as a main priority there is so much incorrect in this post it is best ignored. I don’t think this was intentional, and no disrespect.
Do you not think that reducing wealth inequality should be a far bigger priority in principle than reducing income inequality? Feasibility is another matter of course
Without you explaining yourself, and feeling too lazy to reply, I’m hesitant to walk away from my original stance. Hope you can understand.
The GDP figures we are looking at are not a representative of the companies that make up the FTSE - they do contribute. It is the total monetary value of all the final goods and services. This government published document shows that there is a very weak correlation between FTSE growth and economic growth https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5c6c1db0e5274a72b55d58ea/Jan_2019_update.pdf
Services - which corporations, owned by the wealthy, provide to consumers… who have a limited ability to spend. This bulletin shows the relationship of investments with relation to GDP, and with respect I don’t need a reminder of the GDP formula. It doesn’t do anything to disprove my point that these GDP figures don’t reflect any meaningful positive impact for a majority of the people living in the United Kingdom. If anything, the figures in the document prove my statement: that people who have the means to purchase these assets now have the opportunity to do so at discount - in preparation for when they inevitably grow again. For someone who claims to advocate for a reduction in wealth inequality, you come across as somebody who’d rather flaunt that they know how to read a simple chart.
Thank the batshit left of the Labour Party for Corbyn and his acolytes also
Blames Corbyn who.... checks notes.... _didn't_ run the country
No, this shit is all down to the tories and tory voters. don't blame anyone else
Both sides sucked in 2019, Tories at the time seemed like the less shit option (especially given the other choice was an antisemite that sides with Hamas), but still a really bad option
Tories haven't seemed like a good option since 2015
I must have missed that year
Boris "wrote" a book with antisemetic tropes and let thousands of people die.
Nope
you voted for a man who hid in a fridge, a man who has failed at every office job he has ever had. This is on tory voters.
No no, this is totally the fault of the power (and its voters) that hadn't been in power in 12 years and didn't vote for Brexit
How did this slip through the cracks?
I honestly don’t understand how a fifth of the people intending to vote still have any desire to back this party. Fingers crossed that Labour sees the undoubtably incorrect and harmful methods of the Tories and stops pivoting towards them.
A lot of people have decided to stick with the decision they made over Brexit and won't be swayed from it ever, ever, ever because it would mean admitting they might've got it wrong. Voting for insane/inept Tories is part of that pact they've made with themselves.
I can certainly believe that 1/5 people in the UK are evil or thick as pig shit. I'd have put the number closer to half probably.
>I honestly don’t understand how a fifth of the people intending to vote still have any desire to back this party. Simple - because this party have protected *them*, at the expense of *everyone else*... If Labour get in, they have to break the triple lock, probably means test pensions, raise the pension age, and so on and so forth. A childless, home owning, asset possessing, cash rich, pensioner can qualify for Covid low-income council payments of **£450 (per individual).** If you and your spouse, with a soaring mortgage and several kids and so on, both lose your job *at the same time*, you're entitled to **£500 per month (combined).** Older pigs are much, more equal than younger pigs, while uber-wealthy pigs at the most equal of all.
Any party breaking the triple lock or raising the pension age will doom itself to electoral oblivion. It's expensive, but universal pension and a pension age is how we look after our elderly. Other countries such as India, the parents move in with the kids when they retire. It's a price worth paying.
Yeah but the only way to raise the money to pay for that is to tax the everloving shit out of current workers and cut to money spent on other things, like public transport, infrastructure and the rest of welfare. I see why you're ideologically married to it but with the aging population it's actually effectively a Ponzi scheme and collapses once there aren't enough people on the bottom. If birth rates keep declining how do the people currently paying for the last generations pension get their pensions paid out? Without constant growth the system doesn't work, and "we need to look after our old people" doesn't explain where the money to do that comes from?
