Brexit What Happens Next Thread ---multiple merged threads.

[spyguy]

19 hours ago, pig said:

Well ditto - Spanish and French in my case.

The most interesting however are English friends (who left to live abroad before 2016) who can't understand what is going on here. 

Its almost as if they are plugged into a different reality looking in on us in wonder. The interesting discussion I had a few weeks ago was around the idea that the governments are 'setting the tone' and that the internet isn't quite as powerful as is sometimes made out.

Which is funny because it seems as if our government appears to be waiting to hear what the internet says and then making decisions, by which time its of course too late...

Many things.

Theres a huge number of middle class Brits who someone how think speaking a second language suddenly makes you a genius and sophisticated,.

I spend a massive amount of time trying to explain stuff like vaccines to women who ought to know better.

Theres a pretty think, neolithic band of Marxism that runs deep in Spain and Italy.

Politically, Italy, then Spain and now France has fallen apart. Theres no mainstream left or right any more, just a bunch of loons having Buggins turn.

 

[IMHAL]

6 minutes ago, rollover said:

The UK saw a fall of more than 100% in new foreign direct investment last year from $45bn in 2019 down to -$1.3bn.

BBC

And the evidence just keeps on piling up....

[debtlessmanc]

20 minutes ago, rollover said:

The UK saw a fall of more than 100% in new foreign direct investment last year from $45bn in 2019 down to -$1.3bn.

BBC

Read the report,

https://unctad.org/news/global-foreign-direct-investment-falls-49-first-half-2020

europe as whole saw a decline of more than 100%, the U.K. was actually slightly less affected than the average.

 

[NobodyInParticular]

10 hours ago, kzb said:

Going back to TTIP, MEPs were allowed 15 minutes in a room to look at it, all phones etc taken off them before they went in.

I recall something similar happened just recently with something else, but can't think what it was just now.

Indeed. I thought that was appalling. 

[NobodyInParticular]

11 hours ago, kzb said:

Link?

From the EU's website (30 seconds of googling) 

"

Recovery plan for Europe

[...]

The EU long-term budget will continue to be financed through the well-known revenue sources of the EU budget:

• customs duties
• contributions from the Member States based on value added tax (VAT)
• contributions based on gross national income (GNI)" 

 

Quote

I don't think it is done and dusted.  If so, great, please give us some links to look at.

When we last discussed it on here, many contributors seemed to think €750 billion could just appear, unfunded by any higher contributions.  So if contributions will in fact be higher (as I thought) please let us know.

 

Edited January 25, 2021 by NobodyInParticular

[Peter Hun]

1 hour ago, spyguy said:

Theres a huge number of middle class Brits who someone how think speaking a second language suddenly makes you a genius and sophisticated,.

No, thats what you think. Most people speak different languages so that they communicate with people who don't speak English. 

[debtlessmanc]

7 minutes ago, Peter Hun said:

No, thats what you think. Most people speak different languages so that they communicate with people who don't speak English. 

Tbh i lived in France and learnt french for the experience and it taught me more about how languages work than i could have ever learnt without doing it. I moved back to the UK and have barely used French since (its not a very useful language globally, spanish is more useful). If i had not been curious about languages in themselves, i would probably stuck with anglophone countries and not bothered like most Brits.

[pig]

1 hour ago, debtlessmanc said:

Tbh i lived in France and learnt french for the experience and it taught me more about how languages work than i could have ever learnt without doing it. I moved back to the UK and have barely used French since (its not a very useful language globally, spanish is more useful). If i had not been curious about languages in themselves, i would probably stuck with anglophone countries and not bothered like most Brits.

I once met a taxi driver who had literally never left the island he was born on  - I would guess he was in his 60s. I thought it extraordinary at the time and such a shame, but later I thought it possible even if not desirable to make a rewarding life within those limits.

[pig]

3 hours ago, spyguy said:

Many things.

Theres a huge number of middle class Brits who someone how think speaking a second language suddenly makes you a genius and sophisticated,.

I spend a massive amount of time trying to explain stuff like vaccines to women who ought to know better.

Theres a pretty think, neolithic band of Marxism that runs deep in Spain and Italy.

Politically, Italy, then Spain and now France has fallen apart. Theres no mainstream left or right any more, just a bunch of loons having Buggins turn.

 

Kind of other way round for me - a lot of middle-class brits with language skills guilt lol.

All countries have their individual problems - Spain for example still with the post Franco legacy - but common theme the last decade has been the post credit crunch blues.

[spyguy]

6 minutes ago, pig said:

Kind of other way round for me - a lot of middle-class brits with language skills guilt lol.

All countries have their individual problems - Spain for example still with the post Franco legacy - but common theme the last decade has been the post credit crunch blues.

I cant remember the last person Ive met in Spain who was earning more than E1k/m on a short earn contract.

Its chronic.

