TRUMP IS A See you next Tuesday

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In terms of economic travails in the UK, this doesn’t help, but Ms Reeves remains our larger problem, by some considerable margin.
 
egb_hibs said:
In terms of economic travails in the UK, this doesn’t help, but Ms Reeves remains our larger problem, by some considerable margin.
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What's the betting she adds Trump tae the Tory's missing 20 billion as a reason for fucking us over in the future.
 
Findlayhibby said:
There have been over 1000 demos against Trump over these last few days.It's estimated over 3.5 million have marched.Ok maybe that's small fry in terms of the US population but it's a start.
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What needs to happen is the Democrat party need to sort themselves out. They are recording historic levels of unpopularity. Until they do that it’s all so much hot air as there is not a viable alternative.
 
egb_hibs said:
What needs to happen is the Democrat party need to sort themselves out. They are recording historic levels of unpopularity. Until they do that it’s all so much hot air as there is not a viable alternative.
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Imagine being less popular than Trump.
 
Can we really moan about Trump's tariffs hitting things like our whisky industry when a bottle costs £6 more in Scotland than Carlisle?
 
Smurf said:
Can we really moan about Trump's tariffs hitting things like our whisky industry when a bottle costs £6 more in Scotland than Carlisle?
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Widnae ken aboot whisky, it's fuckin awful stuff. If I did it widnae worry me because my laddie lives in Gretna, he's in Carlisle a lot.
 
joethehibby said:
Markets are crashing worldwide this morning 😩
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The whole model of gutting western labour and undercutting with cheap overseas labour has been blown up. It’s been the blueprint for the neoliberal order for the last 30 years. The world has been turned on its side. Feck knows where it ends. Possibly with a capitalist bullet for the Donald.
 
egb_hibs said:
The whole model of gutting western labour and undercutting with cheap overseas labour has been blown up. It’s been the blueprint for the neoliberal order for the last 30 years. The world has been turned on its side. Feck knows where it ends. Possibly with a capitalist bullet for the Donald.
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Strange, seeing how trump is a capitalist, is he not, ?
 
joethehibby said:
Strange, seeing how trump is a capitalist, is he not, ?
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Indeed. Apparently one intent on restoring the place of American labour.

Maybe he wants a legacy. Or maybe the business he was in wasn’t one where offshoring applies and so it’s never been in his interests (though he has been a user of migrant labour).

Who knows really. But why ever he’s doing it, he’s doing it.

It’s certainly the case that for all those who enjoy exploiting cheap labour there are plenty in business who hate what globalisation has done to workers. But they are forced to compete in the landscape that Clinton, Bush, Blair et al established. Very hard for any individual employer to buck their market without quickly going bust, the playing field needs levelled and that is what Trump appears to be doing.
 
egb_hibs said:
Indeed. Apparently one intent on restoring the place of American labour.

Maybe he wants a legacy. Or maybe the business he was in wasn’t one where offshoring applies and so it’s never been in his interests (though he has been a user of migrant labour).

Who knows really. But why ever he’s doing it, he’s doing it.

It’s certainly the case that for all those who enjoy exploiting cheap labour there are plenty in business who hate what globalisation has done to workers. But they are forced to compete in the landscape that Clinton, Bush, Blair et al established. Very hard for any individual employer to buck their market without quickly going bust, the playing field needs levelled and that is what Trump appears to be doing.
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He’s starting to panic now though . His latest comment “” a little pain required to begin with “ Aye right
 
joethehibby said:
He’s starting to panic now though . His latest comment “” a little pain required to begin with “ Aye right
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Maybe he is. It may well not be possible to save western labour from being punked until they earn equivalent to the developing world. In fact I doubt it is and his chances of pulling it off are slim.

He may add big business to the CIA and FBI in terms of people that would like to see him fall down a flight of stairs, and it may all be for nothing. Indeed it’s very likely. That wouldn’t have me sleeping well at night.
 
Findlayhibby said:
There have been over 1000 demos against Trump over these last few days.It's estimated over 3.5 million have marched.Ok maybe that's small fry in terms of the US population but it's a start.
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Well indeed. About 1% of the population.
 
So if a new the great depression era was to land on us would it no be a chance to start from scratch again?
 
