adamUK

My vote is 2 as the baby boomer generation shuffle off thier mortal coil leaving a lot of housing empty.

From the beeb: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/6589301.stm Allegedly it's a test for Chinese students to get into university and british students doing maths catch up. Of course in the miracle economy where we all get increasingly rich selling houses to each other maths is not even relevant anymore...

That's exactly how Gordon wants it. He wants everyone to be beholden to the state where he takes nearly all your money and hand it back in tax credits for here, there and everywhere so ultimately he has control. It's socialism, simply. Keep the bourgeoisie and the proles in hock to the party. Remember, in the Nu-labour nanny state, big mother is watching you....

bwahhahahaaaaa! Funny.

Yes, if you pay a dividend then if you are below higher rate tax threshold then you will only pay corporation tax. If you are above then you will have to pay 25% on top of corporation tax which only comes due after you make your tax return.. so if you pay yourself £50,000 dividend after 5th April this year, you don't have to pay it until 2009 so you put it into your offset account, you are offsetting the £12,500 that should be sitting in the taxman's bank account cutting your own interest payments. So it can work. Alternatively you could take out a director's loan at good rates but there's certain limitations on this that I am unsure of... Adam.

What happens during the 'spring bounce' will be the key indicator. give it a month or 2...

Methinks a bit of sarcasm there... I plan on buying a stack of johnny-come-lately btl and at current rates I will be richer than Bill Gates himself in 25 years....

Yes... I totally agree and the only real way out of it would be for China to develop sufficient local demand (i.e. Chinese people buying a good proportion of Chinese goods) so that the exchange rate effects on the economy could be minimised before they drop the Yanks in the sh*t.

Just a thought... I thought all these dollar-denominated financial instruments were there purely to keep the yuan pegged to the dollar to keep Chinese goods cheap around te world. Surely if they invest in other things, the dollar crashes but the yuan leaps in comparison to virtually all other currencies thus potentially destabilising the world economy? With so much money at stake, China pretty can't do anything with it without heavily distorting the markets.. ??

Taper relief anyone?? If the assets are tied up as a company structure then they would be eligible for up to 75% taper relief on CGT????? Can anyone confirm this?

Yes, the cathode tubes in our office can be used with a dimmer. The council actually gave each household 3 energy-saving bulbs last year. Actually a good idea from the council!

No it isn't. My girlfriend is American (from Minneapolis) and it's a darn site cheaper living there than here. When she had a job over there her healthcare was paid by her employer, her salary was 30% higher than what she can earn here doing the same job (pharmacist), she paid less income tax. Most things with the exception of car insurance and (oddly) fresh fruit and veg from the supermarket are cheaper in the US.

If I was a creditor I would be furious. I hope he plans to buy all his parts from alternative suppliers. Otherwise it's going to be "cash up front" for everything. Adam.

Yes. My moneys on a static CPI at 2.9->3.0% but an increase in RPI to 4.6-4.7% Ad.

thoughtcrime is worse than physical crime with this lot who use '1984' as an instruction manual and not a novel. Bring on the face-mounted rat cages!

It will make zero difference in the same way the "Million March" against the iraq war made zero difference or when thousands of health workers marched on parliament against cuts in the NHS in November last year made zero difference or when more than 100 teachers marched against school closures in oldham recently which will also make zero difference. This government has nothing but contempt for the citizens of this country and will ignore all who are critical of it.

We will need to see what's published in the inflation quarterly report... due out soon.

It came from somebody in the city who cannot spell. Which city was this? Glasgow?

I think the point was that development of the products requries research and development. They are good products because someone (or rather a team of people) designed them to be good products and that requires design and engineering. When designing something to be manufactured you have to design with the manufacturing process in mind so they are not only a functional success but a commercial success also (they have to be competitive in the market place so have to be cheap to make as possible).

That's exactly my point. A portion of our economy must be able to manufacture things, how are we to build prototypes, develop and test new ideas if we can't make them ourselves. A case in point: I know of a small company that's come up with a really good idea for the design of steam traps (they remove condensate from steam vessels and piping), it's uk-based and the design is really simple but effective. If he couldn't make them in the UK then the idea would have never got off the ground. From looking at it, it's a world-beating product too.

You are leaning against an open door here mate..

I hope she and 300 editors get turfed out onto the jobs market so there's 299 people next to her chasing the same jobs with the same skill set in the same location and see how she likes it. Twit, with an 'a'. Losing your job is horrible, sickening.

Whilst I agree, the UK is benefitting from Dyson (for example) as they are doing better now than ever since he moved to Malaysia. He's employed more engineers in the UK to come up with more funky ideas and was struggling in the UK as the supply chain was crumbling around him. So the value of the Dyson product is more in the engineering than the actual manufacturing. That withstanding, many of the great ideas are not only good products but ingeniously made too and sadly that requires some knowledge of manufacturing processes which we will sadly lack in a few years. After all, there's no point designing a killer product if it can't be made cheaply.

It's probably less sinister than that... more like: "Nulabour know the words but not the tune..."

Therein lies the problem. There are people out there who are in that situation, unfortunately.