Are You Single And In A 14k A Year Job?...

[1929crash]

You can actually live on less than £1000 a year

tent £20

sleeping bag £20

1 tonne coal £100

300kg rice £250

3 pairs of sturdy shoes £100

some sturdy cloths £100

a big knife £5

hey lets add some luxury as we have some spare cash

low power second hand laptop £150

3g internet connection over a year £90

electric to power the laptop for 10h a day every day for a year £10

total: £845

gives you enough left over for 2 pints of own-brand tesco beer a day too!

What more could you all ask for!

You left out water.

[renterbob]

the public are too stupid to steal your wealth, it is only a few who have the power, motive and means.

in the case of inflation it is the government and bankers. we can have zero inflation tomorrow with a pen and a few pieces of paper to write a few laws on. and a match to burn the pieces of paper with VI laws on it.

Have you got a job yet?

If you have, you're a dumb azs.

Get back on the dole with all the sensible people.

Seriously!!!!

[renterbob]

this is v.true as the average car simple car probably costs 2.5k a year when you take fuel/insurance/tax/maintenance/depreciation into account or the equivalent of over £3k before tax. so getting rid of the car is like having a 3k increase in your wages.

Unless you use Londons tube and pass zone one every day and you're -3000 for not having a car.

Bus fares have gone up enormously, as my soon to be evicetd brother, wife and kids will testify to soon. I don't think they've used a bus for 20 years. How I'll love driving past in my little motor (2 litre, auto with all the luxuries actually) and waving to the mewed tozzpots!

[Chrysalis]

When I was in my last job on £7.40 an hour (£15k a year) I did struggle a lot, no entitlement to housing/council tax benefit and no tax credits. I lived in a bedsit and could barely pay my bills however I did have a credit card and loan to pay off from years before so without them it would have been a bit more comfortable. I think anything below 14k it certianly is extremely tough for a single person.

[cells]

You left out water.

water is free from nature, if not then I think it costs some 10p for a thousand gallons.

[Chrysalis]

I lived in a shared house when I was on that money - everyone else in the same situation did as well - it was just normal - single 18-20,21,22 each living in their own place seemed a little silly.

I quite enjoyed it in fact - so long as you get on with the people you are sharing with. I shared until I was 25, despite earning more than double that by then. It gave me a chance to save as my pay increased as the rent was only £325/month each.

If people 'pair off' then they get a place of their own, but then they're no longer single.

thats part of the problem, we assume people of that age are all either living with their parents or in shared accomodation with friends, but thats a bad assumption to make.

Also consider there is millions of much older people who work for that salary.

[cells]

thats part of the problem, we assume people of that age are all either living with their parents or in shared accomodation with friends, but thats a bad assumption to make.

Also consider there is millions of much older people who work for that salary.

£14kpa is plenty if the government didn't tax us so much. in reality the government is taxing the average person 50%. ie if we had no tax £14 would in reality be equivalent to £28k in "todays money"

couple that by removing VI laws such as planning "permission" so we can look after ourselfs and rents are halved. not bad at all.

but then the 20 stone mother of 7 from 9 different fathers in "her 800k council house" would be a bit fooked

the big business who get hundreds of millions from government to then subcontract for tens of millions pocketing the 100s of mil difference for nothing would be a bit fooked

the old lady getting on 95 going in to get "free" cancer treatment would be a bit fooked.

equity sex change equality mentors would be fooked.

ect ect

on the whole it would be a benefit though.

[silver surfer]

population has nothing to do with wealth as humans create their own wealth and don't need to steal it

One of the great ironies of economic history is that in 1798, just when Thomas Malthus completed An Essay On The Principles Of Population, the industrial revolution was starting to fundamentally change the realities of productivity and wealth creation. So just as he cracked the economic code of all previous centuries his theory was rendered obsolete.

Before the industrial revolution the annual increase in productivity was almost nil, fluctuating between 0.02% and 0.10% per year. People did not expect to be richer than their parents or grandparents, and for the great mass of the population the abundance of the harvest or the incidence of pestilence was what determined their quality of life. Indeed, the highest living standards for the common person in Britain between the building of Stonehenge and the Industrial Revolution was probably recorded shortly after the Black Death in the late 14th century, when between a third and a half of the population had died. Food was subsequently plentiful, land was cheap, and labour rates were high, it's grim but the plague boosted living standards like nothing else. So during the thousands of years of the Malthusian era Cells would have been wrong, humans really were pitted in a struggle of each against all.

