Are Labour a total shambles now as an opposition?

[FlemishDuck]

Just pointing out the evidence that cutting taxes makes the economy boom - as it has done under Trump and the reverse is true - cutting people’s take home pay through higher taxes means less demand and lower GDP growth

Theoreticly it always depends how the state invests. At some point there might be economicly benificial projects that require such heavy funding and organisation that only state's can manage them trough tax. A good example could be building up the fundamental transportation infastructure. By youre theory setting a 0% taw rate should be benificial yet that might make it too dificult to set up the transportation infrastructure for example. I think this debunks the absolutness of youre theory.

Would you be surprised if there were genuine racists among the ranks of UKIP? It’s not newsworthy is it because they have ideals that suit such people. The Labour Party is under the spotlight because they laud themselves as the inclusive party. Any incident, perceived, rumoured or actual, will be highlighted. It’s not done because it’s a smear campaign, it’s because people like to expose hypocrisy and double standards.

One considers the BS agenda's that seem to eminate from the british press, it's for ex. easily to proof how the British people have been spoonfed some absolute lies about the Eu for years by trough multiple story's of various Uk media. I don't say that in defense of the Eu, i say that to the discredit of a lot of the British press who one might suspect of having agenda's with certain campaigns.

 

[Jack Hackett]

Theoreticly it always depends how the state invests. At some point there might be economicly benificial projects that require such heavy funding and organisation that only state's can manage them trough tax. A good example could be building up the fundamental transportation infastructure. By youre theory setting a 0% taw rate should be benificial yet that might make it too dificult to set up the transportation infrastructure for example. I think this debunks the absolutness of youre theory.



One considers the BS agenda's that seem to eminate from the british press, it's for ex. easily to proof how the British people have been spoonfed some absolute lies about the Eu for years by trough multiple story's of various Uk media. I don't say that in defense of the Eu, i say that to the discredit of a lot of the British press who one might suspect of having agenda's with certain campaigns.

My 'theory', as you put it is no more than stating the macro economic fact that there is an optimum tax burden at which revenues to the exchequer are maximised. Increasing taxes beyond that level is counter productive for the reasons I've already stated elsewhere. So, not my theory as such, just an economic fact.

Of course we need taxes to run the essential infrastructure and government of the state for police, health, education etc.

We already have a state owned transportation infrastructure- it's called Network Rail and it owns and maintains railway lines, stations and signalling for the benefit of the train operators.

 

[gordondaviesmoustache]

Re the idea that innovation needs the profit motive, here's a little reminder that one of the greatest inventions was opposed by people making profit out of human suffering.

I never said it 'needs' the profit motive, I said it flourishes more abundantly through it. The fact you've been reduced to posting an illustration from around two centuries ago would support that contention.

 

[bluethrunthru]

Would you be surprised if there were genuine racists among the ranks of UKIP? It’s not newsworthy is it because they have ideals that suit such people. The Labour Party is under the spotlight because they laud themselves as the inclusive party. Any incident, perceived, rumoured or actual, will be highlighted. It’s not done because it’s a smear campaign, it’s because people like to expose hypocrisy and double standards.

for a couple of years it seemed there was hardly a week went by without them booting one out... so you could say that yes there are but fewer than there were. Then came along Batten and his views and Robinson and really quite reversed what they were doing.

 

[Vic]

I never said it 'needs' the profit motive, I said it flourishes more abundantly through it. The fact you've been reduced to posting an illustration from around two centuries ago would support that contention.

I'm not really looking to develop an argument about this. The illustration was a reminder that people innovate for reasons other than profit, and some inventions would be anti-profit. My father, hospitalised in his youth, and watching nurses struggle to move patients in beds, proposed electric power to move the height and angle of the platform, but nurses' back pain was a price worth paying for hospitals not to have to develop it.

