Winter election II

[gassor]

The IFS are better respected by journalists than by economists: the charge is usually that they can't do macroeconomics. They certainly don't consider the political context of their calculations.

Here's Simon Wren-Lewis on the credibility of Labour's spending plans. SWL's politics are fairly left wing (although he's no Corbynite) but he is very much a mainstream economist.

https://mainlymacro.blogspot.com/2019/11/is-labours-economic-plan-credible.html

Mostly he seems to be holding his breath hoping for the best. Some of it is just disingenuous, "The IFS say the corporation tax numbers are realistic", yes but they say the significant rise in Corp Tax would be very harmful. Has Labour condemned the IFS before, or is just suddenly that Labour has misgivings about the IFS?

 

[gassor]

Good lord! Dialogue has broken out on pfm. Mods do something!!

Won't last long

 

[gavreid]

The IFS is discredited for arguing that VAT is a progressive tax and that it should be increased.

 

[russel]

And there are so very few of them and so very many of us that it would equate to the value of a bus ticket a year that you would get. And you would have no one managing your pension fund. Bring down capitalism and work till the day you die because there will be no pensions.

I don’t think it would be any problem getting people to do the job for a lot less, you have mentioned saving the planet, well the reason the planet is being destroyed is because people do not think long term and the finance industry is stuffed to the gills with people who are paid to think short term.

 

[Seanm]

Mostly he seems to be holding his breath hoping for the best. Some of it is just disingenuous, "The IFS say the corporation tax numbers are realistic", yes but they say the significant rise in Corp Tax would be very harmful. Has Labour condemned the IFS before, or is just suddenly that Labour has misgivings about the IFS?

Simon Wren-Lewis isn't "Labour", he's an independent, mainstream economist. He's not condemning the IFS (and neither is Labour), he's challenging their reading of the plans and their conclusion. He isn't hoping for the best, he's outlining the need for massive investment and putting it in the context of the last decade's under-funding and other European economies, while offering straightforward explanations as to why fears about corporations withholding investment, and worries over borrowing, are misplaced. This really is the opposite of slagging off the IFS and crossing his fingers!

 

[cooky1257]

BBC and Tories.........

From Real Politik

Oh look! Wadda ya know? ‘White shirt guy’ who attacked Corbyn in last night’s BBC Leaders debate, is a conservative activist!

Ryan Jacobsz. Earlier this year, he was also the conservatives candidate for the local council of Hessle in East Riding, Yorkshire.

Last night was Ryan’s FOURTH appearance on BBCQT. In his first, he attacked Emily Thornberry in chesterfield on 20.04.2018 over Intervention in Syria. In the second, he attacked Richard Burgon on Labour’s brexit position 31.01.2019.

Can BBCQT Audience Producer and UKIP enthusiast, Alison Fuller Pedley explain how conservative activists and candidates make it onto the BBC QuestionTime audience so frequently and why they’re also always conveniently given the opportunity to ask their staged anti-Labour Tory PR attack questions?

Can the BBC explain? How can anyone trust the integrity of the show, or the BBC when this CONTINUES to happen?!

Nothing to add to this apart from BBC News editing out the audience's mocking laughter of Boris in same debate.

 

[maxflinn]

More here:

Ryan Jacobz: The Tory plant that BBC Question Time cannot get enough of

 

[Stunsworth]

Latest “poll of polls”. Tories have a 13% lead over Labour...

https://www.theguardian.com/politic.../oct/31/uk-general-election-2019-poll-tracker

 

[Brian]

Latest “poll of polls”. Tories have a 13% lead over Labour...

https://www.theguardian.com/politic.../oct/31/uk-general-election-2019-poll-tracker

I’m sure the polls will be incorrect as usual and we will hopefully see the back of the tories. To the despair of their supporters, we will also see the start of the decline of foodbanks and the country can start to recover from 9 years of economic incompetence on a massive scale.

 

[Seeker_UK]

Latest “poll of polls”. Tories have a 13% lead over Labour...

https://www.theguardian.com/politic.../oct/31/uk-general-election-2019-poll-tracker

The trend is interesting - Labour and Conservatives seem to be taking support from the others but doesn't seem to change the difference in support.

It appears two weeks' electioneering has made the line line that gets repeated, that neither of the 'big two' represent the views of the population and are led by unpopular individuals, er, b*llocks.

