"No jobs mantra suits the work-shy and welfare abuser"

[Gekko]

ignoring the fact that we have petty criminals making money in fraudulent welfare claims and working on the black market

And such people should be hammered.

You seem to delight in branding people "PDs". However, you could easily be branded a socialist head in the sand merchant.

Simple Micawberism will solve our woes:

"Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen pounds nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery"

First we must eliminate waste - That means hammering fraudsters (i.e. welfare cheats, tax evaders etc), making dead wood redundant (e.g. the surplus of HR staff in the HSE) and putting our level of representation on a par with that in the UK.

Then we must raise money by selling off non strategic assets (e.g. Montrose).

Finally we should broaden our tax base and learn a lesson from the last decade.

Simplicity is what's called for...not a decade of navel gazing. If there are 10,000 people in the HSE doing sweet FA, you get rid of them. Your criticism of my points is clearly meant to be offensive but I actually find it encouraging. Gombeenery and a civil service riddled with conservatism and inertia make it nigh on impossible to get anything done in this country.

 

[Firefly]

Personally I don't think it will - I think the logic that suggests this is trite, faulty. And if saving occur, they won't be passed on to the consumer. The employer will pocket them.
ONQ.

Think we're going around in circles here. If the employer pockets this additional money, they'll attract new entrants to the market who will take another x amount of people off the dole.

Yes, the minimum wage thing is employers whinging about having to pay employees instead of pocketing it themselves.
ONQ.

As above

Just look at the outrageous prices still being charge in shops for goods like sweets and compare the prices of exactly the same product in Britain. 65 cent for a packet of crisps here that costs 45 cent there.
ONQ.

It is frustrating when you see that. Perhaps it's the higher costs of doing business here, primarily in the cost of labour that accounts for this difference. If the prices were too high and profits too large, again this would encourage new market entrants.


ONQ.[/QUOTE]

As for people working in restaurants, they are not simply paid for their time. Waiters for example are front of house staff dealing with customers. Kitchen staff have a plethora of health and safety and food safety regulations to satisfy. They are skilled people, not unskilled. Not valuing anyone below the boardroom is the rock on which badly run businesses founder. Pay peanuts if you want monkeys.
ONQ.

As pointed out earlier, during the good times these staff hopped from employer to employer chasing higher wages. Why should employers in a recession behave differently? Why shouldn't they seek to reduce their costs as much as the market will bear?

Irish businesses may have recently learnt to respect their customers. Now they need to learn to respect the dignity of their employees.
ONQ.

I'm not sure they don't respect their employees which are protected by all sorts of laws. This is just economic supply and demand of labour for a particular industry. If the wages offered are too low then you're right the restaurants won't get good quality staff...surely that should be for the restaurant to decide though?

 

[Gekko]

Just look at the outrageous prices still being charge in shops for goods like sweets and compare the prices of exactly the same product in Britain. 65 cent for a packet of crisps here that costs 45 cent there

The (presumably unskilled) person serving you the crisps in the UK more than likely earns €6.50 per hour.

The (presumably unskilled) person serving you the crisps in Ireland more than likely earns €8.65 per hour.

The price differential is obviously related to the above.

 

[Chris]

I'd imagine that the important thing to the 450k people on the dole is to give them the opportunity to have a meaningful job, paid at a level that allows them to have a meaningful life here in Ireland.

Hey, we agree again, but at the moment they have no job at all, and while they are not working they are not learning new on the job skills. And as I have pointed out many time at this stage, the reason there are unemployed people is because of an artificial mismatch in price of supply and demand. Keeping that artificial interference there will not reduce the number of unemployed.

OK then, I'm sure it is entirely coincidental that the author of the original opinion piece was head honcho of the PDs for years, and that the piece is textbook PD policy. Pure coincidence.

First of all classical liberal/free market theory pre-dates the PDs by centuries. Secondly, the PDs may have talked about free markets, but absolutely nothing they actually did was anything remotely comparable to free market theory.

Here's a lesson in basic life for you - Increased profits means increased capital available for reinvestment does not mean that increased profits actually get reinvested. Some if it may get reinvested, and some of it will certainly go elsewhere.

You are absolutely right. But again the reason why they are not investing here is because there are no or insufficient profits. The higher the profits the higher the investment will be. The situation we have now is that government action is decreasing profitability which is exacerbating the problem. As much as you may choose to ignore this it is not going to go away.

