Labour ?

Yours for £17.00

Yours for £17.00

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The Strat (Fender) posted:

Don Atkinson posted:

Hungryhalibut posted:

Public sector pensions in part make up for lower pay when working. In my view everyone should have a proper defined benefit pension, and Government should legislate for it. There's nothing wrong with a company properly remunerating its workers rather than its directors and shareholders. And I don't believe public sector pensions make people comfortable in their jobs - the small issue of never ending cuts has put paid to job security. 

Without wishing to re-start another pensions war discussion..........

....I take to task your opening sentence. Public sector pay is on a par with private sector pay, or even slightly higher.

However, I do agree that the government should legislate for defined  benefit pensions, let's say two-thirds Final Salary, just as an example !!

If the Nation can't afford such private sector pensions, then I suggest the public sector should fall into line with a nationally sustainable private sector system in terms of both pay and pensions. existing contracts to be honoured - of course.

Let's also be clear. Whether the railway industry is nationalised or remains in the private sector, c.99% of the work-force is the same. It's only only a few at the top of the tree that change. Same applies to the Highway, Power and Water industries and quite a few others that were privatised under Thatcher and that have changed hands many times since.

Cheers, Don ( who is perfectly content with his mixture of public and private accumulated pensions )

Don - your statement in respect of the rail industry is worthy of greater scrutiny.  Before privatisation on a given shift there would be 5 stand-by drivers at Willesden - there is now 1. 

Thank you for carrying out the necessary Greater Scrutiny Strat.

Since the only problem identified by this scrutiny was 5 stand-by drivers at Willesden rather than one, I think we can be assured that the state-owned and state-run system of yester-year was a roaring success.

PS i've now lost track (if you'll pardon the pun). I don't know whether i'm for privatisation of the railways or against it

I'm for nationalisation of the consultancy that advises on the selection of consultancies selected to tender for the process of privatisation!  

For the record I'm for a mixed approach. I think the franchise system is broken but do believe  freight should be completely  private.  Equally I would hate to see Chiltern Railways renationalised.  

Another financial transaction tax. Absolute f****n bonkers. Do they have no idea what little 'industry' there is left in the UK. Do they really hate anyone with pensions that much? Bonds earn fk all already yet most pension funds still invest heavily in them due to their alleged low risk, then place a little in derivatives to get some growth. He's now going to screw that down even more and of course most members don't know how their pensions are invested so won't know they're like a turkey voting for Christmas.  JFC I've lost all patience with the dildos now. What utter ****s.

JamieWednesday posted:

Another financial transaction tax. Absolute f****n bonkers. Do they have no idea what little 'industry' there is left in the UK. Do they really hate anyone with pensions that much? Bonds earn fk all already yet most pension funds still invest heavily in them due to their alleged low risk, then place a little in derivatives to get some growth. He's now going to screw that down even more and of course most members don't know how their pensions are invested so won't know they're like a turkey voting for Christmas.  JFC I've lost all patience with the dildos now. What utter ****s.

I couldn't agree more. After a lifetime of voting Labour (I even voted for Foot!) I give up on them now, Corbyn has ruined the party.
With Brexit, a new financial transaction tax is the last thing we need, it's going to be hard enough to keep the jobs in London as it is.

This does seem a particularly crass idea.

Polls show big public support for a transaction tax of some kind, and many leading economists have been calling for it for some time - an open letter was published a few years ago with 1000 signatures. Also, a group of EU states (originally 11, now 10 I believe) including Germany and France has been working towards implementing a transaction tax for several years. Many other countries, including Switzerland, already have such taxes. Labour has been talking about the idea since at least 2015.

My point isn't to defend the proposal, it's that the idea is hardly out of the blue or totally mad. And I can't see it offending many who'd be likely to vote Labour. Intuitively, a proposal which makes 'bankers' pay and discourages the kind of trading which caused the crash will be appealing to many. I suspect that a majority of normal people, at least outside the South East, think of those who would be affected by these measures as either comparatively rich or greedy millionaire stock broker types. Rightly or wrongly. Also it seems plausible that most of those who would strongly oppose this kind of tax would be Tories anyway.

JAMIEWEDNESDAY, could you explain why the proposal targets the everyman rather than the intended other end of the spectrum?

Just because a group of economists say something is a good idea doesn't mean that it is.  

The Strat (Fender) posted:

Just because a group of economists say something is a good idea doesn't mean that it is.  

That's exactly what I was thinking.. 

So what? Neither does it mean it's a bad idea. But it definitely does mean that the idea seems reasonable to a lot of people who actually understand the substance, as opposed to those of us who have to try to piece together the truth out of a mass of often heavily biased information.

