pppeter

Loading up on guns and booting people off land they've cultivated is rational, at least in the short term. If you've got an idea for a new system then that would be interesting, but avoiding direct answers whilst hinting that you have some well thought out insights isn't. Being someone who Hates The System doesn't make you interesting or your thoughts worthwhile, it just makes for pointless discussions that go nowhere. People will stop believing in drivel if you stop writing it!

Under what circumstances should someone other than huw be able to use the land that he is using if neither owns it? Who should define the term "using"?

5-star posting. Excellent point.

So how would you have the land distributed? Equally, according to lottery, according to skill, a land grab thingy like in that Tom Cruise film, most guns wins, just let the people do whatever they want wherever they want (ie. most guns wins), etc

I didn't read the rest because my eyes started to bleed from the volume of your caps lock shouting. I'll tell you this though, you're in a buyer's market and your house doesn't have the value it once had. The buyers obviously expect to be able to go somewhere else and buy somewhere with a good build quality and a granite worktop and you have to supply that market. Consider a map of a desert island, featuring lots of sea, sand, a few coconut trees and a big X with "here be treasure" written by it. What's the value of the map? Who knows, but if someone goes there and either finds or doesn't find treasure then the value will certainly fall. Now consider a similar map with 2 big Xs on it. What is the value of this one? If someone goes there and finds treasure under one of the Xs then the value will surely go up. You have a map with a single X and the treasure has been removed. If you want to add value to your map draw another X on it. In English, put a granite worktop in the kitchen and paint some magnolia on the walls if you want to get a sale you cheap ba5tard. You can't expect something for nothing you know!

Ok, not much of a tale but I thought I'd see how the houseprices.co.uk stats for the first 4 months of the year in my area compared with the first 4 months of last year now that all the data should be in. Kensington, L6 2007 Sales: 225 2008 Sales: 102 (55% down) 2007 Average Price: £99,253 2008 Average Price: £88,393 (11% down) According to Wikipedia my Kensington is "statistically one of the poorest areas of Liverpool and is considered one of the most deprived districts in the United Kingdom" so why not compare it to the richer, more famous Kensington for the same period?! After all, prices in London only ever go up! A search for "Kensington and Chelsea" got this: 2007 Sales: 1,243 2008 Sales: 574 (54% down, very similar) 2007 Average Price: £995,594 2008 Average Price: £1,207,603 (21% UP!!) So there you have it...London will not crash, it only ever goes up

What sort of freedom are you talking about here? There has to be some restriction on what we can do on land, firstly because all land is owned and secondly because one person's freedom impacts on another's. I'd be mightily peed off if I went to the park for a kickabout only to find that someone had opted out of the system and planted a vegetable patch there. Similarly, I'd be just as annoyed at paying the income I work so hard for to subsidise doleys as I would be if the garden I worked so hard for was taken over by someone to build a shack. If my small piece of land is protected then why should a large landowner not be protected similarly? If you include them then you're talking about the whole country. Perhaps if unproductive fertile land were under threat of being taken over by the unemployed then more of it would be farmed. But suppose a large landowner wants a nature reserve on their land. Should someone have the right to turn it into their own farmland just because they'd rather grow their own food than take the income from maintaining a nature reserve and turn it into food at a market?

Sounds like you're of the opinion that dole scrounging is justifiable on the grounds that the dole is compensation for the adverse consequences of upholding property rights whereas on that same thread you stated "what's wrong with not doing much work? As long as they don't get paid it should balance up just fine," which is my argument here.

It's worse than that. In Croydon (Chaviest Town in England 2008) they've actively asserted their right to make the place a dump. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7513416.stm

Yep. I appreciate the stuff about not being able to live off the land so effectively being forced to be part of the system but this new proposal doesn't make that any better or worse. Anyway, if you're too lazy to go out and collect litter then you're too lazy to plough a field. Assuming people don't lie on their CV, a programme like this would allow employers to distinguish between the work-shy and the industrious when they recieve job applications. I never lied on mine and I'd be shocked to find that such a practice goes on Just thinking about the options for living off the land freely...does a church have to pay council tax? Establish "Church of HPC", STR fund buys some farmland, ba-da-bing.

Not so. Under these proposals you can chose to work and have an income or not work and have no income. That's freedom, not slavery. Having to play football for Man U for £160k/week when your mum wants you to sign for Madrid. Now that's slavery.

I thought they were doing this to get rid of some dollars, not paying in Chinese money.

Thanks

Don't you need almost zero savings to qualify for benefits?

They may be poor, and they probably smell, but why kill half of them?

10) Wait for one's mother to die bear with me... 11) Become King ...it's always the last job to go in a downturn 12) Don't live in Nepal

There are a lot of 62-year-olds. What will this mean for equities in 3 years' time when they retire? When a pension fund is sold for an annuity then is there a net withdrawal from the stock market or do the annuity companies invest in stocks too? Just wondering if the sort of stock held in the last few years of a pension fund might not be the best thing to be invested in in 2011.

I like the tall one. Perhaps the other agents will raise their signs so theydon't get overshadowed, then eventually they'll all be 15ft in the air. Since these are on the pavement, can't the council take them away?

Tesco today, half price socks (50p/pair) and t-shirts (75p each).

A friend of mine sold in January but the process took a few months and it was squeaky bum time all the way with various mortgage offers coming and going. The girl he sold to didn't have a deposit so had to borrow from a cousin to prove to the bank that she could partly fund the purchase . Unfortunately the cousin would need the money back so, instead of gazundering, she offered in excess of the asking price on the condition that my friend handed the difference over on completion. Yes folks, using a LIAR LOAN during a credit contraction! So she's in instant negative equity and clearly has no savings, but once she fixes the roof the house will be habitable.

That doesn't make me want to open an account

This one? http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=JbtMLInQSLg

Shouldn't you be out shagging?

I remember Dianne Abbott talking about being pushed out of a banking-related parliamentary committee because she'd become too knowledgeable about the industry. Not sure of the details and can't find much on Google but the search did come up with this. Fill in the blanks for yourselves or read the article for $32: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=A...5d0b81317765bc5 Is she our very own Ron Paul?

After we lose* our jobs, what are the chances of maintaining an income in a recession? If you can turn up to an interview with polished shoes and a nice short (for the gents) haircut, can accept low wages because you paid off your mortgage instead of MEWing for a Cayenne, and don't consider any employment beneath you, then how bad will it get? *Apologies for not using the Official HPC Spelling of "loose"