First, I’m not sure you’re insulting me by saying that I love myself and believe my own bullshit. I think you’re describing a broad human trait, unless you thin self-loathing and self-doubt are the default positions for humans. I would be interested in your view on that.
I’m also interested in how it is you came to the conclusions you did in making a lot of the assertions you did, when they’re clearly at variance, with well, themselves.
We don’t have a small deficit with the EU. Overall, it is minus 67 biillion sterling. Take services out of the equation, and focus on goods, and it’s minus 95 billion. Those aren’t small numbers. To put that into context, 772 billion is the entire welfare budget, which would probably be a lot smaller if some the near 100bn of goods purchases were translated into domestic production.
Take services out of the equation?
Not sure how you can do that, but i suppose @Map-Of-Tasmania can now discount anything that makes his argument stronger.
What’s your thoughts on the graphs for distance, and the “Rotterdam effect”?
The ONS seem to think it’s important.
(Quick correction UK total revenues are approx 772 billion, you need to put the 67 bn balance of trade deficit in context of the UK GDP of approx 2.2 trillion. The annual welfare budget is approx 130 bn, pensions 165 bn and health 150bn… ) But we can ignore that here as its not relevant to the point i am making.
See this is where its about exploring what these figures might mean as opposed to using them to suit a POV. It is TRUE that IF we produced more it may mean that we have have greater revenues should those jobs be paying at levels that mean the worker do pay tax as well as NI… which means that they need to work in good industries which pay well… usually because they produce excellent products many of which are exported and the companies thrive… this is more difficult if our goods and services are more expensive abroad when tariffs are applied - do we want to be in a country where we are forced to buy UK goods despite them being inferior … because we import so little? Remember the shit the former soviets used to ahem to put up with?
I concede more folks in work means less requirement for ‘welfare’ but only if they are paid at levels that are beyond the poverty line… and most of the jobs vacated by the former Eastern Europeans are low paid, low skilled…
Second, for that not to happen, we need to be producing stuff consumer want both here and abroad at a price we can afford… what are we going to produce to address this balance? A big contributor to our deficit is high quality manufactured goods - cars, appliances etc… we dont produce any of these… and we wont do so again… So I will repeat my question and my POV. What industrial renaissance will occur to create this surplus and more importantly GROWTH… a balance of trade surplus on a much lower GDP and thus much lower revenues will help no one…
Isn’t the answer - the impact of the US in those figures?
Well, strictly speaking the impact of the US, some Gulf-states and China.
From those figures, we exported $99.6Bn to the US out of a total of $284.1Bn outside EU exports in 2016.
So about 35% of the UK’s exports outside of the EU in 2016 were accounted for by an enormous anglophone (largely), services-consuming market that we have long historical ties to.
About 17% (the next largest percentage, BTW!) of the remainder is some Gulf states and China is also about 17% of the outside-EU exports.
So, put another way, ~69% of our exports outside the EU are to 3 countries.
Finding that out shocked me. Again, nearly 70% of our exports outside the EU go to 3 countries/country-groupings.
I take the point you were making @pap, and as a soundbite it sounds convincing, but I think when you break it down like that, it simply says that either through historical happenstance or sheer market size, we have a lot of trade with a small number of countries that skews the term “rest of the world trade”.
So the “few formal deals” and “trade surplus” from your question seem to not acknowledge the skewing of the total towards a small number of countries.
Should we export more to the EU? Yes.
Should we make more stuff instead of selling services? Yes.
Are either of those things the fault of the EU? No.
Can we nail the fault of that to Thatcher - and Blair. Probably.
If we leave the EU, will we sell more to the EU or less? Dunno.
I think I’ve been guilty of not doing the research into what the term “rest of the world” means in terms of trade.
Your use of the term suggests (to my ear, not stating that you meant it to suggest this) that there is a large market of countries out there waiting for us to trade with them and that if we could just escape the gravity of the EU’s restrictive conditions, we will make up for any shortfall in the trade with the EU countries post-Brexit.
I’m not sure that is the case because outside the top 10 in terms of export value the countries get tinier and tinier from a trading persepective.
Outside of that, the others make up 1% or less of the trade total.
Another interesting fact that I found during the cursory research I’ve just done, is outside the EU (RoW) we have WTO deals with 24 countries (the three countries/groupings I mentioned above are carried out under mixed WTO and EU terms I believe) whereas for 68 other countries free trade is enabled, and better terms granted, by being part of the EU.
So another benefit of EU membership? Yes, but let’s not think I’m crowing about that as a massive positive of being in the EU because when you start to think about it those 68 countries must be worth buttons in terms of the potential export value to us.
Then again, it is at least 68 buttons.
So that’s another 68 countries we will have to come to some beneficial relationship with that must be on terms at least as good as those we already enjoy as an EU member, or we will suffer the economic consequences.
Well, the last time “we” went to the EU asking for something Cameron came back all Chamberlain, waving a paper and declaring “peace in our time”. Yet it turned out to be nothing at all.
The EU has a history of intransigence that will only get worse when we leave, my belief is pointed to the rest of the world.
Or maybe I’m an arch realist and I know we’re fucked whichever way we go!!
So I recognise that for some it’s about as biased as you can get so I present it here with that caveat*.