That's not an excuse for failing to think critically about it for oneself. But it is useful.

Rejecting an economic view because it comes from expert economists is ridiculous. Gove (who I can't help thinking of as Cricketty Wicketty after the Daily Mash article ) would have been happy to trumpet expert opinion if the experts agreed with him.

Well given that economists provide a whole range of different predictions and opinions they can't all be right.    

Labour taking us back to the 70s should be enough inspiration for everyone.

Universities were mostly free to study in - but very difficult to be enrolled. 

Jobbing musicians were paid a weekly salary as well as what they earnt.

Artists were supported and made a vital part of the economy and society.

summers were hotter and drier.

Cigarettes and pints cost only pennies.

you could buy a nice car coloured brown.

dog poo that went white.

etc.

Take us back to the 70's meant for me  the Silver Jubilee, Punk rock and other music my parents didn't want me listening to, three day weeks, power cuts and candles, rubbish every where, no go zones in our big towns, motorways being built every where at the expense of the railways  that often looked tired and shabby, evening news regularly  going on about shop stewards and strikes - memories on TV  of angry men in black coats shouting scab and other such things I didn't then understand, Nationwide, race riots and sexual inequality - but I had my free school milk and my cycling proficiency badge - and I remember fox hunting and cricket on my home village cricket green

TOBYJUG posted:

Labour taking us back to the 70s should be enough inspiration for everyone.

Universities were mostly free to study in - but very difficult to be enrolled. 

Jobbing musicians were paid a weekly salary as well as what they earnt.

Artists were supported and made a vital part of the economy and society.

summers were hotter and drier.

Cigarettes and pints cost only pennies.

you could buy a nice car coloured brown.

dog poo that went white.

etc.

...and Mars bars were much bigger

it was pretty cheap to get into a football match, even in the First Division

Test match cricket was free to watch on TV, as was European football

discipline in schools was maintained and (most) teachers were respected

children knew their times-tables and appreciated the importance of spelling and grammer 

Dave***t posted:

JAMIEWEDNESDAY, could you explain why the proposal targets the everyman rather than the intended other end of the spectrum?

OK. All trade involves cost, that's a given. Many trades also involve taxation, again that's understood. Now, many 'systems' are set up around the prevailing and long standing costs, including taxation, this includes investments of course. Time and again, costs and taxes are 'tweaked' to say the least and the FS industries adapt to those changes, either sucking up the costs and/or passing them on to the end user.

Now I can foresee many potential issues with the latest ideas around financial taxes but a key one is surely going to be the impact on people's pensions. Many company schemes and 'default' group fund pensions are held to account to the nth degree in terms of risk and cost management. As such a typical fund will diversify heavily away from equities into fixed interest (Gilts & Bonds in the UK) for the commonly held belief that these are both less risky and cheaper to hold in a pension (whether they are is a whole other discussion, but for now, let's go with this as received wisdom).

FI asset returns are dependent on interest rates and very low interest rates over the last ten years (and the next?) mean very low returns. So, to try and counter this, many pension funds will nowadays diversify again, placing small bits of the fund into derivates (potentially more risky, potentially more returns) to gear up the long term results potential. However, long term, the results on company/default fund group schemes haven't been all that, because of the heavy reliance on FI, but costs can be reasonably well managed as there is less trading on a bond heavy fund and the costs of those trades can be kept relatively low.

Corbyn's latest plan is to increase the tax on trades in bonds and derivatives to equate to equities. However, the costs in equities trading are well known and understood, and accepted because relative to the potential high return, they're manageable. However, levying the same costs on something that generally is expected to get a lower return means that pro-rata those costs will represent a much higher piece of the action. E.G. imagine you've got something returning 10% p.a. and something else returning 3% p.a., a 1% p.a. charge for each represents a much bigger cut into the lower return than the higher one, right? Well that's what's going to happen with low return pension funds, the exact sort of things most voters have.

Now, think of the fights that pension scheme members and Unions put up when it's suggested that members raise the amounts they contribute, and those are percentages are just on the contributions. Scale that up to increased percentage point costs/taxes on the trades of the entire fund itself, that's a disaster in waiting. And people may think, 'well that's a just a little extra on the costs, no biggy' but scale that up in a compound calculator over the lifetime of your pension fund (70 years, age 20 to 90) and it's a complete fk up. If I were the Tories I would be runnimg a calculator right now to estimate the costs to everyone's pension scheme, 'cos it's a huge tax rake and I bet folks wouldn't want to pay the same in higher income tax. This is BIG tax by stealth and Corbyn will play it as a Fat Cat Banker's tax and it's not, it would be all of us that are going to get raped by it.