>It's expensive, but universal pension and a pension age is how we look after our elderly. Other countries such as India, the parents move in with the kids when they retire. It's a price worth paying. My view is that we are already several years *past* the point where it was a choice to keep it. The UK has a structural fiscal deficit, structurally dependent on borrowing and marginal tax rates of over 60% in some cases. Starmer will be handed a burning wreckage of an economy, looking something like this: |Health and Social care|£176bn| |:-|:-| |State Pensions|£124bn| |**Debt Interest**|**£120bn**| |Universal Credit|£83bn| |Education|£81bn| |Defence|£32bn| Even if the economy *never* contracted further - we are already heading for IMF intervention - we have no growth mechanism and drowning in debt just to stay afloat. We are going bankrupt - a slow motion car crash - and that's assuming UKGov do *not* repair the hazardous schools, or ramp up defence spending in preparation for another Russian invasion - both of which already look unavoidable. Everything has been slashed and burned to shield the OAP demographic from any of the economic pain - and that demographic continues to grow. We are currently sitting ducks for another serious economic shock such as currency crisis etc. I'm elaborated on my view somewhat [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/ukpolitics/comments/1apqq50/comment/kq8ra1c/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) >Any party breaking the triple lock or raising the pension age will doom itself to electoral oblivion. Indeed. The questions for Labour are - * Can they politically *afford* to change the winners and the losers? * How *fast* can they go? * *How radical can they be?* For any UK government to fix the existing problems and restore the UK to a stable footing, they're probably going to need about **15 years** minimum. Unfortunately, no UK government ever does anything that won't pay off within a 5 year cycle (see Nuclear power plants etc.) Unless Labour are prepared to bring in PR - then we are at the Last Chance Saloon - the next government will not be Conservative or Reform led, it will be IMF led - and they will cut through bone.
scenes when keir starmer gets into government and blames the last labour government for everything
made me laugh
Oh wow Mr economy man has done a great job, don't mind the other stuff he's good with money!!!1
He's good with HIS money. And his wife's family's money...
It's fairly obvious they've been fudging the numbers since the pandemic to delay the inevitable. A few months back we only 'technically' avoided recession because we had a supposed 'flat' growth rate in the second quarter. In truth, there had been a contraction of something like 0.04%, which they were allowed to round up to zero, despite it still representing £100 million + or so wiped from the nation's wealth. It's there to see on the [graph the BBC have posted while aggressively trying to downplay the significance of the news.](https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/800/cpsprodpb/1178D/production/_132656517_1db22b63-942c-450a-bed1-660d100dd7ac.jpg) Weirdly, the ONS site still says we [grew by 0.2% in the same period](https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/grossdomesticproductgdp/bulletins/quarterlynationalaccounts/apriltojune2023) while their other reports match the BBC's graph, though that's an unrevised figure. Not sure how that works, I'll admit. So the reality is, the economy has been shrinking for 9 months now, but the government has wilfully buried its head in the sand and tried to fool us all into believing it isn't happening.
That's why Labour ditching it's 28 billion in green spending is shortsighted. We need to kickstart growth somehow. Kill the Tory economic talking points dead.
I do think it was a tactical blunder for Labour to give an exact figure on that, because it gives the Tories a stick to beat them with about "extravagant spending". Instead Labour should have focused the message on the OUTCOME of their Green Policy initiative, and then the figures can come out once they're in power and can provide accurate costings. I think they've basically shifted to doing this now. They've dropped the top-line figure, but in reality plan to do pretty much all of it anyway.
They're still committed to spend tens of billions on green initiatives, that 28 billion was *in addition* to the other pledges they've made.
Wow. We should just do whatever we did in Q2 2021 again. That was successful!
Now, remember this is GDP, not GDP per capita, the population grows every year, and immigration was at record levels last year... It's grim.
Except the ONS has operational independence so that's just not possible. GDP revisions are a thing across all countries. The pandemic has increased the uncertainty associated with GDP estimates.
If Labour were in power this would have been sniffed out a lot earlier.
I've never bought much into the idea the BBC is a Tory mouthpiece but their live thread about this news just reads like some damage-control propaganda.