EH17 Jimmy said:
So if a new the great depression era was to land on us would it no be a chance to start from scratch again?
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Get prohibition on the go again tae Jimmy, see how they Yanks like daein without our whisky/whiskey.
 
EH17 Jimmy said:
So if a new the great depression era was to land on us would it no be a chance to start from scratch again?
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I’m not sure how.

In simple terms the American blue collar workforce is fucked unless America can produce goods at a comparable price point and quality to overseas made equivalents. I mean it’s QED right… who pays more for a widget made at home when you can get it much more cheaply made elsewhere. Certainly not the impeccably progressive citizens of this board, based on a poll I once ran.

So how do you bring production costs in line with rivals without driving wages through the floor ?

- Reduce cost of energy, aka drill baby drill; Trump is doing this
- Lower the business tax burden; by all accounts Trump intends to do this
- Get regulatory costs out of the way; I’d expect Trump to pursue this
- Attack your competitors ability to undercut to begin with; tariffs, Trump is doing this

And the nuclear option. Absolutely thermonuclear; devalue you currency so the cost of your labour reduces relative to the world, but not relative to others within your country. This also make imports more expensive….which again helps the cause. But it absolutely tans the wealthy and makes imports and foreign holidays more expensive for everyone else (the latter not such an issue in America perhaps). And remember imports here aren’t just jeans and trainers but the weapons America needs to defend itself.

It also has incalculable other effects if you are America and your currency underpins the world. The UK did it after 2008 which stopped us becoming Greece, but we did it through quantitative easing which benefits the rich and helps polarise wealth. If Trump is trying to do it by breaking the dollar and trashing the wealth of billionaires, well that’s …bold. I don’t believe he’s that gung ho though, and do believe that if he is, someone will kill him. No way corporate America and the three letter agencies are going to let Trump away with that level of far leftism, surely?

@aggie has better finance knowledge and will maybe correct anything I’ve got wrong.
 
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EH17 Jimmy said:
A lot of that went over my head eegie but I just hope someone can start making life better for all our citizens.

Empty promises and pledges do not put food on the table.
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Ok I’ll try it another way, trying to relate to your experience - though my grasp of that ain’t great.

To compete with overseas, US labour has to be able to match them on price. They need to become less expensive as you would competing against a Polish painter back in the day, or the work is going to the other guy.

Now the only way to do do that without simply making US labour ever poorer is to cut other aspects of their overall cost, which might be like you being able to use paint that was much cheaper than our imaginary Polish painter, cheaper brushes, ladders, fuel. Or by making his stuff more expensive. Trumps measures are doing (or attempting to) these sorts of things.

But the Polish dude still has one massive advantage - his wages in the UK is like a doctor’s wage back home, so he can send money home and then return to live like a Prince by comparison.

He can do this because the polish currency is worth less than the pound (to simplify somewhat). In our metaphor here, the nuclear option is for Trump to push the pound down closer to the polish currency to cancel that out. Good for painters - assuming they don’t want to go on holiday overseas anymore - not good for the wealthy.
 
I suppose historically then it was a mistake to allow Japan and Germany to reindustrialise and rebuild after WW2 as that started the real decline in other western industry as British companies simply couldn't complete and with the loss of the Empire had no easy captive markets? Japan beat the the USA high tech industry too. Funny how building stuff properly and good design beat nationalist sympathies.... China, well, that horse has bolted and it was the Western Governments and Corprate complacency and lack of investment in replacing old heavy industry and mining with high tech industry etc that gave the opportunity.
 
EH17 Jimmy said:
A lot of that went over my head eegie but I just hope someone can start making life better for all our citizens.

Empty promises and pledges do not put food on the table.
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Nowt funny about folk trying to feed their family's EG.

Doubt it would be like the last time but folk are struggling.
 
I love it when EGers dislikes simple reporting of how stuff works, rather than my opinions.

That said, a lot of things in reality are fairly dislikable right now :coffee1:
 
"Funny how building stuff properly and good design beat nationalist sympathies"

So we are incapable of building stuff properly then?

When were UK workers given the chance to build stuff properly?

