[Closed] Double dip recession

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How many answers do you need? Perhaps you are looking for the sugar coated magic pill that will address the structural imbalances engrained in our economy in an instant. Well good luck with the search, but do not hold your breath.

[i]I ain't gonna get any answers from solo or THM or any other of the tory apologists am i - just diversionary attacks[/i] because I am getting too old to understand or to keep pace with ideas that do not sound like my own or fly against the way I want the world to be.

T,FTFY
😉

Why repeat the question THM - hoping for an answer

so your answer is more of the same. Hmmmmmmmm it has not worked yet so more of the same will work in future. Riiiiigght. GDPdown, tax receipts down, unemployment up, inflation up. Debt incresing
its really working 🙄

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results

I've got a solution

Its radical

Make unemployed people work 30 hours a week doing community focused tasks, being led/supervised by the people who are currently being paid to do the jobs.

like litter picking!

why pay one man to pick letter, when instead you could pay him to supervise five unemployed people doing it.

Will it improve the economy? maybe, maybe not

But more importantly, it will stimulate a respect for hard work and improve the locale's of the people doing the work and their neighbours, and thats an important step to getting the country back on its feet.

Have I missed anything?

sell off profitable bits of nhs, education, police, royal mail .......

I understand unions wanting to fight for the gains they've made. I'm glad the public sector wages improved during labour's time but maybe they went too far. The public sector doesn't make money, it only spends it.

Anyway, don't worry, us designers & manufacturers will save the country by exporting stuff. Apparently.
Now that's it fashionable again 🙄

TJ and others. Dont know if you are familiar with the idea of profit and loss within business?
Basically any company has overheads that are sort of fixed and not linked to sales volume. they then have cost of sales (ie making stuff) that hopefully they can sell for a profit. If you sell enough to cover your fixed costs and your cost of sales then you break even. if you sell more then you make a profit, if you sell too little to cover fixed costs and variable costs then you make a loss.

Now extend this model to a country.
Fixed costs are the costs of society, teachers, bin men, NHS etc etc They dont on their own generate wealth for the country, but they are vital support functions to keep the country functioning.

The variable costs and profit for the country is mainly from private endeavor and the taxes etc paid by these companies and individuals.

So to keep a country solvent you have to ensure that the fixed costs (state) can be afforded by the level of income generated.

Now ok thats simplistic, because if a state worker buys from a private company then it sort of offsets a lot of the effect, but its not sustainable to have a country with huge state because it has to be paid for somehow, and state cant fund state.
Higher taxes can fund MORE state, but the balance between state and private has to be struck and Gordon swung the pendulum to far in the JEESUS WE ARE GONNA BE SKINT direction.

GDP low, flat and below trend (yes, it will flatline for quite a while, so we know what gesticulations to expect for EB), UN up pretty much guaranteed esp in financial services, public sector, young people etc and inflation yes off course (financial repression) one to stimulate growth (weaker FX) and two to erode the debt levels. We are in for a bloody tough time ahead - face it and prepare accordingly.

[i]so your answer is more of the same. Hmmmmmmmm it has not worked yet so more of the same will work in future. Riiiiigght. GDPdown, tax receipts down, unemployment up, inflation up. Debt incresing
its really working[/i]

Yeah, fixing the crap labour cooked up.
Its not like there wasn't an issue before the Cons and Libs got the keys to No 10.
Things were pretty dire.
probably why the country voted the looneys out of No 10.
😉

[i]unemployment up[/i]
Love this.
Anything to do with.... supply and demand, buy any chance.

TJ.
You do understand supply and demand, dont you ?.
Stay with me here....
Lets just suppose, theres more people than there is, jobs.
What do you think will be the outcome ?.

THATS RIGHT !, unemployment.

Phew, I hope you're staying with me here.

So, what do we do with unemploymed TJ ?....

Do we give them a government job ?.... do we, huh ?.
How will that be paid for ?.

If we're all providing services....
Who gets the bill TJ ?.

Cuts are needed.
Just how cuts are being carried out in Scotland, I've no idea.
I thought you lot had it perfect in Scotlandshire, TJ.

Is Scotlandshire in recession TJ ?.

[img] [/img]

😉

I dont think annoyone is saying we dont need cuts its just the economic policy is being driven by ideology (on both sides) not sound economic sense. We need to maintain some spending to stop the economy going to shit and yet still think long term. Privatising education and the nhs whilst keeping VAT high and reducing tax for the rich are ideaological moves which are being sold as economic necessities.

[i]We need to maintain some spending to stop the economy going to shit and yet still think long term[/i]

Unreal.

