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message 4801:
by
B J
(new)
Oct 14, 2016 02:12PM
It's not supposed to be philanthropic. It was formed at the end of WWII and exists as a lender of last resort for countries about to go bust. It earns interest on the loans and after paying its admin costs the surplus is returned to member countries (who provide the capital) in proportion to funds provided.
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According to Keynes, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank were given each others' names. Countries that fall into the clutches of the IMF are treated rather like RBS customers passed to the GRG. RBS GRG WhistleblowerThe rather sick joke is that the most of the IMF's money goes to the people that the distressed countries owe money to. The IMF then attempts to get paid back by the countries in question.
If you owe the bank £1,000 and you can't pay, you have a problem.If you owe the bank £1,000,000,000 and can't pay, the bank has a problem.
But the banks escape when the IMF pays them off. The problem is then back with you.
He's only saying what a lot of serious economists have said all along, it's an economic project that was massively compromised because of political imperatives. Countries like Greece and a number of the other southern Med states shouldn't have been allowed to join but stuff was fudged
and I'll take pity on you lest you'd begun to feel that you were slipping to the dark side. Here's the Guardian sort of agreeing ;-)https://www.theguardian.com/business/...
anyone see the latest Adam Curtis documentary yet? "Hypernormalisation" is on BBC I-Player. Don't expect it to cheer you up any
I know company finance is complicated and I may be too stupid to understand but why is Ryanair complaining about his Irish company being affected by Brexit and blaming the pound's losing value for a projected downturn. Surely his company returns are in euros. His aviation fuel etc would be bought in dollars so why he's banging on about the pound isn't clear to me. Makes good headlines though for remainers.
Brexit seems to be used right now as a convenient reason for everything, no doubt the recent rainfall will be factored in soon as because of the referendum?
Another interesting article As the chap said it probably won't be possible for us to negotiate a deal with 27 states any one of which could veto it because they didn't get what they wanted.
I think we've just got to go with hard brexit and then do deals on single issues, such as join residence for each others nationals, access to health services etc
I don't think the EU would be willing to accept a free trade deal with us, unless we came inside their tariff wall and we did no trade deals with anybody else
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2...
Short term pain, long term gain seems to be the mantra. Let's hope so.
Worth contemplating, in view of that: if we had stayed in, the chance of the 50% Rebate being renewed must be miniscule.
We've suffered worse without any particular thing to blame. I can remember a time in the mid 70's when our mortgage interest rate was over 16% - we coped then with 2 young children to feed & clothe and I was only working part-time then.............. and no, we didn't have well paid jobs! My husband was working in the local paper mills and I was just starting my Nurse training.
yep we hit 22% on our business overdraft!
That was an awful time. Our mortgage went up by 50%. I wasn't working as our daughter was small. There was no maternity leave provision. The co-op nearby had ticket upon ticket with the price increases on food. No bar codes then. Husband applied for a job in Zambia. We had much too much month left at the end of his salary.
Meanwhile the EU trade deal with Canada appears to be held up (again) awaiting the agreement of the Regional Assembly of Wallonia, population the same size as Cardiff.I conclude that meaningful negotiations with the EU are impossible.
Nevermind. All we'd send over is beaver tails and poutine.
Eu is rubbish.... blah blah... new trade deals impossible... this may be true but you wait and see what trade deals we secure outside of it
Patti (baconater) wrote: "Nevermind. All we'd send over is beaver tails and poutine."How ya gonna keep 'em eatin' chili cheese fries with gravy, after they've had poutine?
There's trouble at t'moulin. The demonstration by the French police is really gaining ground. The 500 or so who marched last week in support of their collègues who were deliberately firebombed and burnt last week at Evry have been sanctioned and the head of the police has told them that the igpn will be investigating them. He was jeered on leaving the meeting and there's an even larger demo in Paris tonight with other regions supporting them. Its bad when the government is not supporting the upholders of the law.
The French government over the years has always had a strange relationship with 'the servants of the state'Isn't there a Yes Primeminister quote where a French government minister says that the government never knows what the secret service are doing?
This particular French government doesn't seem to know what anything is doing. There's a growing groundswell that some sections of the community are literally getting away with murder while commenting or protesting legitimately is not only punished but with relish. I followed the General Piquemal story with interest. He dared to join a protest march organised by various groups including Pegida but he wasn't of that group, about the situation at Calais and the videos and treatment of the old man who did nothing more than attend a march was shocking. He was co-operating with the dispersal order but because he was a very respected retired army general he was dragged along the floor then kept in detention in an alleged cold bare hangar type place for 72 hours. He was hospitalised afterwards. This was to teach decent people a lesson to keep their traps shut, purely and simply. Look what we can do to you if you dare oppose us. He has now been stripped of all rank and presumably his pension. The march last night of ordinary police wasn't reported at all in some newspapers. There are a couple of divisions the BAC and IGPN who enforce the governments wishes with the compliance of the media who censor anything not favourable to ministers. It's fear for livelihoods and censorship that is keeping the people down but it's really bubbling in parts. The dismantling of the Jungle and distributing thousands of people to reception centres where they don't want to go to and they aren't wanted is appalling. Sending 80 adult men of totally different ethnic origin to a mountain village in haute Provence, with an ageing population of 400 is sensible or considered? Yes it's considered - who voted against the government - those villages who are being expected to assimilate and welcome the influx. Nuff said.