Taking money out of a stagnant economy whether through reducing dole payments or cutting the minimum wage will not create more economic activity or employment.

Government cannot increase funds within an economy. Any money it pumps in has to be taken out through taxation!

What's happening right now is a joke. We're navel gazing about a property tax of €100 which will raise €75 million per annum and all the while we're staring into a €20 billion per annum abyss.

Couldn't agree with you more.

To those who oppose pay cuts in general; do you think that we have a competitiveness problem and if so how do we fix it (will pay cuts be part of the solution)?

To entice investment the only thing that government can do is is reduce the costs it burdens on companies. This includes corporate tax, VAT, council rates, employer PRSI, and also minimum wages. In my opinion all of these should be reduced.

This appears to be just a listing of first-year-accountancy Progressive Democrat principles - a monetarist agenda with no appreciation of the overall deflationary economic effects and social hardship it will cause.

Not that PD nonsense again. Please tell me when the PDs actually did anything to reduce the size of government, reduce welfare payments, or reduce anything that government did?
The social hardship has its roots in the unemployment. Discouraging people to take lower paid work does absolutely nothing to increase employment and therefore does nothing to alleviate social hardship.

Borrowing to fund the state is a given - live with it.

Borrowing to fund the state is why most of the western world is in such a dire situation. Such a statement is like an alcoholic saying that drinking alcohol is a given.

Reducing the total amount of money entering an economy is a deflationary measure.

Let me repeat it again for you. Government can only put money into the economy which it takes out of the economy!!!

For investment purposes like building roads,schools this can be true. A cost-benefit analysis can be performed etc. However, we're borrowing 4,500 euro per year for every man, woman and child living in this country. This will have to be repaid (with interest). Does this not alarm you?

It scares the hell out of me anyway.

 

[Firefly]

It scares the hell out of me anyway.

Off topic, but I think this will ultimately lead to people with "good" jobs and skills leaving purely because the tax rates will be so high to repay this borrowing.

 

[Chris]

Is it possible to sell similar products for a higher price than a competitor? Yes.

I agree, but not on a large scale.

Actually this is only possible if the product is of higher quality as perceived by the customers.

 

[Sunny]

This thread is going around in cirlces

 

[Firefly]

Actually this is only possible if the product is of higher quality as perceived by the customers.

You're right as in the case of the perceived superiority of German products. Again though this will take some time to arrive at.

 

[onq]

And such people should be hammered.

You seem to delight in branding people "PDs". However, you could easily be branded a socialist head in the sand merchant.

I could, but that would brand you as a PD who doesn't take the others point - a TRUE PD - LOL!

My position in this and other debates is clear and manifold.

Taking dole money from those who've cut their costs and need it to survive and ARE ENTITLED TO IT ON THE BASIS OF TAX PAID! - is simply wrong.

It is taking money from those who cannot afford to pay for the high salaries of those in the public sector and emergency services.

Taking money from dole scroungers however is simple justice - I wholeheartedly support this.

Asking unskilled people to "work" for their dole money at menial tasks that would normally attract the minimum wage - I wholeheartedly support this. It has many potential benefits.

Asking people who are highly skilled or professionals of many years standing to do menial work for the minimum wage is demeaning and certainly isn't using this currently unemployed resource to best advantage.

Simple Micawberism will solve our woes:

"Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen pounds nineteen and six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pounds ought and six, result misery"

Nope - result short term borrowing until matters can be sorted. Please don't quote the Grandaddy of the PD mantras at me - the exploitation of factory workers in Dark Satanic Mills by the Victorians!
Hint: you are now in a hole - stop digging.

First we must eliminate waste - That means hammering fraudsters (i.e. welfare cheats, tax evaders etc), making dead wood redundant (e.g. the surplus of HR staff in the HSE) and putting our level of representation on a par with that in the UK.

Nope. All of this must be done gradually and well. It is Change Management on a massive scale, and we have secured the funding to allow this to be done well, as opposed to badly and precipitously.

I'm sure you have a PD pamphlet somewhere telling you about that new-fangled Human Resources thing that started coming in back in the 1950's in America? Well managing an electorate is like managing a very sensitive workforce.

