Abstra Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 The employment minister has just been interviewed on News 24. The last quarter figures reveal an extra 210,000 claimants. At that rate we are in trouble. The employment minister was singing the praises of Job Center plus. I've been thier, it takes so long to make a claim now and if you make a mistake on any of the paperwork it is all delayed. It really is a game and its humilliating. Then there's the Housing Benefit Claim, 30 pages long covering all your financial dealings going back years requiring information only an accountant would know. At lot is being made of the economic turnaround expected at some stage, talk about spin. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Converted Lurker Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 a million extra a year, for a 3 year period, is my best guess. One in four unemployed/on benefits/economically inactive by 2012. Then (too late) the govt of the day will wake up to the fact that they should have introduced a huge public works programme and paid folk a reasonable wage to get involved; for example building the finest rail network on the planet... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1929crash Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 a million extra a year, for a 3 year period, is my best guess. One in four unemployed/on benefits/economically inactive by 2012. Then (too late) the govt of the day will wake up to the fact that they should have introduced a huge public works programme and paid folk a reasonable wage to get involved; for example building the finest rail network on the planet... Or the finest sporting white elephant east of the East End. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sinking Feeling Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 Only if they can get enough people on sickness benefit to keep the unemploymemnt figures down! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quad Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 They should consider bringing back work houses. Give people an extra few quid on top of there dole, if they go and work in factories producing similar or same items that the country currently imports. from china etc. Already seeing empty idustrial units near by, which could be used. just stick a few bits of machinery in them and, switch them on. Has to be better than millions of people sitting around idle, for years. Increasing the country's manufacturing base, will in the long run, be a better way, of dealing with mass unemployment. And paying back debt that is currently being run up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest sillybear2 Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 (edited) a million extra a year, for a 3 year period, is my best guess. One in four unemployed/on benefits/economically inactive by 2012. Then (too late) the govt of the day will wake up to the fact that they should have introduced a huge public works programme and paid folk a reasonable wage to get involved; for example building the finest rail network on the planet... Yet they talk of "green shoots", what a kick in the teeth for the newly unemployed, the government are totally in denial about what's happening around them. They cannot ******** and spin their way out of this one. Edited February 21, 2009 by sillybear2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Converted Lurker Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 Yet they talk of "green shoot", what a kick in the teeth for the newly unemployed, the government are totally in denial about what's happening around them. They cannot ******** and spin their way out of this one. Nu Lab will become obsessive and one dimensional about brushing the figures under the carpet/pushing the problem out into the future and not addressing the real problems. The one good aspect of that Digby Jones volte aface on C4 during the week was his expose on the state of Job Centres and the amount of real jobs in the economy. He whittled the jobs down from 500K to 200K in seconds without re-categorising them further and with half of post grads about to join the unemployment Qs there's 300K 'fill' there. Schemes will be invented and laws v. quickly passed to keep kids at school until 18 (with grants and tuition fees whittled down). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Converted Lurker Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 They should consider bringing back work houses. Give people an extra few quid on top of there dole, if they go and work in factories producing similar or same items that the country currently imports. from china etc. Already seeing empty idustrial units near by, which could be used. just stick a few bits of machinery in them and, switch them on. Has to be better than millions of people sitting around idle, for years. Increasing the country's manufacturing base, will in the long run, be a better way, of dealing with mass unemployment. And paying back debt that is currently being run up. Bravo, you're a genius, please post more...no really.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
1929crash Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 They should consider bringing back work houses. Give people an extra few quid on top of there dole, if they go and work in factories producing similar or same items that the country currently imports. from china etc. Already seeing empty idustrial units near by, which could be used. just stick a few bits of machinery in them and, switch them on. Has to be better than millions of people sitting around idle, for years. Increasing the country's manufacturing base, will in the long run, be a better way, of dealing with mass unemployment. And paying back debt that is currently being run up. Well, they did have these, in a modern humane form, for disabled people. The company was/is called Remploy, but NuLab's been busy with its hatchet these last few years. :angry: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aa3 Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 Continuing with my money transmission theory... if 'the masses' don't get money into their hands I think unemployment will just grind higher and higher continually. Look at cars, we have thousands of people who want to make cars, we have thousands of steel workers who want to make the steel for the cars. And we have millions of people who want a new car. But those potential customers dont' have enough money to buy a new car! Unions hammered down, jobs outsourced, jobs automated has meant there is many more workers t han jobs. Whcih means wages continually fall. Which means people have less money to buy things. It is a vicious cycle. There are different ways of tackling the problem. But we will know it is being tackled when demand for labour starts exceeding supply and compensation(through wages or contractor income or whatever) starts rising. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