But after the Industrial Revolution real productivity rates surged to about 2-3% per year. If you take a generation as being about 35 years then children could expect to be about twice as wealthy, in real terms, as their parents. Why was the industrial revolution so successful? Well no one really knows, some say it was rooted in the stability brought about by financial and social institutions. But my own view is a lot more basic, I think the Industrial Revolution was triggered when mankind began to effectively harness fossil fuels, so real energy costs progressively declined down to negligible proportions. To give one example, we think oil is expensive at about $130-140 a barrel. However I'd argue oil is laughably cheap. One barrel contains the energy equivelent of well over 20,000 hours of human labour, just think how much you'd want to paid to push your car one mile?

So for the last 200-250 years Cells has been right. But will he stay being right in the future?

Nobody knows, but there's been a worrying decline in real productivity rates over the last thirty to forty years. Many economists expected productivity rates to blossom as technological advances such as computers, mobile phones, and the internet fed into the economy. But it now appears that the technological advances of previous generations (such as cars, planes, telphones, and the electrification of factories) actually had a far bigger impact on real productivity gains.

Consequently instead of being twice as wealthy as our parents we'll probably struggle to be twice as wealthy as our grandparents. And if energy costs keep escalating then our grandchildren might only be say 50% wealthier than us. Further out than that is so speculative as to be pure guesswork, but if energy costs really take of because of dwindling supply, and if we haven't been ingenious enough to replace fossil fuels, then we probably would be looking at a return to a zero sum Malthusian world, where anyone's gain was absolutely at the expense of everyone else.

[cells]

I am a carpenter - I make things from wood. With the machinery at my disposal I can produce maybe ten times the output of one of my forebears 200 years ago. In real terms I probably earn 3 or 4 times as much money as he would have been able to have done.

i like this example, you can create 10x as much woodwork thanks to things like power tools or automation ect.

now because of that, there should be 10x as much wealth, or you should only have to work 1/10th as much for the same wealth or a combination of both.

i put it to you, that you are NOT 10x better off than someone 200 years ago. NOW someone somewhere must be stealing your wealth. I put it to you that the mother of 17 from 59 different fathers getting a "free" council house and getting "benefit" money and her kids getting a "free" "education" are stealing part of your wealth via taxation.

200 years ago if you had 17 kids from 59 fathers no one would give you a "free" house or a "free" benefits cash. so this person has gained wealth from somewhere. it was directly stolen from you!

that is one way wealth/productivity is stolen by government and given to another.

all tax is theft, they try to show you some of the noble reasons for this theft (like schools or parts of healthcare or...) but it is stolen none the less and most of it goes to shit things.

i also put it to you that, because of our "planning permission" and various other laws such as subsidising ect you are paying more of your labour for the same goods. this is also theft, if i manipulate the food market via laws and force the price of bread up that is direct theft from you. if i manipulate the housing market and force the price of rent up that is direct theft from you ect

productivity always creates wealth or allows the people to work less for the same wealth. it is never destroyed, only stolen!

Now here is a good question. Over the last 50 years we have had MASSIVE productivity increases. I know my company makes 10x as much products with 10x fewer people (ie 100x productivity increase) and there are many examples of massive gains in the last 50 years. Just look at tech or medicine. Are we really 10s if not 100s of times better off than we where 50 years ago??

if not, why not??

[t350t]

you are correct, productivity increases are going into the hands of a few who are uber rich. this isn't a problem in itself but what i am saying is that many of these uber rich have become so by literally stealing wealth from others.

ie, massive landlords with 10,000 homes paid for. nothing wrong with that! but they FORCE you to rent from them, if you go and live in your car they kidnap you and throw you in a cell, if you sleep in a tent they kidnap you and throw you in jail. if you build your own home they come over and knock it down because of "planning laws".

do you think rents are fair in this country? do you think it is fair to FORCE someone to give another his labour? 200 years ago it was called slavery, today it is though of as common law for the benefit of the many. in reality it is a mild form of slavery for the benefit of a few!

what can we do about it, can we win this "battle". yes we can, easily, but it means we must first see it and understand it. perhaps only 1% of the population sees this manipulation of prices to steal the wealth of the people!

there's an elite, there always has been, and there always will be.

any attempt to overthrow the elite just creates a new elite. Considering the alternatives history gave us, the current situation isn't so bad.

Also I think you mis-understand the nature of power.

the powerfull are chosen by the masses - e.g. voting with your wallet, or in feudal times individual soldiers deciding which warlord to fight for.

e.g. how the hell did david beckham get 100m for kicking a ball around. no coersion involved.

how did bill gates get his wealth - no one is forced to use a computer.

etc.

people are greedy for space (no need for 6billion people, no need for everyone to raise a family, just greed, people over-estimating their own value).. hence the property bubble. hence a few clever people rode the wave generated by the masses. hence the inflation resulting from herd stupidity. A decade of people quite happily shorting their own currency. they got what they wanted.