I thas been for years its chairman is a tory doner
The BBC actually came in for a lot of stick in 2008 for being too negative about the recession and making it worse, like a self-fulfilling prophecy. I think it was Robert Peston who said on the 6 o'clock news "things are so bad we might as well turn the lights off, get under the duvet and stay there". Since 2008 they've been notably more cautious when reporting bad economic news.
the current gov. keeps them able to leech from the public, so they need to suck up. licence fee would be gone as soon as they arent on the side of the ones in power. then the left for some reason acts like calls to get rid of the licence fee is some right wing nut job idea. never understood this, the bbc has on some whacky cultural people for the current trends and that seems to get it a pass from the left, like that liniker guy or what ever he is called. its a weird place.
I ferverently believe (i.e. I have no proof at all) that the BBC is a 'whoever funds me' mouthpiece. And I can see why that happens.
This BBC interview from 1996 shows how the media can be manipulated without any hands-on action:- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pV85306K64w The most important line is at the end:- "If you believed something different, you wouldn't be sitting where you're sitting." Now you can extrapolate that to every section of public service, from the media to the police to the politicians that are allowed to run, and you can suddenly understand where the fix actually is.
Oh look it's Noam Chomsky the genocide denier
And Epstein buddy and financial partner.
A government funded news corporation whose staff are showered with honours and titles every year? Colour me surprised.
No surprise at all. We've been circling the drain for years.
British Gas don't seem to be suffering, they are raking it in. I'm starting to think it's by design. The city is booming while nothing else works and everything is really expensive
The top 0.1% are raking it in and the rest of us are broke.
I'm nowhere near the top 5% never mind 0.1% and I'm not broke.
I don't mean literally broke but our living standards are not improving generally speaking
Thing is the 0.1% still need doctors and schools that won't collapse on their kids, and police that will actually do something if they get robbed. If you have a mountain of money but the entire nation is a rancid shithole they won't be enjoying their riches very much. Only thing it makes sense to do is leave
They don't really they can buy the best doctors, teachers and security anywhere in the world if necessary.
>Thing is the 0.1% still need doctors and schools that won't collapse on their kids, The 0.1% don't send their kids to state schools, much less rely on the NHS. They are wealthy enough to insulate themselves from that.
They do rely on the NHS, if you get into a car accident or any emergency private hospitals can't help you. If you have a private surgery and something goes wrong, they will ship you via ambulance to the general hospital. Private health insurance won't cover chronic conditions like diabetes or any auto-immune conditions. Even if you're rich, without health insurance, only the ridiculously wealthy people can afford to pay for things like numerous rounds of surgery and treatments We aren't america (yet), everyone needs the NHS to be functioning otherwise all kinds of minor injuries and conditions become more lethal
Funnily enough British Gas aren't giving their staff bonuses this year.
How have they justified that? Expect lots of resignations at BG this year if true.
But the dividend is going up by a third. Won’t someone think about the shareholders?!
tbh we probably should think of the shareholders, holding UK stocks is just like burning your money fortunately most of the shareholders are pension funds so its just our pensions getting burned, who cares about that
If shareholders of FTSE 100 firms demanded growth over dividend payments we might see more of the business investment the country actually needs, and boost the economy and productivity.
I mean our growth companies are among the worst off, any growth company with a brain doesn't list in the UK anymore. It's a market of dinosaurs and the living dead. Our entire growth sector remains in private equity, even large companies like Dyson just decide to never list publicly. Listing publicly in the UK is just the kiss of death.
If only it were more tax efficient for people to invest in UK equities, we may organically drive growth
And that's the reason why I sold out of the ftse 100 years ago. The ftse 100 is stuck in the 1980s.
Tories are good at rewarding their friends
Maybe we can do what the USA did and just change the definition of Recession.