It was Labour's spending which compounded and sent the economy to the brick out house in the first place.
The rainy day came, and end to boom and bust Brown was already deeply over drawn at the bank.
🙄

Labour spent too much.

What part of that ^^^^^ don't the left understand ?.

Higher taxes can fund MORE state, but the balance between state and private has to be struck and Gordon swung the pendulum to far in the JEESUS WE ARE GONNA BE SKINT direction.

apart from our taxation is significantly below Germany, France, Netherlands, etc etc ( remember that in these countries you pay for your healthcare as well as tax)

Our state spending is also significantly below theirs

So all we get as a possible solution from teh tories is more of the same its going to get worse - welcome to the 1980s again. it worked well thendidn't it?

ah well - I'm off to work shortly. toodlehooo

What part of that ^^^^^ don't the left understand ?.

The part where national debt (as a % of GDP) was significantly lower in early 2008 than in 1997?

Stopping tax cuts might help eh solo?

If cuts are the best method to get out of recession why is Greece in the shit?
Its about balance. Labour got it wrong and now the Tories are too, because both i led by ideology not economics. You cannot cut your way out of a recession, the cuts need to be targetted. Cutting corporation tax accross the board is ideological, cutting it for small business may help.

TJ dont disagree with higher taxes in principle, if they are spent wisely. Happy to pay more personally if it benefits society. Fact is though that gordon did the spending bit, but massivley screwed up on the "lets get value for money with this extra cash" and also messed up on the "lets raise taxes and revenue to fund this".

He ran the country like a working class alcoholic with a winning lottery ticket (except the ticket was lost).

welcome to the 1980s again. it worked well thendidn't it?

Well, yes, it did actually - All that austerity in the early part of the Thatcher years, led to huge, huge gains later on, and lets consider the "purchasing power parity"

[img] ?s=gbrnygdppcapppcd&d1=19800101&d2=19970430[/img]

A_A : very interesting points, but when you get down to it how much do you [b]really[/b] think is driven by ideology rather than economic sense? Ok, I am very sceptical about governments' (of any parties) ability to proactively manage economic activity. And yes they abuse their positions, favour their friends, screw up (literally and metaphorically 😉 oh no the image of jabbing John is too much) but when all is said and done, they don't deliberately set out to screw things up. Its a funny muddle of all these things.

Take tax - ok, loads and loads of ho-hah about it, but step back and take some perspective. Economists really struggle to measure elasticity and to work out where the optimum marginal rate of tax is (ie what level maximises the overall tax take). Most put it somewhere in the mid-40%s. Any wonder why the Labour party didn't whack the MRT up to 50% earlier. Probably for the same reason as the Tories. In the end, they want to max tax revenue and their advisors (people like Davies) would have told them the same things. Then you get the usual bit of fun-and-games from Darling pre-election. Lets put it up anyway just before we are booted out because it will be a political nightmare for the Tories when they restore it back to the mid 40%. Worked a treat and how he must be smiling about it (must still be bitter about being hung out to dry during the crisis?). So they all have a bit of short term fun at our expense and then economic realities take over and they start to behave themselves again.

So governments will carry on implementing policies designed to solve the recent past up until new events overtake them (will it be Europe next?). They will then REACT and change course and the cycle will start all over. In the meantime, most of us will battle on to earn an honest crust.

[i]Its about balance. Labour got it wrong and now the Tories are too, because both i led by ideology not economics. You cannot cut your way out of a recession, the cuts need to be targetted. Cutting corporation tax accross the board is ideological, cutting it for small business may help.[/i]

I'm not entirely down with all that.

But I welcome the change of course you have taken there.

All I'll add, if I may.
Is that while we have the advantage of hindsight wrt to NuLabour.
The Cons have still to play out their hand before we can judge their efforts so comprehensively.
They are still WIP, are they not.

A_A : very interesting points, but when you get down to it how much do you really think is driven by ideology rather than economic sense? Ok, I am very sceptical about governments' (of any parties) ability to proactively manage economic activity. And yes they abuse their positions, favour their friends, screw up (literally and metaphorically  oh no the image of jabbing John is too much) but when all is said and done, they don't deliberately set out to screw things up. Its a funny muddle of all these things.

the structural changes to the nhs and education are idealogy dressed up as economics. And yes i do know that knobber blair came up with academies. The rise of private health and education is idealogical.
cutting corporation tax and the top rate of income tax whilst keeping vat high is idealogical.
Refusing to consider an overall rise in income tax burden to try and spread the pain is idealogical.
None of this is to say the last lot got it right.

But I welcome the change of course you have taken there.

wrote the same thing about five pages back actually.

From page five: To be fair to the Tories their approach is always going to take longer to work and Labours would work bettershort term with potential for problems later. Problem is when a bit of a balanced approach is needed we get dogmatic ideal driven economic policy which is **** the whole thing up.