[cells]

Indeed, the highest living standards for the common person in Britain between the building of Stonehenge and the Industrial Revolution was probably recorded shortly after the Black Death in the late 14th century, when between a third and a half of the population had died. Food was subsequently plentiful, land was cheap, and labour rates were high, it's grim but the plague boosted living standards like nothing else. So during the thousands of years of the Malthusian era Cells would have been wrong, humans really were pitted in a struggle of each against all.

good post but this bit i don't like, you are basically saying theft is gaining wealth. true it is, if i steal your car i have more wealth. or if i kill you and take all you have then true i have gained wealth.

i think instead of looking at it as wealth per person you should look at it as total wealth in the world. more humans equals more wealth created per unit time which is a positive.

i would also add that during the past 50 years we have had massive productivity increases. the reason some might say no we haven't is because they are looking at "goods" only. if you take into account an increasing human age thanks to medicine advances that would probably not be recorded as productivity gain but to the individual it sure is a gain!

i think a crude but decent way to look at world productivity is to look at steel production. over the last 10 years it has been exponential. you may not be far richer than you where 10 years ago, but if you look at the world as a whole then the world is far richer (most of it spend on "emerging" economies)

[t350t]

Now here is a good question. Over the last 50 years we have had MASSIVE productivity increases. I know my company makes 10x as much products with 10x fewer people (ie 100x productivity increase) and there are many examples of massive gains in the last 50 years. Just look at tech or medicine. Are we really 10s if not 100s of times better off than we where 50 years ago??

if not, why not??

how do you measure 'productivity increases' ? we only need food. Everything else is a luxury. no one needs furniture, tv etc.

[silver surfer]

all tax is theft, they try to show you some of the noble reasons for this theft (like schools or parts of healthcare or...) but it is stolen none the less and most of it goes to shit things.

Now here is a good question. Over the last 50 years we have had MASSIVE productivity increases. I know my company makes 10x as much products with 10x fewer people (ie 100x productivity increase) and there are many examples of massive gains in the last 50 years. Just look at tech or medicine. Are we really 10s if not 100s of times better off than we where 50 years ago??

if not, why not??

It's not as simple as that (even leaving aside the fact that your company has almost certainly not achieved a x100 productivity increase). Some of the productivity gains (and probably an increasing part of future productivity gains) depends on resources such as an educated workforce and a transport infra-structure, resources which taxation feeds directly into delivering.

Here's an example. A man digs a hole with his hands, poor productivity. Someone makes a spade and gives it to the man, so his productivity increases. Now someone else makes a bulldozer and gives it to the man, so his productivity goes up even more. However, now we need more skills, people need to read the instruction manuals, not only for the bulldozer but also for the equipment that makes the bulldozer, and you need an infra-structure to get the bulldozer to the man, fuel it, and maintain it.

Modern economies depend on a whole gamut of resources, resources that companies or individuals are ill-equiped to deliver.

[cells]

how do you measure 'productivity increases' ? we only need food. Everything else is a luxury. no one needs furniture, tv etc.

doing more with less is a productivity increase. that might be doing the same thing in half the time, it might be using half as much gas to do the same thing. it might be doing 10x more with the same amount of oil, it might be growing 5x more on the same amount of land ect

don't confuse quality of life which is subjective to productivity which is a fact

As for your previous post about Beckham or bill gates. I am not saying all rich people are rich because they steal wealth but there are many who are rich because they steal wealth.

[piece of paper]

Now here is a good question. Over the last 50 years we have had MASSIVE productivity increases. I know my company makes 10x as much products with 10x fewer people (ie 100x productivity increase) and there are many examples of massive gains in the last 50 years. Just look at tech or medicine. Are we really 10s if not 100s of times better off than we where 50 years ago??

if not, why not??