Thats what we did lmao
don’t give them ideas
*CCHQ currently trying to work a "blame trans people of colour" angle to this*
\*CCHQ pokes Jeremy Coryn\* Come on you know you want to say something about Israel. Pleaaaaaaaase
Ok I have a question that I can't figure out about the UK. It might link into this too. We have 2 repeating narratives going on. The first, bosses screaming that they are having a nightmare finding staff & that especially professional staff are impossible to find. The second is people saying they can't find work & have been out for months, including professionals from tech industries. I know we've got 2.5 million people off sick waiting to be treated but WHAT is causing these two risky different stories? Because entering a recession means people aren't spending because they're scared of which way the economy is going. The job boards i visit ARE empty & I'm bloody lucky I'm in a position at the moment but where are all these jobs that CEOs are complaining they can't fill? Also Jeremy hunt and Sunak, both millionaires going on about "staying the course" really makes me want to puke
A lot of companies want a relevant degree, 3 years experience in the industry and to pay you £25K for an entry level position. So many jobs out there that pay the same as a cashier at Aldi but require 6 years of effort to get. People do want to work, companies just don't want to pay them a fair wage.
>WHAT is causing these two risky different stories? They're not necessarily contradictory... I've explained why in more detail [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/ukpolitics/comments/1aqir5q/comment/kqdj8hc/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3). TLDR; Broadly speaking, UK Pharma salaries currently appear to be **20%-40% lower** than they were 3 years ago. The sector has been flooded by migrants who undercut British workers. They're also not qualified to work in a regulated industry. Most people with their head screwed on straight have left UK Pharma and retrained, or just left the UK - hence most of the big investments planned for the UK over the last several years went to Republic of Ireland instead.
There is a mismatch between which jobs are available, and which jobs people want to take. We lack qualified people in some sectors, such as healthcare, science and technology, and retail. We have too many qualified people in other sectors, such as clerical staff (HR is especially bad; the average position gets 3000+ applicants). With that said, unemployment is at 3.8%, which is a record low. The people saying they can't find work are not representative of the average brit.
I think this is the answer, we've become a country that expects specialisation in work and so you end up with a mismatch between what work people are looking for and what is available. It also forces a lot of people to get low level work they are overqualified for.
And instead of helping educate your local population, you're relying on importing already trained skilled workers (like almost every country in the first world). This approach has personally benefited me, but it's very shortsighted and stupid. Governments should invest (heavily) in local's education rather than rely on importing us 🙄. Edit: actually, every penny saved importing us should be invested in educating the local population so importing us becomes less and less necessary
Yes, and because some of the underlying basic skills are missing (we do poorly on numeracy and GCSE maths), changing to adjacent specialisations is harder than it should be.
I get the impression from "the internet" - which probably means Americans - that the employers are saying "nobody wants to work" and the employees are saying "nobody's hiring ", so there's a disconnect on both sides between what they're looking for and what is available.
And yes, I did try to write that without bias to one side or the other!
The other possibility is that there's a labour shortage in one area, role or other category, with a job shortage in a different one. If there's plenty of software engineers but not enough hardware engineers, there could be visible shortages in both labour and jobs at the same time.
I think it's a combination of both, plus location as it's very possible there might be loads of jobs in a certain sector in London but virtually none in Leeds or vice versa. Getting on your metaphorical bike might be okay if there's a suitable job half an hour away but not at the other end of the country, especially if the employer asks for a local address because long commutes mean transport disruption is more likely. Another issue is some employers wanting very niche skills which aren't part of the contemporary general education for that field but also not wanting to have to train staff. One example is that a decent number of military and finance systems are running on hardware and/or software which is now so old that the people who know how to maintain it are retiring, and they can't find replacements because modern software developers aren't routinely being taught COBOL and are unlikely to spend time teaching themselves a 65 year old programming language just on the off chance a suitable job which pays enough to make it worthwhile pops up nearby.
For many fields, it’s not that they can’t find staff, they just don’t want to pay a wage that will attract staff.