Threatening immediate job losses isn't good HR Management. And this isn't socialism. its advanced Monetarism - what the PD's should have been if they had had both brains and compassion as opposed to merely a monetarist agenda and a bold face.

Then we must raise money by selling off non strategic assets (e.g. Montrose).

Nope. Tired of seeing the value in state assets go to the private sector. Tired of seeing unaccountable corruption in De Meeja. Tired of seeing re-runs of American soaps masquerading as Culture. We keep RTE, but we cut Kenny's salary by 60%.

Finally we should broaden our tax base and learn a lesson from the last decade.

Its a favourite deflection of those with the most money when they see the taxman cometh - broaden the tax base. In other words take more from those who earn less as opposed to me, with my five houses, my yacht and my kids in a Swiss finishing school.

Sorry, but the high rollers are going to lose their passports if they go "tax exile" as far as I'm concerned. They've sucked money from the country into their foreign bank accounts and now they don't even pay tax on deposit interest? Hand over the passport son!

Simplicity is what's called for...not a decade of navel gazing. If there are 10,000 people in the HSE doing sweet FA, you get rid of them. Your criticism of my points is clearly meant to be offensive but I actually find it encouraging. Gombeenery and a civil service riddled with conservatism and inertia make it nigh on impossible to get anything done in this country.

Nope. A complex and well thought out balanced strategy is required, not a sop to those less bright who have against all the odds managed to stay in gainful employment through this recession or parlayed their limited abilities onto some government Quango or other.

Subtlety and change management and treating everyone with dignity and respect is what's called for, not the poorly measured response of broad brushstroke cuts that centre on the less well off and unemployed.

Capping all consultants, and senior positions salaries in government offices, civil and public service jobs and state-owned banks at €150,000 a year would be a good start towards making some cuts.

Full vouching of expenses claims and full vetting of claims incurred so that they are relevant.
No foreign junkets, seminars or "fact-finding" missions this year and a maximum of two seminars on subjects that are directly relevant to the Continuous Professional Development necessary to support the job description will see a significant tranche of taxpayers money saved.

But as I said, take this money out of circulation, lower discretionary income and you end up with a deflationary spiral.

That's why people are navel gazing, intelligent people, experienced people, people who understand complex economic and financial problems.

They KNOW that cuts - however justified - however morally and fiscally correct, won't solve this economic crisis.

Cuts will do us harm in the long run without private investment to replace the money cuts take out of the economy.

This is the hurdle the PD mentality falls at again and again.

Cutting spending reduces the total amount of money in circulation and costs jobs.
Cutting the minimum wage without using the money saved to increase jobs reduces the total amount of money in circulation.
Cutting the social welfare for deserving recipients without cutting costs across the board [particularly utility bills] reduces the total amount of money in circulation and makes a difficult situation intolerable.

So there is a difficult balance to be struck and a period of navel gazing required before a decision is made.

Then there will be the inevitable consequences of any decision.

ONQ.

 

[onq]

Originally Posted by onq http://www.askaboutmoney.com/showthread.php?p=1191955#post1191955
Taking money out of a stagnant economy whether through reducing dole payments or cutting the minimum wage will not create more economic activity or employment.

Government cannot increase funds within an economy. Any money it pumps in has to be taken out through taxation!

Straw man argument.
All my posts in this thread responded to the stated aim of taking money out of the economy, not putting money in.

Your point is correct as far as it goes, but fails to acknowledge current western economic practice which has fuelled economic growth through credit for over a hundred years. Now you can deny this if you want to lose all credibility, but don't ignore it.

Originally Posted by onq http://www.askaboutmoney.com/showthread.php?p=1192030#post1192030
This appears to be just a listing of first-year-accountancy Progressive Democrat principles - a monetarist agenda with no appreciation of the overall deflationary economic effects and social hardship it will cause.

Not that PD nonsense again. Please tell me when the PDs actually did anything to reduce the size of government, reduce welfare payments, or reduce anything that government did?

"Not that PD nonsense again."
That was my first reaction, but I thought Brendan might be annoyed if I used that tone instead of making a reasoned argument.

I referred to the previous comments as "first-year-accountancy Progressive Democrat principles" in other words, badly thought out stuff that wasn't followed through. Thank you for pointing out that the PD's did not live by their convictions. In fact, instead of trimming the civil services oversaw an additional 90,000 people being employed by the state during their time in government.

