Scotlands doesnt need to be in a mess smurf, but thats another thread.
We have a better chance than the UK combined, but we would need vastly different policies, I suspect completely at odds with what many Indy supporters have in mind.
Everyone is pissing in the wind if its about China, the US, India or Russia. But we have things like e.g. The Paris agreement, where effectively the whole of the world is signed up to sans the fat rapists' USA. So there is tacit agreement globally that we cant continue as we are doing.
Not sure if serious. China and the rest don’t give two fucks, at least not until after more pressing and energy consuming priorities are addressed.
Im not sure why we would be poorer tbh, and i think theres a lot of disparate point being made. We havent had a manufacturing base for quite some time, though we are top at manufacturing for the arms industries of the world. We are poor when we want to be and not at other times. Nice new armoured personnel carriers coming into service at a cool £5b, new frigates, subs tanks and aircraft etc.
We are poor all the time and getting poorer with every debt-based spend which you seem to be conflating with periods of not being poor. We have indeed not had a manufacturing base for a while but given the service industry goose is already mostly cooked, and the heat is still being turned up; given that those we depend on to make stuff are increasingly not our pals; and given that we can’t afford to maintain a population of workless people - and not just on financial terms - we need to do something. We are absolutely capable of manufacturing in certain sectors if the conditions are right: low energy costs, low tax burden, properly targeted education, picking and choosing what we aim at.
Labour left the country in 2010 with a defecit of circa £1t, and the tories left the country in 2024 with a defecit of circa £2.8t.
Of which a commensurate share belongs to Scotland. That aside, this is the spiral - contra your rich when we want to be point. We’ve had one PM ousted directly as a consequence of our indebtedness and this PM and / or chancellor have only narrowly avoided it in their first year. We need to escape what is currently a one way ratchet.
The point im making about these things is there is lots of reasons why a country could become poorer. Politicians misuse of funds, but i genuinely think that corporate greed needs reigned in in all sectors. Our version of capitalism doesnt need to be the one we are in now. The manufacturing base being nothing to what it was, is really just one facet of the issues faced.
What do you suggest? The same pattern is repeating across the entire western world, and isnt because of snouts in troughs.
On manufacturing; what the hell can we manufacture anyway? The colume of goods being produced by China and India for example simply smashes wee tiny countries like Britain. All fabrics, steel, most food groups, and thats just economies of scale, and low wages being just one driver. So we are a wee service industry island, and a place for dafties to rinse their money in and very good at weapons manufacturing.
We absolutely could make steel if the incentives were right. Not as cheaply as China of course, but that only matters in a completely open market, and I don’t see that lasting as the world becomes more polarised. More to the point we should be focussed on higher quality goods whether digital or analogue; easier to absorb first world labour costs making Scottish cashmere sweaters than fast fashion for example.
The biggest problem we have and the biggest reason we will become poorer, collectively in the west is a massively ageing population and incorrect immigration. We need people in our countries, we need young people. We dont procreate enough. Thats why we need to smash rascists and the right wingnuts everywhere we find them. The demographics are frightening for the ageing west and we need to address this.... again im jumping into disparate side issues
What right wing racists? 90% of the racial tensions summoned up in the UK when they were all but dead, comes from the opposite flank. England is one of the most racially tolerant countries in the world. We will see if Scotland can match that as our immigration ramps up. With a fair wind perhaps we can buck our history.
Your plan to use the developing world as a baby farm, which depends on them remaining poor, is a cynical one. Let them bear the cost, and we’ll reap the benefits as well as stripping them of the talent they need to get out of the bit - which of course we require, because if they do get out of the bit the model breaks down. It’s gobsmackingly immoral imho, but setting that aside it’s also impractical. In the real world the country will become poorer and balkanised, the trust and communality on which services and business depend will collapse, and then you’ll see racists of every flavour really let rip.
We have to use the resources we all have correctly, I still dont think it needs to be one of the other.
No it doesn’t, but priorities certainly need to be in line. High energy costs and high labour costs put together are teas oot time for the service sector never mind manufacturing. And that’s before we get to geopolitical exposures.