> The job boards i visit ARE empty & I'm bloody lucky I'm in a position at the moment but where are all these jobs that CEOs are complaining they can't fill There will be some parts of the UK that are doing ok, and much smaller cells that are doing well. The rest, and vast majority, is either on its knees or falling to that point. Those CEO need to be brought out onto the streets to address the tens (hundreds) of thousands of tech sector unemployed, and the government should be standing behind them with a bat in hand. Something has gone horribly wrong and it's not showing in aggregate data such as GDP or even GDP per capita.
OK, so the country is in recession, NHS in ruins, cost of living is astronomical, prisons full to bursting, not enough houses. But have you considered how woke trans people existing is!
Also city councils are broke and those babies are what's keeping founded a lot of welfare stuff that keeps people away from doing really desperate stuff. Just look at Bristol stabbings to have an idea what happens when those social nets disappear
It's not the decades-long real terms wage stagnation leading many to look at strongmen anti democratic leaders in a more favourable light that's the long term (or short term, if Trump wins) threat to the West. No, it's the wrong kind of people being able to use bathrooms that is the real threat.
Ok but what about Labour though.
*"Labour needs to do some soul searching"* ...which somehow involves capituating to every Reform talking point.
I have been wondering why Labour did this. Maybe we should all vote in a party that's good with the economy like the Tories. A few years of a Tory government would sort this whole problem out. /S obvs
We’ve had one recession yes, but what about second recession? *based on [this wiki page](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_recessions_in_the_United_Kingdom) that shows two recessions since the Tories came to power
>GDP per capita began to fall in Q2 2022, the longest run of falls or stagnation by that metric since 1955. By February 2024 GDP per capita had shrunk by 4.2% compared to its pre- cost of living crisis peak. That's quite brutal..
Tories: Ukraine and Covid Everyone else: But what abou... Tories: La la la *not listening* UKRAINE AND COVID!!!
Rish!'s recess!on
The Rishession, if you will.
Is this the fault of the leftwing Bank of England again?
And woke lettuce
No, on this occasion, it's clearly the fault of the future Labour government.
No, you are wrong. Clearly this is the fault of the EU
Welp. And Sunak still had enough money to sponsor a war. Nice.
What a bizarre opinion, Ukraine and red sea crisis ain't it chief
Sponsor what war? The UK (along with most of the western world) is defending international shipping lanes that were being targeted from Houthi Rebels which are financed and directed by Iran, which in turn is being directed by Moscow. It’s a predictable distraction dead cat strategy to divert attention from Ukraine. See: lead up to WW1, small incidents were popping off everywhere before it finally started. FYI - Chinese Navy ships are also there, but not engaging…. I’m not a fan of Rishi in the slightest, but our Military response has been well within reason.
And I'd much rather send tools to another country at war than send our own troops in and escalate. Or sit and do nothing waiting for the war to take over Europe and be at our doorstep.
Our PM is an ex hedge fund manager right? He'll know how to make more millions off the back of it.
So turns out Sunak was the head of the anti-growth coalition.
Liz Truss’ government did call Sunak a socialist, so they clearly tried to warn us. Though, Sunak did call Liz Truss a socialist too. Either way, it definitely demonstrates that it must be those damn socialist bankers’ fault. It’s no good, it’s socialists all the way down. The problem with Conservatism is that you eventually run out of other people's money.
So under the Tories, we have high inflation, high interest rates, record rents, and a recession to boot. Why would anyone consider voting for them ever again?
Because some minor Labour nobody said something moronic about a conflict thousands of miles away that doesn't affect the country in the slightest.
> Why would anyone consider voting for them ever again "To save us from Marxist leader Kier Starmer!" ...But then throw in a line towards the end saying the UK lacks strong opposition parties and that's bad for democracy.