I don't rate the PDs or Latter-Day Monetarists. Simplistic approaches to economics tend to blow up in your face but farming core government work out to "consultants" was never on either.

They still had no excuse for kow-towing to the unions and taking on all those extra bodies in the civil service. I'd love a breakdown of that alleged 90,000 figure (which I have to say I have no link for).

The social hardship has its roots in the unemployment. Discouraging people to take lower paid work does absolutely nothing to increase employment and therefore does nothing to alleviate social hardship.

State the obvious and then rebut straw man arguments.
I've already addressed the issue of requiring people to work for their dole money as a Good Thing.

Social hardship was only ever going to increase from the time we started to consider Globalized Trade.

Originally Posted by onq http://www.askaboutmoney.com/showthread.php?p=1192030#post1192030
Borrowing to fund the state is a given - live with it.

Borrowing to fund the state is why most of the western world is in such a dire situation. Such a statement is like an alcoholic saying that drinking alcohol is a given.

An extreme and unjustified comment given the fact that America has managed to survive by rolling over its debt since WWI.

Originally Posted by onq http://www.askaboutmoney.com/showthread.php?p=1192030#post1192030
Reducing the total amount of money entering an economy is a deflationary measure.

Let me repeat it again for you. Government can only put money into the economy which it takes out of the economy!!!

Watch that shake!!!!111!1!!1!1!1111!! LOL!

You have just admitted - and I quote:

"Borrowing to fund the state is why most of the western world is in such a dire situation."

Borrowing therefore rebuts your point above, and is a well used mechanism endorsed by all western governments.

Unregulated market speculation and uncertainty is what causes the problems we are experiencing at the moment, whether the previous property market or the current international finance market.

The people who like to think they run the world are screwing us over.

And we're letting them, sucking on their mantra of "the free market will find a way".

In fact the free market is the last resort of the pirates and scoundrels who destroy economies and wage illegal wars.

Full spectrum dominance and it needs to be challenged - and soon.

 

[darag]

Borrowing therefore rebuts your point above, and is a well used mechanism endorsed by all western governments.

No, it is not. It may be "endorsed" by the renowned beacons of good-governance like Greece, Ireland (since 2000), the US (post-Clinton), Italy, etc.

It is not endorsed in Switzerland, Scandinavian countries, Canada, Australia, Ireland (1990 to 2000) etc.

Historically the size of a country's fiscal deficit is a pretty reliable indicator of how incompetently it is being run or how distressed it is.

Fiscal economics is not complicated; a country borrowing money to pay for day-to-day expenses is no more sustainable than an individual building up credit card debt to cover regular expenses. Both behaviors end in ruin. It's simple arithmetic.

 

[Chris]

Taking dole money from those who've cut their costs and need it to survive and ARE ENTITLED TO IT ON THE BASIS OF TAX PAID! - is simply wrong.

While this is a nice argument it ignores the fact that the welfare system is a pay as you go system. Contributions are not set aside, but directly paid to the current recipients. There is nothing in a pot that has your name on it. It is a massive government mandated ponzi scheme. And those that come late to the party are the ones that lose out.

Asking people who are highly skilled or professionals of many years standing to do menial work for the minimum wage is demeaning and certainly isn't using this currently unemployed resource to best advantage.

I agree, but unemployed skilled workers should not be given unlimited time to find work, the time frame should be short. And I also agree with making people of any background do something in return for welfare payments.

Nope - result short term borrowing until matters can be sorted. Please don't quote the Grandaddy of the PD mantras at me - the exploitation of factory workers in Dark Satanic Mills by the Victorians!

But none of the countries that are in trouble only borrow short term. They massively borrow in the bad times and then borrow some more in the good times.

Nope. All of this must be done gradually and well. It is Change Management on a massive scale, and we have secured the funding to allow this to be done well, as opposed to badly and precipitously.

It is because this is being done gradually that Ireland is in such a mess, that should be pretty obvious now that after 4 years since the crisis began government has only achieved somewhere between €3bn - €5bn in spending cuts.

I'm sure you have a PD pamphlet somewhere telling you about that new-fangled Human Resources thing that started coming in back in the 1950's in America? Well managing an electorate is like managing a very sensitive workforce.