InternationalRockSuperstar Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 Are We Looking At 3 Million Year End., Unemployment like it isn't >3m already. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wonderpup Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 Give people an extra few quid on top of there dole, if they go and work in factories producing similar or same items that the country currently imports. from china etc. It's not quite that simple- very often when people claim one benefit, they are also eligable to claim others, like housing benefit- the system is designed in such a way that to move from the dole into work will activate a trap in which you lose access to other needed support- so your sweatshops would have to pay high enough to compensate people for the loss of the other help as well; ie- a decent living wage, otherwise they would be unable to take the jobs on offer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BXLONDONMAN Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 It's not quite that simple- very often when people claim one benefit, they are also eligable to claim others, like housing benefit- the system is designed in such a way that to move from the dole into work will activate a trap in which you lose access to other needed support- so your sweatshops would have to pay high enough to compensate people for the loss of the other help as well; ie- a decent living wage, otherwise they would be unable to take the jobs on offer. why don't we have a vote to see if we want to stop all benfit's to the unemployed...how many people would want to do that..i would like a opt out, i would give up all my rights to any benefit's if i could pay max 10% tax on income or profits no upper limits i think many would love this opt out.lets have true free markets,no safety net only for the old or sick etc..anybody who doesn't want the opt out could share their income tax with the out of work...and pay income tax at 80% or more !!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
the primitive Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 why don't we have a vote to see if we want to stop all benfit's to the unemployed...how many people would want to do that..i would like a opt out, i would give up all my rights to any benefit's if i could pay max 10% tax on income or profits no upper limits i think many would love this opt out.lets have true free markets,no safety net only for the old or sick etc..anybody who doesn't want the opt out could share their income tax with the out of work...and pay income tax at 80% or more !!! Well it's a point of view... Benefit system is far from perfect, but your system is a tad harsh I would say. In previous recessions/depressions. people have taken menial jobs (x2 or 3) to make ends vaguely meet. It was grim, it was hard, but it was doable. This time, there ain't enough hours in the day to make the minimum wage pay the mortgage on a slavebox, so we're utterly fecked. How many people had mortgages in 1930s America? Not many...they could at least survive, albeit with a shitty life and little money, but most weren't in massive unpayable DEBT. It's like mankind needs to CTRL-ALT-Delete Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dr ray Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 The employment minister has just been interviewed on News 24. The last quarter figures reveal an extra 210,000 claimants. At that rate we are in trouble. The employment minister was singing the praises of Job Center plus. I've been thier, it takes so long to make a claim now and if you make a mistake on any of the paperwork it is all delayed. It really is a game and its humilliating. Then there's the Housing Benefit Claim, 30 pages long covering all your financial dealings going back years requiring information only an accountant would know.At lot is being made of the economic turnaround expected at some stage, talk about spin. "More people in work" was another of Gordon Browns famous boasts (along with abolishing boom and bust, a strong currency, reduced public sector borrowing, an independant BoE, profitable financial sector and rising GDP). I suppose he could still boast about our low inflation rate but doesn't seem keen to at the moment Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
billfunk Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 why don't we have a vote to see if we want to stop all benfit's to the unemployed...how many people would want to do that..i would like a opt out, i would give up all my rights to any benefit's if i could pay max 10% tax on income or profits no upper limits i think many would love this opt out.lets have true free markets,no safety net only for the old or sick etc..anybody who doesn't want the opt out could share their income tax with the out of work...and pay income tax at 80% or more !!! Imprisonment is far more expensive than unemployment benefits. Better they receive free housing etc and £60 a week to pay for sky, beer, smokes than risk them becoming organised criminals. A few benefits here, petty drug dealing there, small time anti-social behaviour here, petty theft there is cheaper than armed robbery and 5 years imprisonment. OK not every unemployment claiment is a criminal lying in wait but the government thinks a lot of them are. Benefits are just there to placate them into not committing crimes leading to their imprisonment. You pull the benefits then the cost of prisons goes up. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CarbonBasedLifeform Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 Bravo, you're a genius, please post more...no really.... +1 what a c@ck obviously a banker. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saberu Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 They should consider bringing back work houses. Give people an extra few quid on top of there dole, if they go and work in factories producing similar or same items that the country currently imports. from china etc. Already seeing empty idustrial units near by, which could be used. just stick a few bits of machinery in them and, switch them on. Has to be better than millions of people sitting around idle, for years. Increasing the country's manufacturing base, will in the long run, be a better way, of dealing with mass unemployment. And paying back debt that is currently being run up. Ofcourse that is the solution becuase between 30-50% of the cost price of many manufacutered goods is simply the international shipping cost. However before it becomes affordable to employ people economically in manufacturing in this country we need to have affordable housing for everyone- something certain vested interests like the super rich don't want to happen. The super rich rule this country so take pride in making working class people eat ****. Everyone says how unethical China is..well at least their rich people work on business models that give jobs to their population as opposed to grand financial bubble schemes designed to rid the poor of the little wealth they have left whilst making the rich even richer through the power of leverage and no real, honest oversight from the FSA. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