The benefit was stolen by debt. When women entered employment as the norm, their income contributed to HPI because more debt became affordable (serviceable). The idea that people would become wealthier was unpalateable to the banks and the government. Nearly as big a con trick as Eric's liar loans.

p-o-p

[cells]

depends on resources such as an educated workforce and a transport infra-structure, resources which taxation feeds directly into delivering.

as injin says, you only need to tax for things people don't want. do we tax people for chocolate? why not?

with that in mind, all tax is theft!

as for schools, people would pay for it themselves or for their children.

for roads, people/companies would pay for it

ect ect

Here's an example. A man digs a hole with his hands, poor productivity. Someone makes a spade and gives it to the man, so his productivity increases. Now someone else makes a bulldozer and gives it to the man, so his productivity goes up even more. However, now we need more skills, people need to read the instruction manuals, not only for the bulldozer but also for the equipment that makes the bulldozer, and you need an infra-structure to get the bulldozer to the man, fuel it, and maintain it.

it is quicker and more efficient to dig out the iron ore , to dig out coal, to turn the two into hot metal, to turn the hot metal into steel, to transport all of this 5 times around the world, to shape the steal, to put together the bulldozer, to deliver it to the site, to train the person than it is to have a man doing the job with a spade.

if this where not the case, no one would buy bulldozers.

Anyway, my point is. 50% of your wealth is directly stolen from you via tax. (if you don't believe me, don't pay it and see what happens)

and imo the remaining 50% if not more is stolen from you via VI laws and systems. The largest in this country being “rent” or buying a home.

[silver surfer]

you are basically saying theft is gaining wealth. true it is, if i steal your car i have more wealth. or if i kill you and take all you have then true i have gained wealth.

i think instead of looking at it as wealth per person you should look at it as total wealth in the world. more humans equals more wealth created per unit time which is a positive.

i would also add that during the past 50 years we have had massive productivity increases. the reason some might say no we haven't is because they are looking at "goods" only. if you take into account an increasing human age thanks to medicine advances that would probably not be recorded as productivity gain but to the individual it sure is a gain!

i think a crude but decent way to look at world productivity is to look at steel production. over the last 10 years it has been exponential. you may not be far richer than you where 10 years ago, but if you look at the world as a whole then the world is far richer (most of it spend on "emerging" economies)

During the Malthusian era, ie all time before the Industrial Revolution, there was hardly any net gains in wealth due to productivity increases (productivity crept upwards at a snail's pace, only 0.02-0.10% per year), so it genuinely was a zero sum world, one man's gain was another man's loss. After the Industrial Revolution real productivity growth rocketed to 2-3% per year. However, far from seeing "massive productivity increases" over the past 50 years, we've actually seeing a small but significant dip in productivity gains over the last thirty to forty years.

Increases in life expectancy is an interesting one, from a strictly economic perspective it's included in the figures but only in that longer life spans allow people to be more productive. Economics measures standard of living rather than judging quality of life. Equally, I'd argue that the decline in private sector final salary schemes in the last twenty years, from over 30% to under 10%, represents a real decline in living standards but one that is normally excluded from productivity analysis.

[cells]

The benefit was stolen by debt. When women entered employment as the norm, their income contributed to HPI because more debt became affordable (serviceable). The idea that people would become wealthier was unpalateable to the banks and the government. Nearly as big a con trick as Eric's liar loans.

p-o-p

wrong, it wasn't debt itself. it was the limitation of building one way or another that forced all excess monies to go into bidding up a "limited" resource. if housing was not limited artificially then going from a one income household to a two income household would have made us instantly richer.

[silver surfer]

as injin says, you only need to tax for things people don't want. do we tax people for chocolate? why not?

with that in mind, all tax is theft!

as for schools, people would pay for it themselves or for their children.

for roads, people/companies would pay for it

ect ect

it is quicker and more efficient to dig out the iron ore , to dig out coal, to turn the two into hot metal, to turn the hot metal into steel, to transport all of this 5 times around the world, to shape the steal, to put together the bulldozer, to deliver it to the site, to train the person than it is to have a man doing the job with a spade.

if this where not the case, no one would buy bulldozers.

Anyway, my point is. 50% of your wealth is directly stolen from you via tax. (if you don't believe me, don't pay it and see what happens)

and imo the remaining 50% if not more is stolen from you via VI laws and systems. The largest in this country being “rent” or buying a home.

Let me try again.

A world in which men dig holes with their hands or with spades really doesn't need much taxation.

But a world in which men dig holes with bulldozers needs much larger taxes. Not least the taxes to provide the infra-structure that make bulldozer production possible in the first place!

[piece of paper]

wrong, it wasn't debt itself. it was the limitation of building one way or another that forced all excess monies to go into bidding up a "limited" resource. if housing was not limited artificially then going from a one income household to a two income household would have made us instantly richer.

As you will. The point is that most of the additional income has gone on servicing debt unnecessarily rather than increasing disposable income and improving living standards.

p-o-p

[cells]

During the Malthusian era, ie all time before the Industrial Revolution, there was hardly any net gains in wealth due to productivity increases (productivity crept upwards at a snail's pace, only 0.02-0.10% per year), so it genuinely was a zero sum world, one man's gain was another man's loss. After the Industrial Revolution real productivity growth rocketed to 2-3% per year. However, far from seeing "massive productivity increases" over the past 50 years, we've actually seeing a small but significant dip in productivity gains over the last thirty to forty years.