Always intrigued me that the people in the Jungle want to come to the UK and don't want to be in France or the rest of the EU
I recall reading in a Bernard Cornwell Sharpe novel a character saying:The French believe that they are blessed by God, and cursed with Paris.
It sounded then like something he had heard whilst researching.
I think that's very appropriate Will. It actually puzzles me why they are determined to get here. It's almost as if they've been brainwashed :o)
The whole world knows that the streets of London are paved with gold.Joking apart, though, London is a pretty amazing place. I doubt its equal exists anywhere else in the world; if it does, I've never found it.
I always felt the finest sight in London was the Platforms at Euston as you pulled out heading northI don't mind London but I'd dislike spending more than one night there :-)
David wrote: "The whole world knows that the streets of London are paved with gold.Joking apart, though, London is a pretty amazing place. I doubt its equal exists anywhere else in the world; if it does, I've ..."
I have. A little suburb in Wales - called Cardiff!!! Fantastic place to live!!
I wouldn't knock Cardiff, it has a nice 'minor European provincial capital' vibe, but it's not in the same league as London. But the North isn't in the same epoch.
Quite correct David - it's not in the same league - it's in the Premiership!!! London is only about Div. 2 as far as I'm concerned ;-)
Gotta say I'd take living in Cardiff over London any day. Actually, London is pretty far down on my list of big cities I'd be willing to live in.
My girlfriend's daughter lives in London. I cannot understand anyone spending more than 24 hours there. It would drive me mad. They all seem either mad, bad, or simply terrified.
I haven't set foot in London since the Hyde park bombings. What should have been a lovely day out turned into a nightmare.
London is fantastic, but we need to get rid of eyesores like the Palace of Westminster.
Oops! That was completely the wrong thread! Sorry!!
never mind, congratulations anyway Claire :-)
it's okay, London for the Londoners I say! Let us have our city-state status and we can set the rest of you lot adrift, I mean afloat. Bon voyage! :-)
Sort of related actually, just going through the consultation document for the reform of health services in the northern half of Cumbria. They recognise their improvements will add over 40 minutes to the length of time it takes a woman in the rural bits of Cumbria to get to a maternity ward :-(
London is welcome to go, Marc. Just pay the res of us back the tax monies that went into Crossrail... ;)
pay us all the revenues we use to stop other regions sinking into the mire :-)
I think this is one area where we find the roots of Brexit to be honest. London does contribute more per head than other regions, but there again, it gets vastly more of the investment than other regions. It's something people have realised long ago.But just as the North West's investment figures are massively distorted by Sellafield and decommissioning, so London's are by the influence of 'The City'
There is a clash of arguments, on one hand it makes sense to invest in success, where things are going well, invest to make them go better.
But on the other hand if other regions had had the same level of investment as London had, then they might well have boomed in much the same way.
Certainly there is a strong argument for switching a proportion of investment away from London. The first is the principle of picking the low hanging fruit. Because the other areas have been so under-invested, you'll get more result for the money you spend.
The second is the more long term, if global warming is a real deal, in the life time of some of the people reading this post, the sea levels will rise and the Thames will flow through the tunnels of the underground and life in large parts of London may become impossible. For some areas, investing in evacuation drills and housing in areas on higher ground might make more sense than continuing to throw money into the areas that will be under water.
Marc wrote: "pay us all the revenues we use to stop other regions sinking into the mire :-)"Scotland calling: we'd like our North Sea Oil money back :P
Jim wrote: "I think this is one area where we find the roots of Brexit to be honest. London does contribute more per head than other regions, but there again, it gets vastly more of the investment than other r..."The West Midlands was the heartbeat of the Industrial revolution - still a lot ox expertise there, and some good investment could see them take off again.
It's an interesting problem of maths and compound interest but if you work out the debt Scotland had when it joined the UK and we took on, the oil money, minus our investment capital, just about pays if off :-)
Will & Jim, yes I absolutely agree parts of the rest of the country wanted to give London (and Westminster elites) a kicking and informed their choice to vote Brexit. They may well get their wish by dragging London down towards their level if The City of London loses its financial primacy between the Far East & New York time zones and it goes instead to Frankfurt or Paris. Bang goes 10% of HMRC tax revenue. Then we can all wallow in then mire together, united in our penurious isolation. BTW for what it's worth, Arts Council England has a stated aim to move funding away from London and out to other areas of the country. Enjoy your performance artists stuffing yams up their nether regions on the public pound up there in Cockermouth and Market Deeping. We'll miss 'em
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