the primitive Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 Ofcourse that is the solution becuase between 30-50% of the cost price of many manufacutered goods is simply the international shipping cost. Not at the moment it;s not - shipping costs have plummeted to fuel+labour. Theres some threads on it somewhere. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Abstra Posted February 21, 2009 Author Share Posted February 21, 2009 a million extra a year, for a 3 year period, is my best guess. One in four unemployed/on benefits/economically inactive by 2012. Then (too late) the govt of the day will wake up to the fact that they should have introduced a huge public works programme and paid folk a reasonable wage to get involved; for example building the finest rail network on the planet... At that point our oil and gas are gone. Poverty will run city's. The Police will be overwelmed and will simply be firefighters. The government will still have faith in globalisation and not in co-opertion. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wonderpup Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 lets have true free markets,no safety net only for the old or sick etc..anybody In a true free market everything you own would be taken from you by force- your ability to hold whatever wealth you have is dependant on the existance of rules that protect your right to hold it, and backed up by the police and legal system- so you yourself operate with a 'safety net' of rights and protections. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
quinnbear Posted February 21, 2009 Share Posted February 21, 2009 I was talking to the wife about unemployment and why it is so grim for the economy (never mind for the poor sods who end up chucked out a job). Obviously benefits are complex, but even taking £60 per week job seeker's allowance, together with a loss of income tax (if a worker is on the 'average' salary of £25K they will pay about £6,000 in tax and NI etc, this comes to about £120 per week). This means the government loses £120 per week and has to pay out £60 quid JSA instead. Multiplied by 1,000,000 people for a year is about £9bn. That's a lot of money, or it used to be, in the days when government borrowing was measured in tens of billions of pounds. I suppose nowadays it would get lost in amongst the trillions of government liabilities (a bit like me losing a pound down the back of sofa ) QB Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Converted Lurker Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 I was talking to the wife about unemployment and why it is so grim for the economy (never mind for the poor sods who end up chucked out a job).Obviously benefits are complex, but even taking £60 per week job seeker's allowance, together with a loss of income tax (if a worker is on the 'average' salary of £25K they will pay about £6,000 in tax and NI etc, this comes to about £120 per week). This means the government loses £120 per week and has to pay out £60 quid JSA instead. Multiplied by 1,000,000 people for a year is about £9bn. That's a lot of money, or it used to be, in the days when government borrowing was measured in tens of billions of pounds. I suppose nowadays it would get lost in amongst the trillions of government liabilities (a bit like me losing a pound down the back of sofa ) QB it's far worse than that, families with perhaps 2 kids will get mortgage paid after 11-13 weeks, a bump in tax credits wotsits and no community charge bill. Let's say the average cost of the JSA + those extras is £1,500 a month net, spread across an extra 2 mil unemployed (over the next 2 years) that's a lot of wonga to find each month, £1,500 x 2,000,000....sorry, meant to say to print. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saberu Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 In a true free market everything you own would be taken from you by force- your ability to hold whatever wealth you have is dependant on the existance of rules that protect your right to hold it, and backed up by the police and legal system- so you yourself operate with a 'safety net' of rights and protections. There is more to it than that, there needs to be a much stronger 'safety net' than the current lax rules we have at the moment as clearly all these clever financial instruments that use leverage make the rich 10x richer overnight without lifting a finger. Imagine if you could buy derivative contracts in your job for example, that meant for every £1,000 you earned each month, you can now earn £100,000 providing you don't mess up on your job performance. That's essentially what has happened. Someone, somewhere has been given the right to leverage huge amounts of money as credit then use a meagre return like 5 or 10% to become 500 or 1000% return on investment. This is probably why cheap credit exists in the first place, it's all been engineered to help the rich. Now that the bubble is over in housing they will just find a new market to turn into a bubble and leverage on credit. God knows there are enough problems in the world without this financial mess, for example the mass monopolisation of most markets, even ISP's are merging at an incredible rate and they were once one of the most competitive industries. Society today is no longer about working hard for a good buck, it's about getting insider information and being able to climb the ladder of everyone screwing eachother over. If you manage to stop being a wage slave you probably move up one rung on the ladder from the bottom to second from the bottom. Above that rung you have the investors dealing in derivatives, above that you have the large monopoly companies, above that is the government then above the government are the central banks and therefore the banking families in power of them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarkG Posted February 22, 2009 Share Posted February 22, 2009 Imprisonment is far more expensive than unemployment benefits. Bunk-beds and barbed wire are cheap. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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