Anyway, they have computed an average tariff for WTO members which looks like this.
Commentary from BBC article…
If the UK had to trade under WTO rules, tariffs - a tax on traded goods - would be applied to all UK exports.
The average WTO tariff varies from product to product, from 0% on mineral fuels and pharmaceuticals, to around 20-35% on processed food and 45-50% on meat.
The CEPS document goes on to qualify the average calculation by saying it ranges from zero to very high, so it may or may not have value.
However, IF those figures are in any way representative, it shows the potential impact on the cost of our exports in a WTO-only world.
I guess, the continued lowering of the value of the pound would offset some of those costs.
Its OK bleach… we make none of those (maybe the odd aircraft) but we probably export a load more of ‘industrial machinery’ to RSA and other ‘allies’ - without those darn EU types and their rules… and this will of course please many of their non exec directors and investors… how just also happen to include (allegedly) many of those politicos who support our extraction from the undemocratic heathen union
Do we enjoy a good trading relationship with the EU? I’d really say no. The deficit is but one component. The inflated prices really don’t help either. Thanks to controls on food, much cheaper elsewhere in the world.
I don’t need to lecture you on having all your eggs in one basket. You’ve noted yourself that we’re going to have the opportunity to diversify. The level of integration with EU markets has left us vulnerable, and it’s something that we can’t ever allow to happen again.
I’m not saying we should look to autarky. I don’t think it realistic. At the very least, we can lower the food bill and stimulate the domestic production we used to be famous for, and if one of our suppliers decides to be a twat, then we can at least source things from elsewhere.
Thing is BT, its much tougher going to the EU for something when you already get 45% of contributions back… we wanted our cake so to speak. For me there are three main argument streams
The economic implications vs benefits - the jury is still out on what these might be, but its looking a bit grim. In part this also includes a sensible and grown up debate about immigration to remove all the rubbish that is spread and discuss. Its very complex - many variables
The issue of sovereignty - for some this was the only issue - My take has always been this is a red herring. we are all governed from somewhere by someone and the scale only really becomes and issue when things are bad… its why so many suddenly thought this was important as we are in an economic shit… the premise being we can do more about it if we can make our own rules… but agin this is complicated when part of a global economy - some will argue its simply just about self determination whatever happens, but that is nose cutting in teh extreme… for me it should also include…
Unity as a principle… Borders and centres of government are relatively insignificant in a world that is 4.5bn years old, of which humans have only really formed formal governments and borders for 2000-4000 years depending on the civilisation… The only reason these have been formed is as humans MIGRATED and discovered local resources they began putting up fences to fight over them… as we discovered new resource needs such as mineral wealth and fossil fuels, it intensified, so form a philosophical perspective its all bollocks and we would do well to just be getting on with living with each other a lot better. Yes there has been an increase far right activity throughout the EU and the world, but this is sadly a reaction to economic downturn - lets blame the immigrants, the weak, the poor. The best way to overcome this is for increased integration, leading to better understanding of different cultures - it also helps to EVOLVE our cultures as we take the best of all and from a new one… as has been happening for those last 2000 years. This happens best when we live freely and work freely and integrate freely with one another… our nationality should never be and issue… because its simply a matter of chance as to where you were born… I happen to believe in this one more than any, even if the price is some shitty non-democratic decisions made by fat cat eurocrats… the alternative is more isolation and the same SHITTY decisions made by fat cats in Westminster.
What makes me so angry is both the cunts like RM, BJ and Gove et al who are leading this charge for personal gain, both power and financial recognising the signs post 2008 and using that to create the current divide. They were never going to change the minds of all, but did not need to… just those who tend to swing every election, the strange thing about democracy is that the real power lies not with all, but with a few who can be persuaded and often don’t have a scoob what they are voting for …‘will keep the mullahs out’ being the extreme excel but suspect a common POV amongst the 2-3million who regularly swing between parties in elections etc… Given the enormity of the implications and complexity of the pros vs cons, I simply don’t believe this was ever a decision that should be left to 2-3 million that often portray themselves as not having a political or commons sense bonein their body… that may seem harsh, but is it not a valid point especially when it will impact multiple generations before any ‘correction’ is likely to be possible?
I can fully understand the photographers point - it’s a point of principle rather than him deliberately being a twat to the school. Equally, I understand the schools position - it’s all very tricky. I got into a bit of bother once for posting something on-line that wasnt my own work. I never claimed it to be my work when I posted it and had taken it from another souce where it was freely available to anyone to look at. The person whose work it was saw it and had a bit if a pop at me saying that I was trying to make out it was mine. I told them that I wasnt and that I would have credited them if I knew their name as it wasnt credited from the source I took it from. In the end I called the person a cunt and removed it from the platform I was using. All it took was for that person to ensure that their name was embedded into the document and it would have been fine, but they didnt do this.
As you didn’t make a comment, I’m not sure what your point of posting is as this has nothing to do with Brexit.
Today we did a bingo bus trip to Prague. The border is a road sign and a gas station.
So in a hard Brexit just what happens then? They have to put up a border post to check for Brits without visas?
Maybe our negotiators could be cvnts and not recognise Shengen to get their own back.
In a 30 Mile radius of here they’d need about 20 manned border posts.
It’s a bigger mess than I imagined for both sides