Threatening immediate job losses isn't good HR Management. And this isn't socialism. its advanced Monetarism - what the PD's should have been if they had had both brains and compassion as opposed to merely a monetarist agenda and a bold face.

Please provide one piece of evidence that puts the PDs in the monetarist camp? And just to clarify things, monetarists are not in favour of deflation, quite the opposite.

Its a favourite deflection of those with the most money when they see the taxman cometh - broaden the tax base. In other words take more from those who earn less as opposed to me, with my five houses, my yacht and my kids in a Swiss finishing school.

It's actually a case of making those who contribute nothing in income tax to contribute something. Is this the new definition of fairness where a small group of people pick up the tab while 50% pay nothing?

Sorry, but the high rollers are going to lose their passports if they go "tax exile" as far as I'm concerned. They've sucked money from the country into their foreign bank accounts and now they don't even pay tax on deposit interest? Hand over the passport son!

Let me ask you this, do you think Ireland would be better off if these high wealth individuals gave up their citizenship to continue not paying taxes here?

They KNOW that cuts - however justified - however morally and fiscally correct, won't solve this economic crisis.

Then maybe you could point to some time in history where an economic crisis was solved by not cutting spending? Let me give you a hint, they do not exist. Your argument was spouted out in the US in 1921 and 1945, i.e. under no circumstances stop spending money or there will be a massive bust. The exact opposite happened in 1922 and 1946 after government slashed spending.

Cuts will do us harm in the long run without private investment to replace the money cuts take out of the economy.

Money government spends has to be taken out of the economy, there is no net gain!!!

This is the hurdle the PD mentality falls at again and again.

Please provide some proof that the PDs ever advocated actual cuts in spending, this fictitious argument is getting tiring.

Cutting spending reduces the total amount of money in circulation and costs jobs.
Cutting the minimum wage without using the money saved to increase jobs reduces the total amount of money in circulation.
Cutting the social welfare for deserving recipients without cutting costs across the board [particularly utility bills] reduces the total amount of money in circulation and makes a difficult situation intolerable.

Nonsense, nonsense, nonsense. Any money that government cuts in spending is money that it doesn't have to take out of the economy, whether that be through taxation or borrowing. It cannot be made more clear than that.

Straw man argument.
All my posts in this thread responded to the stated aim of taking money out of the economy, not putting money in.

The point was that government cannot add to the economy without taking money out. When government spends less then it takes less money out of the economy, which means that there is no net loss to the economy.

Your point is correct as far as it goes, but fails to acknowledge current western economic practice which has fuelled economic growth through credit for over a hundred years. Now you can deny this if you want to lose all credibility, but don't ignore it.

This is simply not true. Until the 60s, western governments only went into debt heavily in order to finance wars. Since the 60s the western world has seen ever deeper crises in shorter succession than ever before. The time of the industrial revolution saw the biggest economic growth in history, while public debt was pretty much non-existent. All that government borrowing has done is cause crises and hamper growth in the private economy.

State the obvious and then rebut straw man arguments.
I've already addressed the issue of requiring people to work for their dole money as a Good Thing.

How is this a straw man argument. We are talking about unemployment and you add in social hardship. Then I point out the root of social hardship is the unemployment itself.

Social hardship was only ever going to increase from the time we started to consider Globalized Trade.

I don't even know where to start with this comment. Do you think that the world would be a better place if every country had to make everything it needed itself? Or am I missing something?

An extreme and unjustified comment given the fact that America has managed to survive by rolling over its debt since WWI.

Let's take a look at the facts before we come to such fallacious conclusions. US debt to GDP was pretty low until the 80s, it is now worse than during the Great Depression. The only reason the US has managed to roll over its debt in recent years is, especially this year, is because the Federal Reserve has been buying up 70% of issued debt. You can hardly argue that that proves the US has sustainable debt.

You have just admitted - and I quote:

"Borrowing to fund the state is why most of the western world is in such a dire situation."

Borrowing therefore rebuts your point above, and is a well used mechanism endorsed by all western governments.

No it doesn't, but this comment does highlight some serious gaps in your understanding of economics. When government spends money it has to take it from somewhere. It does this either through immediate taxation or it borrows money which has to be later repaid (plus interest) by taking money out of the economy through taxation. Either way, government spending is financed by taking money out of the economy. If it is done through immediate taxation then people have less money in their pockets to spend now. If it is done through borrowing, then the private economy has less supply of capital at present and people in general have less money in the future. That is why credit fuelled government spending is worse than spending financed through immediate taxation. And it is because of the level of debt accumulated that so many countries are in trouble, while those countries with lower and sustainable levels of debt are not in trouble.

