Bob8

I have been lurking without posting for the last several years. Really, literally years. I just broke that in order to call you out for thinking that addind a stupid smiley makes you the winner. You made a stupid remark. Apologise and move on. And question what you are doing with life.

Thanks, I read that and it is really good. Sorry it took me five years to get round to it.

I am from a former mining town, yet had not heard that this ever happened until I moved to the South. There, I heard it was common.

London often seems to be forgotten when in comes to major infatstructure investments and large one-off injections of cash, so it is nice that it has been remembered for once.

True. Low wages also discourage investments in technology, efficiency and worker training. The reason many continental workers is more efficient is more has to be squeezed out of them, in the UK there is a determination to avoid anything so dangerously long term.

Disappointing!

I moved to Denmark and had a similar increase in income. Cost of living is higher, rent is comparable (but better quality). It is not too good to be true. Send me a pm.

IT serves most of the fraudsters right. I remember being seriously and visibly poor in England and every time I visited a dentist they would explain I urgently need to spend hundreds on treatment. When I visited a dentist whom I knew personally, I was complemented on how well I kept my teeth. I am normally an honest man, but managed to avoid paying the shysters a penny.

Indeed, the relative success of China in comparison with India, from what would seem to be lower educational base would confirm what you say and suggest a more controlled economy may be more suitable for a developing nation with a large labour base. Would you have any pictures to illustrate your point more fully?

Yes, but in Scandinavia.

I bought a train ticket in France recently and was charged for a youth ticket. I am 33. Amusingly, my 27 year old sister was charged full fare.

A low wage economy. It is cheaper to use three barely trained people rather than training up a couple of people. If wages were higher, then it would be necessary to invest more in getting more out of them.

Do you not think it a remarkable co-incidence that all the best happen to come from a handful of schools? They must shocked when they meet each other! The top scientists are from a variety of backgrounds, as it is not an easy choice, but one motivated by the possibility of a job when there is no chance of a cushsy number through contacts after graduation, which is why we also see an increase in the propportion of state school backgrounds when we get to PhD's. For managers, doctors, MP, we are clearly wasting people of better potential to go for the right school instead. This is not elitism but pig headed stupidity.

Sorry that so many of my generation seem so angry. I did find it annoying in England, that as an educated man with major qualifications, responsible job etc, I could not really afford a car or foreign holiday, whilst there were various news programmes claiming people like me were spend thrift and ruining the economy. However, there were many that had it far worse than these woes, which are really nothing of the sort. My impression is that the generation above, had a lot more optimism that things would get better. Now, people can be well qualified, hard working, but know their place is society is far more set. Clearly though, the standard of living is far higher. Indeed, what people at twenty take for granted is a world away from what I expected at twenty (twelve yeasr ago). However, there are plenty at twenty who have no hope of aspiration and think whatever they do will make no difference (and they are pretty much right).

Indeed. My own engineering company are looking to open up an office in the UK, purely to tap the large amount of highly skilled and cheap labour. Meanwhile, companies in the UK are complaining about there not being enough available labour (by which they mean, cheaper than they would pay their own kids for a summer job. TBF the original poster is not an example of this, but there is a good reason for the brain drain.