Increases in life expectancy is an interesting one, from a strictly economic perspective it's included in the figures but only in that longer life spans allow people to be more productive. Economics measures standard of living rather than judging quality of life. Equally, I'd argue that the decline in private sector final salary schemes in the last twenty years, from over 30% to under 10%, represents a real decline in living standards but one that is normally excluded from productivity analysis.

people create their own wealth. so an increasing population is not a negative even with no productivity gains (although you can argue an increasing population is productivity in itself. as say designing a car, there is building costs. which is linear per person who buys one. and there is research and start-up costs which are one offs which would be divided by the whole population. so overall each unit can be sold cheaper. that is productivity gains of sorts)

you are confusing population growth with stealing wealth. if half the world population dies tomorrow sure the remaining half would have more and be more wealthy but the earth still has the same wealth.

[t350t]

It's not as simple as that (even leaving aside the fact that your company has almost certainly not achieved a x100 productivity increase). Some of the productivity gains (and probably an increasing part of future productivity gains) depends on resources such as an educated workforce and a transport infra-structure, resources which taxation feeds directly into delivering.

Here's an example. A man digs a hole with his hands, poor productivity. Someone makes a spade and gives it to the man, so his productivity increases. Now someone else makes a bulldozer and gives it to the man, so his productivity goes up even more. However, now we need more skills, people need to read the instruction manuals, not only for the bulldozer but also for the equipment that makes the bulldozer, and you need an infra-structure to get the bulldozer to the man, fuel it, and maintain it.

Modern economies depend on a whole gamut of resources, resources that companies or individuals are ill-equiped to deliver.

right.

He is vastly over-estimating the contribution of the individual. if you drive a bulldozer it does not make you personally worth 100x as much as someone with a spade.

The value comes from oil and machines. Oil is a finite resource that had to be fought for.

It's just nature, it's not "nice". we're not created to be happy, we're just created to smooth out nature's energy gradients, to increase the amount of entropy in the universe

[cells]

Let me try again.

A world in which men dig holes with their hands or with spades really doesn't need much taxation.

But a world in which men dig holes with bulldozers needs much larger taxes. Not least the taxes to provide the infra-structure that make bulldozer production possible in the first place!

you only need to tax for things people dont want.

some tax might be spent wisely and help, but it was stolen from you none the less which is wrong. if i steal your wallet and buy you a coat does it make it right? now add to that the fact that governments are v.wastefull and it would be akin to stealing your wallet with £100 in it and buying you an ice cream, how nice of me

[t350t]

people create their own wealth. so an increasing population is not a negative even with no productivity gains (although you can argue an increasing population is productivity in itself. as say designing a car, there is building costs. which is linear per person who buys one. and there is research and start-up costs which are one offs which would be divided by the whole population. so overall each unit can be sold cheaper. that is productivity gains of sorts)

you are confusing population growth with stealing wealth. if half the world population dies tomorrow sure the remaining half would have more and be more wealthy but the earth still has the same wealth.

nope, currently most wealth is created by energy & information/machines, not people. most people are very limited as there isn't enough land for them to hunt & gather like they're designed to.

you only need to tax for things people dont want.

some tax might be spent wisely and help, but it was stolen from you none the less which is wrong. if i steal your wallet and buy you a coat does it make it right? now add to that the fact that governments are v.wastefull and it would be akin to stealing your wallet with £100 in it and buying you an ice cream, how nice of me

tax is there to let the poor rob the rich. hence it's popularity. see my point about the nature of power? the elite give the poor what they want - e.g. child benefit. Or inflation to rob savers like me. so it's society as a whole thats doing the robbing.

Edited July 20, 2008 by t350t

[cells]

right.

He is vastly over-estimating the contribution of the individual. if you drive a bulldozer it does not make you personally worth 100x as much as someone with a spade.

The value comes from oil and machines. Oil is a finite resource that had to be fought for.

It's just nature, it's not "nice". we're not created to be happy, we're just created to smooth out nature's energy gradients, to increase the amount of entropy in the universe

twice the population = twice as many Einsteins = twice as fast progress = good

as for the fella in a bulldozer, if everything was 100x more productive down the line. then yes he is worth 100x more than the fella with a spade. how about you and 99 of your mates race me in a bulldozer to see who can clear 1m tonnes of soil first!