I hate to say it but the economic climate isn't only directly caused by the current set of Tories. High inflation caused by high food and energy prices caused by the war in Ukraine does have an impact. The Houthis attacking boats in the Red Sea does have an impact on trade. The record number of people who are long term sick because of long Covid does have an impact. All while we have a slowly aging population that needs more healthcare spending year on year in real terms. ... There are some decisions the Tories have made to make things worse. Leaving the EU caused trade friction, turning off coal power stations, not investing in nuclear earlier, low long term investment in R&D in general, record immigration (debatable) causing strain on housing. There are also some decisions that the Tories made which have helped. Offshore wind expansion made us slightly more energy independent, housebuilding has actually gone up, tax loopholes on IR35 contractors and digital services taxes, NHS productivity has been improving every year. I'm just saying this because I'm honestly not sure if Labour will actually do anything differently. For instance they're backing down from their previous goals around house insulation (which should be the easiest win in the world) & there's no sign of any long term investment. It's also to stress to people that we can't stop being involved in world politics because it does have an impact at home.
> turning off coal power stations Really? I thought we did that become gas is cheaper.
The first four things you mention are problems in all of Western Europe too. The Houthis attacking ships won’t even be impacting GDP yet. The problems there picked up in October/November when they started firing rockets north. Attacks on shipping started later, the first notable one being in mid December. But the latest GDP data is only going up to December, and of course a recession means two negative quarters. So any Houthi impact would’ve been on the last couple of weeks of 6 months of data.
> The first four things you mention are problems in all of Western Europe too. GDP growth has been sluggish across the continent also. I believe Germany has also been in a recession recently. I could be wrong. France has been slightly insulated as they're more dependent on nuclear energy and less on gas. That's not necessarily "better". For instance issues in uranium mining in Niger could cause greater issues for them. Just not in this instance. > The Houthis attacking ships won’t even be impacting GDP yet. The problems there picked up in October/November when they started firing rockets north. Attacks on shipping started later, the first notable one being in mid December. Yes, you are correct. It shouldn't be counted. I do believe the other issues are valid though.
i'm sorry, but if Hunt and Rishi stand there and pat themselves on the back when inflation went down, saying that their plan was working, then they should also shoulder the opposite when everything goes wrong. It can't be only one way.
Anything going well is entirely down to them, even if they just sat on their arses and waited for it to happen by itself (e.g. inflation going down), and anything going badly is down to absolutely anyone on the entire planet except them. It's the political capital equivalent of "privatise the profits, nationalise the losses."
Higher than ever immigration too, these guys can't even pull off being right wing properly. I hope we get a realignment and the Tories go extinct next election.
Pro immigration isn't really left or right wing. It's pro capitalism and pro-asset owning class - wage suppression, higher house prices, weaker labour laws, etc.
Yes but just remember what the last Labour government did! /s
And how bad the next Labour government's plans that don't exist are.
Yes but they the best party to manage the economy.
where /s
We should need to signpost sarcasm so blatantly. What are, Americans?
true, but have you considered foreigners and the lgbt community exist? under these circumstances, one has to hold one’s nose and vote for the tories
Jesus. If inflation doesn't come down in April we are in a serious world of shit.
It Will come down alot next from next month as Feb 23 had 1.2% MoM wich is massive. We should be below 3% by april if not earlier.
The people that continually vote Tory want a strong economy and less immigrants. Under the Tories, we have a recession and record immigration. It’s time for Britain to wake up.
All polling indicates they have.
I will wait until the election result to decide if they have. Polling is so fickle and I don’t trust the public until they’ve cast their votes.
You can't trust people Jeremy. People like Coldplay and voted for the Tories.
>Polling is so fickle [what on earth is fickle about this](https://i.imgur.com/e2qfkTD.png)
It can wildly contrast with the actual election result. There are so many recent examples - Trump, Boris etc. I won’t be celebrating until it’s set in stone.
If Liz Truss was still in we would not be in a recession. We would be in a depression I grant you but it would not be a recession.
If Liz Truss was still in we'll be fighting each other for toilet paper.
Unlikely. Truss would've made the (correct) call to trade off higher public debt for higher GDP growth.
Truss’ plan involves the abolition of most employment rights in order to chase growth. We would be in a general strike right now.