Course, he won't win so actually fairly academic. But he is a knob.

Simon-in-Suffolk posted:

Take us back to the 70's meant for me Nationwide

Now we are talking sense.  Don't forget Anglia Bygones.

JamieWednesday posted:

Course, he won't win so actually fairly academic. But he is a knob.

Could you explain this term ' knob', is this a political expression? 

wenger2015 posted:

JamieWednesday posted:

Course, he won't win so actually fairly academic. But he is a knob.

Could you explain this term ' knob', is this a political expression? 

Think of Boris Johnson, Philip Hammond, Theresa May, that minister for destroying the UK economy bloke, and you have a perfect embodiment.

Hungryhalibut posted:

wenger2015 posted:

JamieWednesday posted:

Course, he won't win so actually fairly academic. But he is a knob.

Could you explain this term ' knob', is this a political expression?  

that minister for destroying the UK economy bloke.

Do you mean Gordon Brown? and Corbyn is on a par with such distinguished company. 

JamieWednesday posted:

Corbyn's latest plan is to increase the tax on trades in bonds and derivatives to equate to equities. However, the costs in equities trading are well known and understood, and accepted because relative to the potential high return, they're manageable. However, levying the same costs on something that generally is expected to get a lower return means that pro-rata those costs will represent a much higher piece of the action. E.G. imagine you've got something returning 10% p.a. and something else returning 3% p.a., a 1% p.a. charge for each represents a much bigger cut into the lower return than the higher one, right? Well that's what's going to happen with low return pension funds, the exact sort of things most voters have.

Now, think of the fights that pension scheme members and Unions put up when it's suggested that members raise the amounts they contribute, and those are percentages are just on the contributions. Scale that up to increased percentage point costs/taxes on the trades of the entire fund itself, that's a disaster in waiting. And people may think, 'well that's a just a little extra on the costs, no biggy' but scale that up in a compound calculator over the lifetime of your pension fund (70 years, age 20 to 90) and it's a complete fk up. If I were the Tories I would be runnimg a calculator right now to estimate the costs to everyone's pension scheme, 'cos it's a huge tax rake and I bet folks wouldn't want to pay the same in higher income tax. This is BIG tax by stealth and Corbyn will play it as a Fat Cat Banker's tax and it's not, it would be all of us that are going to get raped by it.

Course, he won't win so actually fairly academic. But he is a knob.

You’re right he is a knob, he should be going a lot further. Nationalising the pension industry would definitely be a vote winner. At present it’s run by a bunch of crooks.

Let’s take your example of a 70 year pension. Lets say the final fund value is £100,000 and the average value over the 70 years £40,000. If that was my pension company they’d be charging on average £400 per annum, (1% of fund value), that’s £28,000.

Regarding the transaction charge. Let’s say a pension company buys a £100 million worth of 25 year bonds, the tax payable on the transaction at 1% would be £1 million, seems a lot doesn’t it. However, as they charge 1% per annum for managing the £100 million of bonds, the total charge for spending £100 million of somebody else’s money is £25 million.

I could go on.

It appears this is a reprise of my post on the Trump thread; I have removed the most recent posts from a certain member here (and any associated responses). Please could members keep their posts civil, and remember and respect that the forum is diverse in its membership - nationally, racially, sexually, culturally, politically, in fact any "lly" you care to name.

Richard, can you take this whole non musical streams back to the company and ask, does Naim really want a website that has a focus other than music and product. Has it started to grow outside of the original remit, should it be regrounded in music and product and the very helpful input from members, rather than global and local politics.

Richard Dane posted:

It appears this is a reprise of my post on the Trump thread; I have removed the most recent posts from a certain member here (and any associated responses). Please could members keep their posts civil, and remember and respect that the forum is diverse in its membership - nationally, racially, sexually, culturally, politically, in fact any "lly" you care to name.

Again Thank you Richard...

Another ...lly if you avoid my bad spelling!  This one nice!

Gazza posted:

Richard, can you take this whole non musical streams back to the company and ask, does Naim really want a website that has a focus other than music and product. Has it started to grow outside of the original remit, should it be regrounded in music and product and the very helpful input from members, rather than global and local politics.

In my humble opinion, the Padded Cell is potentially the best bit of the Forum. I've had so much advice over the years, on vacuum cleaners, gas hobs and all sorts. 

The trouble with the political threads is that there are always some who like to hurl abuse. If everything stays polite and people write as if they were talking across the dinner table, and not hiding behind the anonymity of the internet, challenging discussions can be had in a civilised way without anyone getting upset. 

I'm a Labour Party member and a Europhile, but many of my friends are Conservatives or pro-Brexit. But they are still my friends.