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£GBP heading to oblivion


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My daughter has to rent in a shared house something that is disgusting for the job she has, we were supposed to be a house owning society this is becoming a joke.  Rents have gone up a tremendous amount (not included in inflation), plus council tax though not gone up much if you factor in what you get for what you pay (and someone near me has), it has gone up between 10-14%  not the 1.5% the money increase (reduction in Police, Fire, Social care, Social services, etc).  Everything that seems to go up or has been removed from a service or size of service or size of car or quality of item is not taken into account in the inflation figures.  I have come to the conclusion that the inflation figures are just a joke and manipulated to suit.    

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@richo The Pension pots have been raided by mostly Conservative Governments in the 1980's and 1990's by underfunding them.  Today there is a massive also shortfalls in Pensions because of the extremely low 'emergency' interest rates that were introduced after the financial crisis which was supposed to be temporary. Again IMO all of this is a TAX on the younger generations who are bailing out the banks the idle wealthy and now the pensioners.   

Edit when i say idle wealthy i do not mean the masses of middle classes who are prudent, have reached an age where they can retire early because of good choices they made, I am talking about wealth that has not, does not have to work or has not every had to work.          

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it is death by x1,000 little weeny slow, daily, weekly, monthly, and annual, consistent cuts, YOU NEVER NOTICE - just shrug and moan, a little here and a little there. add something here, take a little more away there.

It is happening not just in UK, all areas of the world are similar.

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I bought a tub of sandwich filler from Asda the other day and it barely filled one decently 'manly' baguette.  

Ten years back to same pot would do you two sandwiches and a jacket spud . It is now twice the price for something half the size - pardon my generalisation - 'shrinkflation' is real for every consumable we buy

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It used to be the case of you had the 'haves' and 'have nots'

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We are now being slowly eroded day by day to a collective of 'have nots' and 'have yachts'

Everyone will be on the same level playing field as nobody realises it spreads a little by little, years after year.  

The blurring between a half decent middle class lifestyle and poverty is so much closer.  

A 37.5 hour FT 'blue collar' average working man/woman is not too far apart (£££) from Mr Doley who enjoys Jeremy Kyle, eats cheesy wotsits and watches porn as a hobby, once you take away all his expenses in life.

RENT/MORTGAGE<COUNCIL TAX< NI<PERSONAL TAX< <CAR< INSURANCE<CREDIT CARD BILLS< LOAN< OVERDRAFTS<UTILITIES<MOBILE<BROADBAND<SKY/CABLE<KIDS<TRIPS<CLOTHES< comes from his take home pay yet 

The other who gets his main life costs from 'big daddy government' for sweet Felicity Arkwright 

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Add to this the uncertainty of some big event, this fine balance could be destroyed when the fuel stops pumping, a bank holiday comes, truckers and tanker drivers go on strike, FTSE nose dives 30% overnight, the banks recall ALL overdrafts overnight, banks dont open, ATMs are empty, banks close their doors, food trucks dont deliver - Take your pick  

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keep your bug out bag handy in the garage, because if something goes bad, QUICK Civilisation is only a few meals and twenty-four hours away from barbarism 

Signing off, forever your Forum Optimist & social commentor 

 

 

 

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14 hours ago, Pipers said:

@richo The Pension pots have been raided by mostly Conservative Governments in the 1980's and 1990's by underfunding them.  Today there is a massive also shortfalls in Pensions because of the extremely low 'emergency' interest rates that were introduced after the financial crisis which was supposed to be temporary. Again IMO all of this is a TAX on the younger generations who are bailing out the banks the idle wealthy and now the pensioners.   

Edit when i say idle wealthy i do not mean the masses of middle classes who are prudent, have reached an age where they can retire early because of good choices they made, I am talking about wealth that has not, does not have to work or has not every had to work.          

Nah, nothing to do with Conservatives. It's a popular narrative of left wing councils, but usually a false flag. In my view, there is a worrying semi hypocrisy of the liberal left quite happy to play every card in the book about needing money for social provision, but is quite happy to have very fat pension pots as the number 1 priority on local councils. Close libraries?, that's fine, end final salary schemes or cut back chief executive salaries in excess of the PMs salary, absolutely no way. 