Unregulated market speculation and uncertainty is what causes the problems we are experiencing at the moment, whether the previous property market or the current international finance market.

The people who like to think they run the world are screwing us over.

And we're letting them, sucking on their mantra of "the free market will find a way".

In fact the free market is the last resort of the pirates and scoundrels who destroy economies and wage illegal wars.

We have absolutely nothing even remotely resembling a free market, and the biggest businesses in the world are not looking for freer markets, but more government intervention. They want bailouts and protection from foreign competition and tax breaks and subsidies and the list goes on. What they want is more of the system that is so spectacularly failing, and this is being sold to the public as the solution.
Absolutely none of this has anything to do with free market economics.

 

[csirl]

Cutting spending reduces the total amount of money in circulation and costs jobs.
Cutting the minimum wage without using the money saved to increase jobs reduces the total amount of money in circulation.
Cutting the social welfare for deserving recipients without cutting costs across the board [particularly utility bills] reduces the total amount of money in circulation and makes a difficult situation intolerable.

This is completely untrue. Just because you cut spending in one area, it doesnt mean you dont spend the money saved. If the Goverrnment cuts spending on social welfare or unnecessary HSE staff, then it has more money available to spend on more useful things which may be a lot more beneficial to the economy. Alternatively, the Government could pass the savings on by reducing taxes thus leaving more money in the pockets of the citizens and businesses - which would boost the economy.

 

[Purple]

Asking unskilled people to "work" for their dole money at menial tasks that would normally attract the minimum wage - I wholeheartedly support this. It has many potential benefits.

Asking people who are highly skilled or professionals of many years standing to do menial work for the minimum wage is demeaning and certainly isn't using this currently unemployed resource to best advantage.

That's on eof the most elitist posts I've ever read on AAM. A persons skills are worth only what someone is willing to pay for them. If nobody wants to pay for them then they are worth zip. We have a huge oversupply in many areas of the economy. It doesn't matter how skilled those people are there aint no work for them so here and now their skills are worthless.

 

[Gekko]

ONQ was obviously savaged by Michael McDowell's dog in Ranelagh a couple of years ago...mental scar tissue as a result of a terrible PD related experience is the only explanation I can think for his McCarthy-like "PDs under the bed" paranoia about any proposals to address our current difficulties.

 

[onq]

No, it is not. It may be "endorsed" by the renowned beacons of good-governance like Greece, Ireland (since 2000), the US (post-Clinton), Italy, etc.

It is not endorsed in Switzerland, Scandinavian countries, Canada, Australia, Ireland (1990 to 2000) etc.

Historically the size of a country's fiscal deficit is a pretty reliable indicator of how incompetently it is being run or how distressed it is.

Fiscal economics is not complicated; a country borrowing money to pay for day-to-day expenses is no more sustainable than an individual building up credit card debt to cover regular expenses. Both behaviors end in ruin. It's simple arithmetic.

Its simplistic rhetoric.

Where did you get the idea that we didn't borrow?
The first ten years of my post-graduate career were spent in Ireland 1990-2000 and I can confirm we borrowed during that time.

And if you refer to a country and its borrowing requirements, look at it in the round.
If a country has low borrowings and still provides a good level of civil service and state agencies, how is it funded?

No, its usually by imposing higher taxes.
These are the very reason we were so uncompetitive AND ran a deficit all through the Eighties.

The Socialist State doesn't work.
We've recently found that the Monetarist State regularly blows up in your face.
So less of the simplistic rhetoric and more subtle thought is needed to find a balanced way through the current crisis.

ONQ.

 

[onq]

ONQ was obviously savaged by Michael McDowell's dog in Ranelagh a couple of years ago...mental scar tissue as a result of a terrible PD related experience is the only explanation I can think for his McCarthy-like "PDs under the bed" paranoia about any proposals to address our current difficulties.

I'm sensitive to "solutions" based on an apparently limited grasp of economics at the national and international scale that include simplistic proposals about how to "fix" things which do not appear to have been thought through.

ONQ.

