| Author | Message | ||
     Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.29.180.201 |
Hey, look, I was once described on this board as "David Icke" after making a similar claim a few years ago: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-18944097 I believe the words used were that "I'd fit right in" with Icke's pals. "There isn't any economic elite", I think another phrase was, and then, "except in your Icky mind." Ah well. | ||
| Craig (Craig) Username: Craig Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 99.126.164.88 |
Conservatives here like to make this stupid argument that "it's not a zero-sum game," economies; that just because one person's making untold billions or trillions, doesn't mean you can't either. Of course, if you try making some money with a Photoshop program and a good laser printer... well.... Money is finite. And the very rich are holding a whole hell of a lot of it in secret places. We have a massive game of chicken going on right now in the States, called "the Presidental election." When Romney wins (I'm making a prediction here), the greedy bastards world wide will release their stashes, and the economies of the world will recover. Though it might go through some brutal times beforehand:just because economies recover, doesn't mean a whole lot of human fodder can't go into recovering it.... | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.158.156.168 |
My theory - if all the jobs are taken let those on benefits relax. Let those who want to work, work. I do think, however, that those on benefits should do *something*, and certainly receive only so much and not be allowed to get more money for every kid they get. There should be a cut-off point. And if you work pay less car tax, stuff like that - make those that don't need cars pay. Things need evening out. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.29.180.201 |
Er, and get all the folk who've hidden £21 trillion to maybe pay some tax on it, Tony? Does that factor into your vision at all? | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.29.180.201 |
Just to make the figure more recognisable, we should maybe write it thus: £21,000,000,000,000. That's 21 thousand billion pounds. And that's a conservative estimate. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 92.40.254.200 |
What's insidious is the way the Murdoch press get people more cranked about a Somali bloke in a council house working as a window cleaner on the side than a bloke exploiting the free country he lives in by syphoning off his dosh to a dubious banking scheme to avoid paying tax. Remember please, Jimmy Carr, Gary Barlow, and you faceless bankers, if you don't like to think of it as tax dodging, just think of it as an NHS cancer unit buying you a new Jaguar. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 92.40.254.209 |
Now, about those turquoise shellsuits you've taken to wearing, Gary... | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.29.180.201 |
They're very me, I think. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 92.40.254.237 |
I've just bought a Captain Britain T-shirt in the Asda sale for £4. Probably made by some poor sod in a slave factory in the far east. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.29.180.201 |
Hard to avoid it. I really hope Whitby manages to keep Tesco out. Their dirt prices are too tempting. I need saving from myself. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 92.41.251.250 |
Tesco has just been refused permission to put a store up in Holmfirth, even though they funded a priavte citizens' lobby group to challenge the council. Sad to see Hebden Bridge flooded recently. A town that has resisted the big corporates. Sole traders and independents only, and they were among the first to go green with their shopping bags. Remember how the big supermarkets were going to phase out plastic bags on a volountary basiss? No need for regulation. That went well. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.29.180.201 |
Whitby is trying, but has now let in Homebase and Sainsburys. It'll be like Blackpool in 20 years. | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.44.185.15 |
I never said don't wrest all that wealth from the rich... we must do that too. Money needs to keep moving for it to work for us. Whitby's nice; I love how all the little cafes are still going, and aren't that expensive. I hate Starbucks and would much rather have a cup of Nescafe poured out by an old lady. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 92.40.254.194 |
Nescafe... Ah. Well... Ethically sourced? | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.44.185.15 |
Well, something 'like' Nescafe! You know - cheap and cheerful. You right-on people you... | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.178.159.240 |
I know what you mean about Starbucks, Tony - I don't like them either, but use them on rare occasions. I really don't like 'latte' and usually just have espresso or 'americano'. Mind you, it's good to have a choice of coffee beyond "cup or mug?"... | ||
| Tony (Tony) Username: Tony Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 217.44.185.15 |
True, true. They just feel so damned pretentious. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 94.197.127.208 |
Tory ministers quick to get on the talk shows and news today, so that they can deflect attention from those hiding their dosh overseas and focus in on the window cleaner who's being paid cash money and may not be declaring all his income to the inland revenue... | ||
| Mick Curtis (Mick) Username: Mick Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 86.178.159.240 |
Guess so but if it's wrong it's wrong, whether for fifty quid or fifty million... | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 94.197.127.92 |
This is true. But it's easier to get someone wound up about the bloke down the road getting 50 quid they're not getting than the bloke in the Canaries who's getting 50 million quid they're not getting. John Major had a go at single mothers every time his government faced a crisis. Blair and Brown didn't exactly stop that, but did start up the anti benefits theme that Cameron has upped the stakes on by having a go at the disabled. Closing Remploy, for fook's sake. Because the money will be better spent finding those employed with Remploy 'better jobs' elsewhere. Oh yeah. That'll work. | ||
| Mark_lynch (Mark_lynch) Username: Mark_lynch Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 94.197.127.199 |
Actually, I think some professor somewhere or other has argued there's a good case for cash payments-no questions asked, because it oils the wider economy. Give a bloke who's earning 200 quid a week an extra 50 quid in cash and it'll get spent. Give a bloke in the top tier of the tax system a 5p income tax cut (to encourage those at the top to work harder, as Osbourne put it - thus making them sound like lazy gits) and it'll get put in a bank account...possibly one not in this country...and won't get spent. | ||
| Gary Fry (Gary_fry) Username: Gary_fry Registered: 03-2008 Posted From: 2.102.69.8 |
The thing is, we all know the bloke who takes cash in hand or the benefits scrounger. They have hedonic relevance and make our blood boil quicker. How many of us know tax-dodging millionaires? Very few. They're abstract, like comic-book villains. We boo and hiss but don't get really angry, because they're not real to us. |