 

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All time high price for gold was just over 1100 GBP and it still feels expensive now at around a grand. That was back in 2011, not inclined to check what the exchange rate was back then but if we take the all time high gold price in USD, $1800+ at today's exchange rates (very weak) you are looking at gold £1450 ozt. I think this will easily be reached in the near future and a whole lot more with all the instability. 

“Nowadays people know the price of everything and the value of nothing.” Oscillate Wildly

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At my local garage you can buy a 750ml glass bottle of Irn bru (sweet, carbonated, coloured beverage for the benefit of our foreign members) for 99p nicely chilled in the cabinet with 20p back on the bottle OR you can purchase those nasty plastic 500ml jobs 12" away for £1.40, Am I missing something here?

“Nowadays people know the price of everything and the value of nothing.” Oscillate Wildly

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I'm back, hello all and the £ will rise the moment Article 50 is triggered as expected, the unexpected is the shorting of the Euro Currency and sell-off of Eurozone Bonds that is about to happen. 18 months to go now until the Bond Maturity Bomb that is showing clearly in the Yield Curves across the world. Hoo Noo 2007 to 2009 happened aye. Never forget Enron and Arthur Andersen, Long Term Capital Management, Lehmans, Bear Stearns.... here we go again...anyone notice the credit crunch is upon us again....Libor oh dear why are you rising so fast, but wait, Inflation with negative interest rates and zero growth, yes Mary Berry, with milk, flour and Consolidated Loan/Debt Obligations, Pension funds failing and monetary policy running out of options we have a recipe for disaster. Oil to $10 a barrel, U.S. Fracking costs of Oil/Uranium interchangeable joint supply fell below $40 barrel overall with $26 a barrel cost of extraction now reached in the Bakken Shale fields (bet you didn't know that!!) almost equal to Saudi Arabian conventional extraction costs. Lots to ponder this year, put your seat belts on as this will be a rollercoaster 2017!

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will GBP rise when article 50 is triggered? Sure the uncertainty of calling it will have gone  but the initial negotiation  will be volatile.

1. the divorce payment does the UK owe the  EU 60 billion or does the EU owe us 9 billion

2. the fate of EU citizens in UK, and UK citizens in the EU.

 

i dont think it will go down much as most of brexit is already baked in the price but not sure it will go up significantly.

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FWIW I think the floor on GBPUSD looks to be about $1.20. The long term moving averages are flattening out, and we should move higher over the next 24 months, but it will be a slow climb out of the pit.

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On 3/18/2017 at 09:17, richo said:

Nah, nothing to do with Conservatives. It's a popular narrative of left wing councils, but usually a false flag. In my view, there is a worrying semi hypocrisy of the liberal left quite happy to play every card in the book about needing money for social provision, but is quite happy to have very fat pension pots as the number 1 priority on local councils. Close libraries?, that's fine, end final salary schemes or cut back chief executive salaries in excess of the PMs salary, absolutely no way. 

 

I think its a red herring of the Political Right to blame everything on the 'Liberal Left'. If you look back at most of the debt creation it has come under the Conservatives which was surprising, it certainly surprised me.   I have read Adam Smith and it now makes sense why the Tories would load debt on the masses while looking after their friends in the City.  I also believe the majority of the Labour Party would not run the country in the best interest of the population.

The 3rd way Liberals (neo Liberals) , Labour, Conservative, Liberal Demercrats, have conspired together and the end result has been a massive wealth divide.  Both the proper Right and Left wing have merits to get the country out of the mess we are in.      

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6 hours ago, Pipers said:

I think its a red herring of the Political Right to blame everything on the 'Liberal Left'. If you look back at most of the debt creation it has come under the Conservatives which was surprising, it certainly surprised me.   I have read Adam Smith and it now makes sense why the Tories would load debt on the masses while looking after their friends in the City.  I also believe the majority of the Labour Party would not run the country in the best interest of the population.

The 3rd way Liberals (neo Liberals) , Labour, Conservative, Liberal Demercrats, have conspired together and the end result has been a massive wealth divide.  Both the proper Right and Left wing have merits to get the country out of the mess we are in.      