And 'nationalist sympathies' 🤣🤣🤣
 
jetsam1 said:
I suppose historically then it was a mistake to allow Japan and Germany to reindustrialise and rebuild after WW2 as that started the real decline in other western industry as British companies simply couldn't complete and with the loss of the Empire had no easy captive markets? Japan beat the the USA high tech industry too. Funny how building stuff properly and good design beat nationalist sympathies.... China, well, that horse has bolted and it was the Western Governments and Corprate complacency and lack of investment in replacing old heavy industry and mining with high tech industry etc that gave the opportunity.
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The problem is not so much competing with others on the development and production of their own finished goods. This has little to do with what Japan and Germany pulled off back in the day, indeed it’s likely to absolutely fuck Germany over the next 20 years.

It is about labour arbitrage - the ability to endlessly bid down the cost of your own labour through having a globalised elastic workforce. It reduces workers to the equivalent of spanners or photocopiers - you just shop around for the cheapest. Exploitation at its purest. It also eliminates the need to invest in manufacturing efficiency that would help goods be made domestically.

It is also about western companies giving the likes of China the technological expertise they need to outgun the west, and India control of the operations of service industries, in return for that ability to swap in cheaper workers.

I think you are right that the horse is bolted, but we need to at least focus on the races as they are run today.

I’ve no idea what captive markets the American empire lost by the way. I mean honestly this anti western mythology is served up to soften up western labour to their own exploitation. I’d pass on it if I were you.
 
That was a problem eegie. But our Polish friends now charge the same as everyone else.

Cheap paint is crap. Which is why many many times when working for firms who done insurance work came unstuck.

Now it may not sound important to most folk but cheap brushes are shite. And good tools make a better job.

As an example for all yous DIY folks. If you use water based paints use synthetic brushes.

If you use oil based (as I did) then get pure bristle brushes.

Were yous aware that you can pay north of £20 for a decent brush.

But you get what you pay for. 🙄
 
EH17 Jimmy said:
That was a problem eegie. But our Polish friends now charge the same as everyone else.

Cheap paint is crap. Which is why many many times when working for firms who done insurance work came unstuck.

Now it may not sound important to most folk but cheap brushes are shite. And good tools make a better job.

As an example for all yous DIY folks. If you use water based paints use synthetic brushes.

If you use oil based (as I did) then get pure bristle brushes.

Were yous aware that you can pay north of £20 for a decent brush.

But you get what you pay for. 🙄
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It was a metaphor Jimmy. The cheap paint was not meant to describe crap paint or any paint, it was meant to represent other parts of the cost of doing a job, in addition to labour. So, in manufacturing terms the paint represents energy cost, tax etc. hope that makes sense?

The polish guys charging the same now is I expect because those that are left now intend to make their lives in the UK, and can’t therefore no longer benefit from the currency mismatch.

Edit - I’d have as many poles here as we can get tbh on that basis. It was the 12 guys to a room sending the money home then returning to it, that I think punked you lads. If we need migrants to prop up our dying shambles, poles are about as good a choice as there is. Alas, with polish living standards set to exceed our own before long, I think that door is closed.
 
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Yep. And I've worked with many decent lads. And ooops just went back into decorating mode regarding paint 🤣

And again any DIY folk. Don't buy shite from B and Q. Go to The Paint Shed for your paint. And buy Johnstone's paint. It's as good as most paint and cheaper than Dulux
 
He's no daft eh....

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EH17 Jimmy said:
That was a problem eegie. But our Polish friends now charge the same as everyone else.

Cheap paint is crap. Which is why many many times when working for firms who done insurance work came unstuck.

Now it may not sound important to most folk but cheap brushes are shite. And good tools make a better job.

As an example for all yous DIY folks. If you use water based paints use synthetic brushes.

If you use oil based (as I did) then get pure bristle brushes.

Were yous aware that you can pay north of £20 for a decent brush.

But you get what you pay for. 🙄
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Jimmy, you sound like my brother who has been a painter decorator for fifty yesrs . All absolutely correct though.
Regarding polish guys charging the same . We got some slabbing done in the back garden at a fraction of the cost by local businesses . Strong as feck he was carrying the big slabs about as if they were sheets of cardboard 💪
 
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