But briefly - for profit, inventions are best targeted at higher income customers, innovators have to maintain a monopoly to get maximum profit so reducing utility, and if there's no money in it, think of unprofitable things that haven't been invented that might really have improved the world. Sometimes there's a profit motive in not innovating (The Man in the White Suit, the everlasting light bulb, and the whole concept of built-in obsolescence, sabotaging of electric car development) - though obviously you can't hold back progress for ever (LED bulbs).

And what is the point of academic research? It wasn't a profit-making firm that got the Nobel prize for developing graphene.

 

[inbetween]

I'm not really looking to develop an argument about this. The illustration was a reminder that people innovate for reasons other than profit, and some inventions would be anti-profit. My father, hospitalised in his youth, and watching nurses struggle to move patients in beds, proposed electric power to move the height and angle of the platform, but nurses' back pain was a price worth paying for hospitals not to have to develop it.

But briefly - for profit, inventions are best targeted at higher income customers, innovators have to maintain a monopoly to get maximum profit so reducing utility, and if there's no money in it, think of unprofitable things that haven't been invented that might really have improved the world. Sometimes there's a profit motive in not innovating (The Man in the White Suit, the everlasting light bulb, and the whole concept of built-in obsolescence, sabotaging of electric car development) - though obviously you can't hold back progress for ever (LED bulbs).

And what is the point of academic research? It wasn't a profit-making firm that got the Nobel prize for developing graphene.

Of course it was! Manchester University supplemented all research into Graphene via the private sector on the understanding it would be the private sector who took advantage of it, IE, developing applications for profit. Manchester University makes a profit, that is what pays for the nice shiny buildings such as the National Graphene Institute.

I had to sign a form when I was at Manchester which said anything I invented or produced in my project was the property of the university, why do you think that was? The sole objective of universities and academic research is to make money plain and simple. Universities couple up with private industry on virtually all projects and the reason is always the same, because they get paid to do it and because they couldn't do it otherwise.

Profit is the prime driver in everything because profit is what allows you to reinvest and grow something. Not making any profit means you can only sustain what you have so in general more and more profit is good. Without profit there is no growth, there is no technological advancement and there is no incentive for someone to go out and develop something like Graphene.

Just because some private companies redirect profit back to more unproductive stakeholders like shareholders does not automatically mean profit is bad.

 

[Blue Hefner]

If you consistently have small margins, your business model needs amending.

If they're affected by tax or paying people more, why not raise prices as a percentage, that's acceptable to their customers, to offset any problems ahead?

Why don't companies raise prices? Competition, for a start

Lots of businesses run on small margins, but they move volume to make a living

If a wage increase is imposed or even the threat of a wage increase is imposed, companies will accelerate their research into technological solutions to take up the work of a human(or amending the business model, if you will). Then more people will be out of work, or at best, need retraining. Which again comes at a cost - It is the world we live in

 

[aguero93:20]

If a wage increase is imposed or even the threat of a wage increase is imposed, companies will accelerate their research into technological solutions to take up the work of a human(or amending the business model, if you will). Then more people will be out of work, or at best, need retraining. Which again comes at a cost - It is the world we live in

That's unavoidable at this stage, at least in high value economies.

 

[Blue Hefner]

That's unavoidable at this stage, at least in high value economies.

So we need to accept it and create workable government policy around it. Not put our head in the sand and the politicians need to think up a workable strategy and do a bit more than using vote winning slogans such as raising the minimum wage

 

[FlemishDuck]

If a wage increase is imposed or even the threat of a wage increase is imposed, companies will accelerate their research into technological solutions to take up the work of a human(or amending the business model, if you will). Then more people will be out of work, or at best, need retraining. Which again comes at a cost - It is the world we live in

We should also shorten average man hours while increasing the wages. Automation can allow higher output with less required labour afterall.

If in time we could evolve to a fully automated system then why shouldn't we? However the way the current system is build with distribution mostly along merrit of labour as a cornerstone to it does provide potentially significant social challenge's. This evolution might make a lot of orthodox economical thinking simply redundant and require significant social changes to be maximised the utility for the public good.