 

[spyguy]

1 hour ago, debtlessmanc said:

Tbh i lived in France and learnt french for the experience and it taught me more about how languages work than i could have ever learnt without doing it. I moved back to the UK and have barely used French since (its not a very useful language globally, spanish is more useful). If i had not been curious about languages in themselves, i would probably stuck with anglophone countries and not bothered like most Brits.

If you are British , working in the private sector then your choice of learning a language are:

- German, which is the only large successful European economy. However ... get your foot in the door is very hard work.

- Spanish - useful outside of Europe. Not that useful in Europe as Spain's economy has been shedding jobs for ~13 years.

And thats its.

I started to learn German but gave it up as it became  obvious Id never move there.

Mrs speaks Italian + French bilingually. And English and Spanish as 2nd language, which her Dad spent several E10K on her learning.

She can speak German too, well, Swiss German but pretty much refuses to speak it.

 

 

 

[spyguy]

My BIL lives in Spain, well, Catalonia.

All his friends + family refuse to speak Spanish - Catalan or English only.

Ive had similar in Belgium, where the differrent language tribes refuse to speak to each other in anything but English, the great Lingua-SrewYou of Eruope.

 

[debtlessmanc]

9 minutes ago, spyguy said:

She can speak German too, well, Swiss German but pretty much refuses to speak it.

 

Not even to her horse?

[pig]

3 minutes ago, spyguy said:

My BIL lives in Spain, well, Catalonia.

All his friends + family refuse to speak Spanish - Catalan or English only.

Ive had similar in Belgium, where the differrent language tribes refuse to speak to each other in anything but English, the great Lingua-SrewYou of Eruope.

 

Yeah - when I'm in polite Englishman abroad mode (and you can add Basques to Catalonians )common argument presented to me is 'like Northern Ireland' or 'like Scotland'.

[kzb]

2 hours ago, NobodyInParticular said:

From the EU's website (30 seconds of googling) 

"

Recovery plan for Europe

[...]

The EU long-term budget will continue to be financed through the well-known revenue sources of the EU budget:

• customs duties
• contributions from the Member States based on value added tax (VAT)
• contributions based on gross national income (GNI)" 

 

 

Recall we were discussing the EU Recovery Plan specifically i.e. not the long term budget.

If you scroll down a bit further on your site you found, which I think must be the same one that I linked to upthread, you will see listed all the exciting new taxes proposed to pay for the borrowing.

https://ec.europa.eu/info/strategy/recovery-plan-europe_en

There are several new taxes, one of which is the financial transaction tax.  The only reason I picked on that one specifically is because we were thinking that financial institutions would up sticks and move to Paris or whatever.  

 

[skinnylattej]

2 hours ago, debtlessmanc said:

Tbh i lived in France and learnt french for the experience and it taught me more about how languages work than i could have ever learnt without doing it. I moved back to the UK and have barely used French since (its not a very useful language globally, spanish is more useful). If i had not been curious about languages in themselves, i would probably stuck with anglophone countries and not bothered like most Brits.

I agree with Debtless, I had two fabulous years working in the mezzogiorno of Italy.  Great people, learnt Italian, and thus a lot about other Romantic languages.  Later it was the base for learning Spanish as my commercial interests changed.

Living in Italy was fabulous, just keep clear of the Camorra.

[dugsbody]

1 hour ago, kzb said:

Recall we were discussing the EU Recovery Plan specifically i.e. not the long term budget.

If you scroll down a bit further on your site you found, which I think must be the same one that I linked to upthread, you will see listed all the exciting new taxes proposed to pay for the borrowing.

https://ec.europa.eu/info/strategy/recovery-plan-europe_en

There are several new taxes, one of which is the financial transaction tax.  The only reason I picked on that one specifically is because we were thinking that financial institutions would up sticks and move to Paris or whatever.  

 

Is that like the new wealth tax in the UK? It's a shame that we'll have to start paying taxes on our wealth here.

[NobodyInParticular]

1 hour ago, spyguy said:

If you are British , working in the private sector then your choice of learning a language are:

- German, which is the only large successful European economy. However ... get your foot in the door is very hard work.

Eh? French GDP is very similar to that of the UK. Why is France not successful by your reckoning? And what counts as large? 

My French and German is rusty, but I can get by. I can more-or-less read a Dutch newspaper by pretending it's German. Latin... Not so useful after all. 

My wife understands spoken German but can't speak or read it. 

Plenty of my friends and family can speak additional languages due to parentage or living in Europe, from Norwegian to Polish. Even French. 

1 hour ago, spyguy said:

 

 

 

[NobodyInParticular]

1 hour ago, kzb said:

Recall we were discussing the EU Recovery Plan specifically i.e. not the long term budget.

If you scroll down a bit further on your site you found, which I think must be the same one that I linked to upthread, you will see listed all the exciting new taxes proposed to pay for the borrowing.

https://ec.europa.eu/info/strategy/recovery-plan-europe_en

There are several new taxes, one of which is the financial transaction tax.  The only reason I picked on that one specifically is because we were thinking that financial institutions would up sticks and move to Paris or whatever.  