 

[onq]

That's on eof the most elitist posts I've ever read on AAM. A persons skills are worth only what someone is willing to pay for them. If nobody wants to pay for them then they are worth zip. We have a huge oversupply in many areas of the economy. It doesn't matter how skilled those people are there aint no work for them so here and now their skills are worthless.

Let's set a baseline here.

If you forego ten years or more of gainful employment by remaining in education and training to become a competent professional you will expect to sell your skills at a premium, both to recoup your losses and as recompense for the higher duty of care you bear.

Is sort of like manufacturers margins.
Without profits you cannot pay for innovation and research and development, your brand loses place in the market and eventually fails.

Its like profit as a reward for enterprise.

Neither are guaranteed, but its certainly not élitist to expect them

Said premium for professional services is reasonable.

If the market no longer supports that price, you will be reduced to selling your skills at a level at which your business breaks even.

If you cannot sell your skills at that level you will go out of business.

----------------------------------

Now let's look at the condition you set.

"A persons skills are worth only what someone is willing to pay for them."

The lowest price person's skills are worth what that person is willing to perform them at. The lowest sustainable price is the break even point of the person's business. Recently we have seen many firms eating into their cash reserves to engage in below cost selling of skills and services. This is unsustainable and will result in those businesses failing.

----------------------------------

"If nobody wants to pay for them then they are worth zip."

My experience is that people still want to pay for them, therefore they are not "worth zip".

It is my experience that people who are not professionally qualified or competent to act as a professional begrudge the premium professionals charge, because they assume they are operating at a level, when they are not.

----------------------------------

Let me put the boot on the other foot.

Should a professional work as a sweeper for their dole money Purple, or should their skills be put to good use by the state?

It is a very short sighted administration that would not avail of the latter.

If the professional is then operating at a level which demanded you used your skills and experience, do you think it appropriate that he/she should do so for the minimum wage?

The fact is they cannot supply their services at the minimum wage

----------------------------------

A fair days pay for a fair days work is not élitist

If you bring considerably more to the table than someone with no third level qualifications you would expect to see your abilities used wouldn't you?

And if that was the case you'd expect more than the basic dole payment.

But in fact you will NEED this just to provide the service.

----------------------------------

Since you would be operating at a certain level, you would be expected to maintain your appearance and you might have to use a car to attend some meetings.

Your expenses immediately rise above the level sustainable by dole payments.

And if you are offering professional skillsets, you will need to keep current which requires attending seminars and continuous study - not cheap, even to travel to them.

Finally if you are acting in that professional capacity you may be required to pay professional indemnity insurance - another expense.

----------------------------------

If the state to pick up the tab for all of this at cost - not run through your firm - it would place your "take home" well above the dole payments.

If the state decides there was no use for you, well, you'd either have to leave or commit suicide. The rise in suicides in the State is being kept out of the news.

I suppose when you are told you are being élitist for expecting reasonable reward for your skills, suicide seems the least painful option.

Allow me to bring a bit of balance and reality to the situation.

ONQ.

 

[onq]

This is completely untrue.

The consequences of a strategy may not seem palatable, but going into denial doesn't help.

Just because you cut spending in one area, it doesnt mean you dont spend the money saved.

Straw man argument - I never said it did.

If the Goverrnment cuts spending on social welfare or unnecessary HSE staff, then it has more money available to spend on more useful things which may be a lot more beneficial to the economy.

Straw man argument - I never said it wouldn't.

Alternatively, the Government could pass the savings on by reducing taxes thus leaving more money in the pockets of the citizens and businesses - which would boost the economy.

Straw man argument - I never said it couldn't.


Perhaps if you read my post again and address the points I made, or even just the central issue, which is that by cutting expenditure you are taking money out of the economy and causing deflation, we might move the debate on a little.

I already suggested that using monies for innovation would be a good thing.

ONQ.

 

[csirl]

by cutting expenditure you are taking money out of the economy and causing deflation

No, this is not true. Cutting expenditure means you dont have to raise as much tax money, thus you are leaving more money in the economy. Cutting expenditure will only take money out of the economy if the Government is planning to stash the money saved - which is not proposed or suggested.

This thread is about social welfate. Cutting social welfare does not mean total expenditure has to be cut and so does not mean that money is taken out of the economy. It could simply mean that the money saved is spent in a more productive way or left in workers pockets.