Tell Me Something............Anything!

[struth]

we need young migrants as we dont have enough young folk to foot the pension bills, or do the many relatively low skilled jobs plus many of the high skilled ones. the ways its going you'll soon work til you drop and your pension will bury you(if your lucky)..

[Macca]

we need young migrants as we dont have enough young folk to foot the pension bills, or do the many relatively low skilled jobs plus many of the high skilled ones. the ways its going you'll soon work til you drop and your pension will bury you(if your lucky)..

don't really buy that since we already had a surplus of unskilled workers amongst the indigenous personnel going back to at least the late 70s. The problem was that for those with children getting an unskilled job meant they were worse off than on benefits.

Bringing in millions of unskilled labour from abroad prevented wages rising for unskilled workers, which is the only other possible outcome when there is a labour shortage.

The problem is when all those imported unskilled workers start having children and discover that, since unskilled wages are still too low, that they are better off on benefits. This is why the welfare bill is now a third of government spending.

Flips side to all that is if you don't increase the unskilled labour pool, unskilled wages rise and the cost of everything rises as a result. Personally I think that the lesser of the two evils. Like most things there's no simple solution, there's probably not even a complex solution.

[struth]

was talking about now...

[struth]

thats my cupboards, fridge and freezer full. all set for letting the world pass me by. was nice to get out tho and made me feel a lot better. trying to get the shopping into house from car was fun-not... got a nice bit of pork loin salt aged to roast for xmas.

[walpurgis]

I finished stocking up for the xmas break a week ago. I'll be OK until second week of Jan.

[Mikeandvan]

don't really buy that since we already had a surplus of unskilled workers amongst the indigenous personnel going back to at least the late 70s. The problem was that for those with children getting an unskilled job meant they were worse off than on benefits.

Bringing in millions of unskilled labour from abroad prevented wages rising for unskilled workers, which is the only other possible outcome when there is a labour shortage.

The problem is when all those imported unskilled workers start having children and discover that, since unskilled wages are still too low, that they are better off on benefits. This is why the welfare bill is now a third of government spending.

Flips side to all that is if you don't increase the unskilled labour pool, unskilled wages rise and the cost of everything rises as a result. Personally I think that the lesser of the two evils. Like most things there's no simple solution, there's probably not even a complex solution.

The wage inflation theory is the biggest capitalist con trick out there. So unions fighting for their members interests are the one's 'responsible' for inflation, this is just the scenario we have right now with the biggest wave of strikes since the 70s. Wage rises/bonuses ok for me, but not for thee!

[Mikeandvan]

I don't think there's any chance of those right wing parties ever getting full control but as you say people are rightly concerned about economic migration so some will vote for them and that does mean they have an influence on policy. If it wasn't for UKIP splitting the tory vote we would never have had the referendum on EU membership. And UKIP would never have got anywhere if it wasn't for the 'come one come all' immigration policy of the early 2000s.

Now they just come in illegally and get to stay anyway so not sure what that solved but hey ho it's a problem for the younger generation now.

The public debate over immigration is messed up, neither side want to admit their own contradictions. On the pro side all immigrants/boat people are refugees, even though the evidence overwhelmingly points to the fact that many are obviously economic migrants, like the Albanians for instance, and also many of the Africans. On the other side, post Brexit we actually need immigrants to fill the gap left by European workers - so why not fill it with those who need it most? I think genuine refugees should be allowed to work as well from day one, at least they'll pay their way. partly anyway. On the other hand I don't think we or any European nation are under any obligation to take in countless numbers of refugees from the Middle East/Africa, we may be party to UN refugee laws, but on a moral basis, why? The UK is densely populated enough as it is, housing is at an absolute peak capacity in the South and many cities anyway. What the Middle East and Africa need is democracy, countries like Iran, many of their own people hate the government, no wonder they want out of there.

[Mikeandvan]

Talking about the far right in Europe, you've also got Putin openly flirting with ultra-Nationalist ideology. Such as his reclaiming of the Russian Fascist Ivan Ilyin, who was extradited by the Bolseviks, only for his corpse to be returned to Russia in 2008 by Putin, who gave him a ceremonial reburial in his homeland. Putin openly associates with Fascists such as Dugin and quite a few others, the national conversation over in Russia is hyper Nationalistic if RT is anything to go by. This is why I'm shit scared of WW3 starting with Ukraine, I kind of wish the US and Nato states would stop getting involved.

[walpurgis]

I'm shit scared of WW3 starting with Ukraine, I kind of wish the US and Nato states would stop getting involved.

Anything is possible, but with China on Putin's doorstep it's probably unlikely. Without trade with the west China would go broke so they'd possibly support NATO if there were hostilities even if they don't like us. And if Russia were weakened by retaliatory nuclear strikes from the west, they might be vulnerable to a Chinese invasion of their eastern states.

[walpurgis]

Telly in my den won't switch on this morning. Done the usual checks, but no joy. Looks like I'm off to Curry's today.