 

Yes, you are right. It's one of the elements, of many, being considered to repay the borrowing element. I stand corrected. 

However, it's one of a series of revenue sources, and it doesn't mean it will be implemented. However, I suspect it will be, as it was discussed previously, as a means to control things like high frequency trading, which were raising concern in the wake of the financial crash, and which the UK paid some lip service to, but also impeded. 

[kzb]

35 minutes ago, dugsbody said:

Is that like the new wealth tax in the UK? It's a shame that we'll have to start paying taxes on our wealth here.

Is there going to be a wealth tax here?  This is supposedly a Tory government remember.

The FTT is nothing like a wealth tax.  Well OK, I suppose costs would be passed onto shareholders, which would negatively impact pension funds and private shareholders.  But it isn't imposed directly on wealthy individuals, it is a small percentage tax on financial transactions undertaken by financial institutions.

In France for example, every time they buy or sell shares there is 0.3% tax to pay.

It's really only a good idea if it is global.  It would have to be the same the world over.

 

[kzb]

 

26 minutes ago, NobodyInParticular said:

Yes, you are right. It's one of the elements, of many, being considered to repay the borrowing element. I stand corrected. 

However, it's one of a series of revenue sources, and it doesn't mean it will be implemented. However, I suspect it will be, as it was discussed previously, as a means to control things like high frequency trading, which were raising concern in the wake of the financial crash, and which the UK paid some lip service to, but also impeded. 

Are you seeing this IMHAL and Freki ???  I am right.  Just remember this moment.

Anyhow thanks for saying that, not many on here can admit they were wrong.

It's tied on those new taxes are coming.  They have the €750bn recovery fund to finance somehow, the routine 7-year budget has been increased (€1,074bn) and the UK is no longer a large net contributor.

We've seen that France already has a transaction tax and they will want that harmonised across the EU ("level playing field").

Re-reading that site I noticed the €0.80 per kg non-recyclable plastic tax.  I'm sure it means well but that is going to be a lot to pay.  Also the EU then has an incentive not to increase recycling capability, or they will lose revenue !

[zugzwang]

10 minutes ago, kzb said:

Is there going to be a wealth tax here?  This is supposedly a Tory government remember.

The FTT is nothing like a wealth tax.  Well OK, I suppose costs would be passed onto shareholders, which would negatively impact pension funds and private shareholders.  But it isn't imposed directly on wealthy individuals, it is a small percentage tax on financial transactions undertaken by financial institutions.

In France for example, every time they buy or sell shares there is 0.3% tax to pay.

It's really only a good idea if it is global.  It would have to be the same the world over.

 

A regional  FTT is entirely feasible. Globally, the move towards centralised trading systems means that fewer and fewer trades can be hidden. The cost to any individual financial institution would be modest, significantly lower than the expense and risk of offshoring.

[kzb]

3 minutes ago, zugzwang said:

A regional  FTT is entirely feasible. Globally, the move towards centralised trading systems means that fewer and fewer trades can be hidden. The cost to any individual financial institution would be modest, significantly lower than the expense and risk of offshoring.

In Sweden it was termed a catastrophe.

All I am saying is that it is hardly an incentive to move your financial institute into a FTT region, when non-FTT regions are available.  We'll have to see how it goes.   Next thing you know they will be demanding the UK imposes a FTT, shadowing the EU tax rate, because of the level playing field.

[debtlessmanc]

2 hours ago, pig said:

I once met a taxi driver who had literally never left the island he was born on  - I would guess he was in his 60s. I thought it extraordinary at the time and such a shame, but later I thought it possible even if not desirable to make a rewarding life within those limits.

I helped organise a conference in Christchurch, quite a long time ago now. two stories

Got talking to an English guy working at the university of canterbury. He told me he was looking for a permanent job and had worked up to then in Canada the US and Oz. I said i had postdoc'd in France, he replied "never been to the continent, whats it like?"

2nd at conference reception, i was angling after a sabbatical out there, spoke to a prof from christchurch. he said

"take my advice, dont got to france, they refuse to speak english to you"

i protested pointing out that they were a proud nation that treasured their heritage, his reply "whats the point, everyone is going to speak english and they might as well just get on in teach it in french schools as standard"!!

Think brits are bad!?

There is anther interesting anglo/continental story about the behaviour of a french prof at the conference, but i'll leave that.

[zugzwang]

1 minute ago, kzb said:

In Sweden it was termed a catastrophe.

All I am saying is that it is hardly an incentive to move your financial institute into a FTT region, when non-FTT regions are available.  We'll have to see how it goes.   Next thing you know they will be demanding the UK imposes a FTT, shadowing the EU tax rate, because of the level playing field.

Unless they're given equivalence UK banksters will have to relocate or go out of business.