Do you know anything about modern UK political economic history are you just being partisan? The Labour Govt have had three significant spells in power in the last half decade or so, on each occasion they left the country near bankruptcy. Actually on one occasion,1976, call it full bankruptcy, as we had to go cap in hand to the IMF for $3.9 billion. 

Not trying to sound smart, but my degree is in Economics and European Politics so it's something I take an interest in. 

Gordon Brown was meant to be an advocate of Keynes over neo-liberalism or Hayek if you like, but even in the Blair boom years they were borrowing £30bn, which was admittedly a small proportion of GDP, but it's hardly the surplus in good times Keynes advocated. When the crash hit, borrowing as % of GDP soared and yes the Tories and Osbourne had to take this over and borrowed a lot, but it was hardly the utterly benign and improving economy that Major handed Blair. Typical Labour, they handed over garbage, hence the borrowing you speak of. There really is no other spin that can be put on these facts.

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I'm no fan of Labour!

So forgive me a little chuckle when you call me Partisan.  Yes one could argue 1976 was from the earlier Tory years and the Arab oil price war 1973.  The 3 periods of Labour government you state i assume are post ww2 the birth of the health service and social housing ( Labour got in by the armed forces vote who having seen how the Europeans had lived and wanted more when they got home not the qualor they had lived in before the war.) Yes Attlee did leave a large debt but we got a lot for that debt lots of infustructure houses health service etc.   I am sure it was Churchill who nationalised the railways!!!  Was it not in 1978 James Callaghan who said we had to live within our means, only for Thatcher to massively borrow money after squeezing the currency to Deindustrialize?  Here do you not notice that big money will lend to a Tory Government more than a Labour government, this is political.

You having a degree in economics you will be well aware of Adam Smith.   From what you write i think you are right wing and probably Partisan towards voting conservative while i am a swing voter.  I have not studied economics  and do not have a degree but i know enough about it to know it that the names are looked after at the expense of the masses and that includes the bottom 95% of people.  I am not sure if you are an   Austrian  in your thinking i have read some papers on the web about about this way of thinking but most students are Keynes, Keynes is nearer neo liberal to me, but I'm sure you will put me right. 

As a student of economics you must know figures do not lie, 

so who has borrowed the most money the last government Conservative (Osborne) or the entire history of the Labour party in government?  

Answer Conservative George Osborne!!!!

If as you say the Labour government were bankrupt in 1976 i thought it was 1978 one could easily point the finger at the conservatives. it's nonsense they all lie. 

Just one question what school do you put yourself in? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Just a couple of charts, The idiot Osborne who has a History Degree a 2:1, chose to help his friends out in the city.  He let the BOE keep interest rates at emergency low rates while just giving free money to the City and removing money from the real economy (the poor working class and middle class) people who  spend their money.  The only other times we have seen debt like this is in war times its that bad so thank you Osborne /Carney its nearly as bad as the Napoleonic Wars and after the WW1 and WW2 and we have not had a war.  I believe Osborne has been the worse chancellor the UK has had, he certainly has been well rewarded for his efforts.           

http://www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/debt_history

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Most of the continuing rise in debt after Osbourne became chancellor was a hang over from the last of the Brown years and the 2008 crisis. He could hardly just pull the plug could he? These things take time to turn around, and the economy was addicted to debt. Whichever way you look at it, Blair and Brown took over a booming economy and completely ruined it in the 13 years they were in power. If Brown had dealt with the 2008 crisis properly instead of his big-headed, hair-brained "we've saved the world" attitude, we would be in a far better state today.

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The currencies have behaved in a "buy the rumour sell the fact" pattern for the last few months. 

Things are turning around - USD looks like it has topped out and is heading back down, which should act as a strong tailwind for PMs in the next 12-24 months, especially if the stock market also has a wobble (or worse).

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On 3/19/2017 at 11:38, shemyaza said:

. Oil to $10 a barrel, U.S. Fracking costs of Oil/Uranium interchangeable joint supply fell below $40 barrel overall with $26 a barrel cost of extraction now reached in the Bakken Shale fields (bet you didn't know that!!) almost equal to Saudi Arabian conventional extraction costs. Lots to ponder this year, put your seat belts on as this will be a rollercoaster 2017!

Shem Are you sure its that low, I find it hard to believe a fracking operation can be that cheap.  Can you also expand on oil/Uranium interchangable joint supply I am not sure what that means?   