 

[Frankiesays]

How credible are Labour's spending plans (which taken item by item are indeed laudable) when looked at in total? "Spending on a million council homes, increasing public sector pay, free broadband, green transformation etc amounts to £800bn, according to the manifesto. But this is before counting the cost of six major industry nationalisations, the four-day week and freezing the state pension age.*" Just to take the increasing of tax on those earning £80k would only net £6bn.

The rest would be found in increased Corporation Tax. "Alongside other corporation tax increases proposed, this would move the UK from raising an average share of national income in corporation tax to the highest in the G7. IFS" Prices would rise and wages would fall and the direction of travel for many businesses would only be one way.

The country cannot move to become Norway mk2 at the drop of a hat. McDonnell says the IFS are wrong without any reason I can see.

* Today's Scotsman

Exactly, Labour's first priority should be to help the working poor, and those trying to buy their own homes, in whatever form that takes. They should be honest about the rest of it, forget about the 4 day working week - for now anyway, forget about free broadband, that's a consumer choice, not a human right! Those harking back to Roosevelts New Deal are dreamers, do they think Roosevelt said free this, free that? I think not. He probably promised jobs on low wages and little else, but back then people would march for the right to work, almost 100 years later a century of capitalism has brought us to a point where some are virtually campaigning for the right to shirk.

 

[Tony L]

The trend is interesting - Labour and Conservatives seem to be taking support from the others but doesn't seem to change the difference in support.

This happened last time, it became far more a two-horse race as time went on.

PS FWIW I think Jo Swinson has killed what was initially an exceptionally strong Lib Dem position, which will gift a majority to Johnson. We are almost certainly heading for a Tory majority now, and worse than that a Tory party absolutely purged of all moderates and centrists. It is now effectively the ERG insurgency wearing a Tory rosette.

 

[Brian]

This happened last time, it became far more a two-horse race as time went on.

PS FWIW I think Jo Swinson has killed what was initially an exceptionally strong Lib Dem position, which will gift a majority to Johnson. We are almost certainly heading for a Tory majority now, and worse than that a Tory party absolutely purged of all moderates and centrists. It is now effectively the ERG insurgency wearing a Tory rosette.

As has been pointd out many times, Tony, Swinson is in the wrong party. She is a tory at heart and probably one of the worst. It begs the question why did those in the party want her as leader? Perhaps they are all tories now, while the tories are now UKIP.

 

[Bob McC]

She will oversee the wipe out of the Lib Dems.

 

[cooky1257]

She wasn't sorry for the Lib Der complicity in austerity and sold out the poor, disabled and students for ministerial status.

 

[roman]

Some interesting perspectives on all this in the latest 'remaniacs' podcast.

 

[Barrymagrec]

She will oversee the wipe out of the Lib Dems.

She`ll have to go some the beat Cleggs attempt.

 

[NeilR]

Joe you're all over the place here. No-one's talking about hanging hedge fund managers, unless I've missed something. Labour are talking about taxing them slightly more than they're taxed already so that people don't have to find a bin to sleep in after they've finished their shift, and so that we can...Tackle climate change! Read the manifesto. It opens with an account of the Green New Deal.

She's saying to the rough sleeper: "You know compared with people in other parts of the world you're actually very wealthy! And anyway the real issue's climate change!"

what i am surprised about is that everyone is talking about taxing income, but not about taxing wealth. Surely this should also be being discussed if we want to have a more balanced system?

We have to pay wealth taxes in Switzerland, starting from a relatively modest amount of total wealth. Makes a lot of sense to me.

 

[Dave H.]

what i am surprised about is that everyone is talking about taxing income, but not about taxing wealth. Surely this should also be being discussed if we want to have a more balanced system?

We have to pay wealth taxes in Switzerland, starting from a relatively modest amount of total wealth. Makes a lot of sense to me.

 

[Seanm]

what i am surprised about is that everyone is talking about taxing income, but not about taxing wealth. Surely this should also be being discussed if we want to have a more balanced system?

We have to pay wealth taxes in Switzerland, starting from a relatively modest amount of total wealth. Makes a lot of sense to me.

Absolutely. Labour are proposing reforms to capital gains tax and dividends tax. From page 33, here:

https://labour.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Funding-Real-Change-1.pdf

They'll also reverse cuts to inheritance tax and impose a second home tax.