General strikes have been banned for nearly 100 years
Sometimes people do things that are illegal. Shocking I know.
Right, because there’s such a strong trade union movement in the UK lol. You know a general strike is illegal in this country right?
[удалено]
What’s wrong with it? There isn’t a strong trade union movement in the UK. There’s a trade union movement, but it has historically low membership and UK wages have flatlined for a decade. They aren’t in a position of strength.
[удалено]
And?
[удалено]
Where did I say there wasn’t a trade union movement?
[удалено]
You’ll need to quote me because I don’t see it.
It’s also currently illegal to pay below minimum wage.
We wouldn't be in a strike, we'd be doing the classic British thing and taking it up the chuff but moaning about it
Honestly I don't know why Rishi won't call an election? He seems to think something might improve but longer it goes on the worse the damage seems.
Sunak Cost Fallacy. At some point you're so invested in the "it'll all turn around eventually" narrative that it's too painful to admit you're wrong and that you've fucked it by waiting.
They need to pay off the tory donors first
Because there's still plenty of policies he can push through to make himself and his obscenely rich cronies and donors even richer!
> Honestly I don't know why Rishi won't call an election? The most recent poll I can find posted on this subreddit has the Tories winning 80 seats. That's why he won't hold an election right now. Things might not get much better for the Conservatives, but they are probably not going to get massively worse than rock bottom either, and the people at the top will be out of politics by the time the next Conservative government is elected, so they would be mad to give up power early.
> but they are probably not going to get massively worse than rock bottom either He better hope so. I hope he ends up giving his party a Canada style wipe out. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Canadian_federal_election
Inflation expected to hit 2% by April and I guess from there he's hoping his tax cuts (funded by further cuts to public spending) will see him gain popularity.
Why would you do that? They are fucked anyway.
The tax cuts he is capable of giving won't even scratch the surface of the inflationary damage to cost of living so it's not going to make anyone feel any better and it will further undermine the long-term economy so it's just a quick bung to harvest votes with no real benefit to anyone at all (save for those gullible enough to fall for it)
No matter how well meaning, any tax cuts will be also intended to punish the next government. It either leaves them with less money to do things and more debt, or means they’ll immediately have to increase taxes, both of which will spun as negatives.
As with Rwanda, maybe Sunak can pass a law saying 'the UK isn't in recession' and magically change reality. Bellend.
TBF recessions are a tool to ease inflation, they are almost the goal when you raise interest rates, although rates at 5% aren't really that high historically speaking.
Also a tool to cause mass unemployment and homelessness
This is true. Although then you shouldn’t pledge to grow the economy
And this isn't that big a recession, historically speaking. Still, time for a change eh?
GDP per capita has been in recession for an entire year.
What is the mainstream orthodox economic solution? If they say productivity, how?
Economic orthodoxy would be "low productivity is entirely within expectation, investment has predictably been stagnant since the country voted to mangle its own business sector in the name of sovereignty". As we unfortunately cannot jump to the alternate reality where Brexit didn't happen, easy solutions are difficult to come by.
The classical solution to low growth is lowering interest rates, increased government spending and/or lowering taxes. This is, unfortunately, the polar opposite of the solution to high inflation and mainstream economic orthodoxy says that reducing inflation should be the priority when it's to far above 2%. (And it's almost certainly right)
so this is stagflation?
This is stagflation made all the more worse by an overvaluation of the pound internationally thanks to Londons financial activities, discouraging foreign investment
The majority of the country has been experiencing stagflation since 2008. Brexit has just squeezed a little too much to be ignored.
Not quite, that also requires high unemployment
ah yes maybe we need a new term? is it secular stagnation? Is this what Japan is classed as?
Let's call it the Liz-Rishi special.
Some sort of high speed railway line linking the biggest economic areas of the UK allowing people and goods to move easily and quickly around the country?
And a 28 billion investment in green technology...
I've got a better idea, how about we build half of it then stop without connecting it to anywhere useful, wasting billions of pounds?