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On 3/21/2017 at 15:05, sovereignsteve said:

Most of the continuing rise in debt after Osbourne became chancellor was a hang over from the last of the Brown years and the 2008 crisis. He could hardly just pull the plug could he? These things take time to turn around, and the economy was addicted to debt. Whichever way you look at it, Blair and Brown took over a booming economy and completely ruined it in the 13 years they were in power. If Brown had dealt with the 2008 crisis properly instead of his big-headed, hair-brained "we've saved the world" attitude, we would be in a far better state today.

I am not sticking up for Blair Brown Campbell they were are part of the same neo liberal problem as the last nearly 40 years the country has been living off debt apart from a couple of years and we have not got anything for that debt so it is bad debt.

My point is this you cannot blame everything on the red team when the blue team are just as bad, Thatcher didn't get the country out of trouble she loaned and sold off lots of the family silver, most then went into the stock market which then went into foreign Governments hands (making a few very rich).  I now notice that home ownership is down another failing flagship of the neo liberals both teams, or was it all the time to put the majority of home ownership into a few rich peoples hands?

There are some in both Parties who are good MP's, I have been asking myself for years why did Osborne get the job as Chancellor  when the Conservatives have many in the Party who were/are more qualified?  

Osborne doubled down on the debt  a thing only a fool would do or a gambler, at the same time as giving massive handouts to the City he attacked the most vulnerable in society scape goating them as  not disabled enough or lazy or thick through media propaganda, while giving Rentier landlords more benefits by proxy.  

Also It is quite obvious the country needed more homes but the neo Liberals could not and can not see that the private sector will not provide the necessary houses it is against their interest, also its against the City and  Banks interests.  The only way enough new homes would be built is through taxation of unused land taxation of unused homes new, and old homes and second homes. Government lad grab of land to make new Cities in our Country from Wealthy Land owners who would be paid for the Land.  This would then bring down the price of housing and stimulate the country away from real estate as the only investment/ industry.     

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59 minutes ago, Pipers said:

Shem Are you sure its that low, I find it hard to believe a fracking operation can be that cheap. 

Yes pretty much accurate, I was reading about it recently.

In fact I believe the US reserves of frackable oil is 2 or 3 times as large as Saudi's reserves.

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4 minutes ago, Pipers said:

My point is this you cannot blame everything on the red team when the blue team are just as bad, Thatcher didn't get the country out of trouble she loaned and sold off lots of the family silver, most then went into the stock market which then went into foreign Governments hands (making a few very rich).   

Thatcher certainly had a lot to answer for in the increased rush for globalisation which many are now railing against, but the fact is, after the Blues were kicked out by Blair, the economy was robust and vibrant. The reds then proceeded to waste this inheritance. As soon as the balance of payments started turning positive, instead of paying off debt, Brown couldn't wait to spend (?waste) money and borrow even more. He thought he was a god with the economy and became overconfident in his own abilities. He talked a lot about prudence and paying off debt when the economic cycle gave us good times but in the end, he thought he had cured boom and bust and the good times would just carry on under his stewardship. Nearly all out current problems are down to the BB pair along with similar idiots in the US and EU.

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I agree about brown, but as the red team of Neo liberals came to realise taxes were not coming in and working welfare was rising, because wages were being suppressed because of globalization, a big failure of the neo liberals.  What should of happened was welfare should of been left as it was in the 1980's and the industrial disputes played out.  Same thing is happening today one could argure the Government is subsidising companies and Landords with working welfare, this makes the employee docile  stops the workers forming organised labour movements.  This is all part of the Neo Liberal plan.  While a free market would never let this sort of interference happen, nor would a left wing attlee type of Govenment who would run up debt but you would a least get Homes and infrastructure for the spending.              

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what would have happened if the blues hadn't jumped into bed with the orange lot after Brown was ousted, who knows. It may turn out to be what the country needed at the time or perhaps we needed another election to sort out the indecision. History may well tell us in time.

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So its this week, triggering of article 50, the big questions are the following short term /mid term/ long term:-

1 Will the £ strengthen or weaken against Gold.

2 Will the £ strengthen or weaken against the $

3 will the £ strengthen or weaken against the Euro  

 

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