People may well, when asked, say they want a shopping list of goodies provided by the state. This doesn’t mean their desires are achievable, never mind mutually exclusive.
Nick Whitehouse
4 years ago
One of the problems of our times is that the educational system does not promote the successes of the last 300 years, let alone the benefits of living in Britain. It seems to be run by “intellectuals”, who as George Orwell wrote; they would be more ashamed to be caught standing up for God save the King, than for being caught stealing from the poor box. Here is a list Peter, of the great achievements of the 20th centaury.
The mass production of the motor car – that allowed the peasants to travel beyond their village, when they wanted. Modern planes – that allowed the peasants to travel abroad. Anti biotics Computers The internet Mobile phones Vastly more wealth generated that allowed for the NHS, pensions and the welfare state. Central heating Washing Machines The electric/gas ovens. Affordable carpets Vacuum cleaners Inside toilets & bathrooms
Many of the above were invented in the 19th centaury, but the increasing wealth produced by advances in manufacturing allowed them to be available to most in Britain.
Michael Whittock
4 years ago
The phrase “progressive authoritarianism” reminds me of the woke community’s bullying tactics against those they consider to be fascist or various types of phobe The glaring example of this is universities allowing themselves to be jackbooted into noplatforming those whom a noisy minority of students consider to be unsound. For instance the rescinding of a visiting fellowship offered to Dr. Jordan Peterson by the Divinity School at Cambridge was a disgraceful and shameful event. This kind of injustice is happening too often, and when it does the offending university should be heavily fined. Universities must not be impeded from exercising freedom of thought and expression which is essential to the academic enterprise. What I think could be happening is that the wokes are becoming the establishment and reacting against the new counter- cultural conservatism which is questioning their assumptions and prejudices. Like most establishments the wokes have become angrily reactionary. Ironic?
Fraser Bailey
4 years ago
Well you can’t blame the young for having no faith in governments given their track record across the west since 1989. And it seems to me that both young and old are turning into ‘progressive authoritarians’, with particular reference to the new hate speech laws in Scotland. The future does not look bright.
Andrew Hallett
4 years ago
Its fine for whatever generation to want ever more and more form Government but as always they never want to talk about how we are going to pay for it. Guaranteed income, higher basic wage, improved health care are all well and good, but almost every country is already heavily indebted paying for what we already have. If you want more you are going to have to pay more taxes but any politician who says he/she will raise taxes will never get elected. So all of us who want more services are the same people who wont vote to pay for them.
Sparta Cuss
4 years ago
UBI is affordable if we abolish all benefits and restrict government to the essentials e.g. defence, law & order, the NHS etc. True, we would still have to raise taxes but the net effect would be to cost only the richest.
E.g 50% tax would lead to a government budget of c. £1 Trillion. Minus the essentials of c. £400 Billion that would leave £600B to be divided by c. 35M British born and resident citizens aged 18-65 which = c. £17k UBI/annum 🙂
Obviously UBI would have to start lower, e.g. the UC rate of £5k/yr and then go up if affordable and I admit the essential budget of £400B is a bit of a lower end guesstimate!
Sparta Cuss
4 years ago
And the quid pro quo for (big) business might have to be an abolition of red tape and costs e.g. minimum wage but this might actually lead to greater productivity (and employment as all those stuck in the benefits trap would now have an incentive to seek employment).
People may well, when asked, say they want a shopping list of goodies provided by the state. This doesn’t mean their desires are achievable, never mind mutually exclusive.
One of the problems of our times is that the educational system does not promote the successes of the last 300 years, let alone the benefits of living in Britain.
It seems to be run by “intellectuals”, who as George Orwell wrote; they would be more ashamed to be caught standing up for God save the King, than for being caught stealing from the poor box.
Here is a list Peter, of the great achievements of the 20th centaury.
The mass production of the motor car – that allowed the peasants to travel beyond their village, when they wanted.
Modern planes – that allowed the peasants to travel abroad.
Anti biotics
Computers
The internet
Mobile phones
Vastly more wealth generated that allowed for the NHS, pensions and the welfare state.
Central heating
Washing Machines
The electric/gas ovens.
Affordable carpets
Vacuum cleaners
Inside toilets & bathrooms
Many of the above were invented in the 19th centaury, but the increasing wealth produced by advances in manufacturing allowed them to be available to most in Britain.
The phrase “progressive authoritarianism” reminds me of the woke community’s bullying tactics against those they consider to be fascist or various types of phobe The glaring example of this is universities allowing themselves to be jackbooted into noplatforming those whom a noisy minority of students consider to be unsound. For instance the rescinding of a visiting fellowship offered to Dr. Jordan Peterson by the Divinity School at Cambridge was a disgraceful and shameful event.
This kind of injustice is happening too often, and when it does the offending university should be heavily fined. Universities must not be impeded from exercising freedom of thought and expression which is essential to the academic enterprise.
What I think could be happening is that the wokes are becoming the establishment and reacting against the new counter- cultural conservatism which is questioning their assumptions and prejudices. Like most establishments the wokes have become angrily reactionary. Ironic?
Well you can’t blame the young for having no faith in governments given their track record across the west since 1989. And it seems to me that both young and old are turning into ‘progressive authoritarians’, with particular reference to the new hate speech laws in Scotland. The future does not look bright.
Its fine for whatever generation to want ever more and more form Government but as always they never want to talk about how we are going to pay for it. Guaranteed income, higher basic wage, improved health care are all well and good, but almost every country is already heavily indebted paying for what we already have. If you want more you are going to have to pay more taxes but any politician who says he/she will raise taxes will never get elected. So all of us who want more services are the same people who wont vote to pay for them.
UBI is affordable if we abolish all benefits and restrict government to the essentials e.g. defence, law & order, the NHS etc. True, we would still have to raise taxes but the net effect would be to cost only the richest.
E.g 50% tax would lead to a government budget of c. £1 Trillion. Minus the essentials of c. £400 Billion that would leave £600B to be divided by c. 35M British born and resident citizens aged 18-65 which = c. £17k UBI/annum 🙂
Obviously UBI would have to start lower, e.g. the UC rate of £5k/yr and then go up if affordable and I admit the essential budget of £400B is a bit of a lower end guesstimate!
And the quid pro quo for (big) business might have to be an abolition of red tape and costs e.g. minimum wage but this might actually lead to greater productivity (and employment as all those stuck in the benefits trap would now have an incentive to seek employment).
Why the photo with Greta?