Cannot see how this is a new stance i've taken.

I think the major problem with today's recession was the performance of the construction sector.
Economically, the constuction sector tends to act as a "leading indicator" relative to the overall economy. Usually, the country's overall economic performance will follow a similar pattern to the construction sector, with roughly a six to nine month lag.
Its also interesting that most "debt based" indicators are usually considered to be lagging indicators (6-9 months behind the overall economy). Therefore , in an economic recovery, it would be normal to expect to see the Construction sector improve, then the Overall Economy, then debt levels.

One other key aspect of the construction sector is the way it responds to investment. It's usually accepted that construction investment can be used as a driver for overall economic growth or recovery. If you invest and improve infrastructure, civil engineering, transport and the built environment then you improve the conditions for many other sectors to do business in. It has worked in pretty much every country in the world. Its an easy option for boosting growth, but one weakness of the sector can be its dependance on public investment due to the scale of the potential projects involved.

Although the overall drop today was 0.3%, the construction sector drop was measured at 3% ~ ten times worse. This could be taken as an indicator of what is to come for the overall economy. Or, it could be taken as a mismanagement of the sector and a failure of government policy. However you read it, the news is almost certainly worse than the "double dip" headlines. That's why they're claiming that the figures must be wrong this time. They're not.

edit:

The ONS said output of the production industries decreased by 0.4%, construction decreased by 3%. Output of the services sector, which includes retail, increased by 0.1%, after falling a month earlier.
It added that a fall in government spending had contributed to the particularly large fall in the construction sector.

"The huge cuts to public spending - 25% in public sector housing and 24% in public non-housing and with a further 10% cuts to both anticipated for 2013 - have left a hole too big for other sectors to fill," said Judy Lowe, deputy chairman of industry body CITB-ConstructionSkills, said.
Some have questioned the validity of the ONS's figures, particularly on the construction industry, which has been particularly volatile in recent quarters.
But Joe Grice, chief economic adviser to the ONS, said the construction data was based on a survey of 8,000 companies and had been carefully checked and double checked.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17836624

I can't believe this is still going. No wait, yes I can.

The part where national debt (as a % of GDP) was significantly lower in early 2008 than in 1997?

A-A: again interesting to hear you perspective esp on education. But a question, if I may. OK, so the introduction of comprehensive education by Castle was a major idealogical and radical move. Perhaps the abolition of public schools would be the same, albeit unlikely to ever happen. But the rest, isn't it more tinkering around a general trend? There is no wholesale privatisation of education (or healthcare) as nice as the headlines are. Nor is there a re-introduction of grammar/secondary modern (is that right?). Gov's have to manage an education budget and rather like certain PR men and gov advisors may like to overplay their real impact. But in the end, aren't the big decisions more often based on economic realities?

Personally I couldn't give a shit about some basic values that are based on outdated terms of reference.

In my view a lot og Goves changes are dressed up as money saving which is not what its about. His changes are designed to improve the standing of private schools and selective grammar schools and thus are idealogical.

The difference between Coalition and Labour spending plans over the next 5 years amounts to about £40 billion. Government spending is running at about £720billion per year. So that £40 billion amounts to a 1.1% difference in spending plans between Labour and the Coalition. So whoever thinks that things would be any better if Labour were in charge is, to quote a well known poster on here, a "fantasist". The world economy has to de-leverage and its going to take time. If you increase taxes to pay for increased public spending you'll just kill off demand. If you increase borrowing to increase public spending bond yields will rise and mortgages along with them again killing off demand. There's no easy way out of this. Like THM says we're going to be bumping along the bottom for a while so get used to it.

As far as I can tell outside of Crossrail and the Thames Tunnel there's very little major construction projects happening in the UK, and as an architect and therefore amongst the very first to feel both the downturn and (fingers crossed) upturn for those outside London/ south east the news isn't good. There is some movement in residential development appearing but not much else. Margins are down and suicidal fee bidding is causing severe pain and will result in more job losses I think during the next few months. I have been told recently that across the UK as a whole architectural fee income is projected to fall a further 15% over the next 12 months, which coming on top of the 40% drop since the peak is pretty catastrophic. The current thinking of working in the Oil states isn't necessarily panning out too well either due to interesting contractual arrangements with local clients.
As for the answer? God knows.

aP
That's bad news all round.
I'd guess architects see what the rest of construction will see about 6 months later.

building some new council houses- kil 2 birds with one redbrick?

Borrow our way out of recession had pretty much been the labour plan all along. Ass hats.

This is just a 26 v 29 debate using different references isn't it? Round and round with no progress.

Borrow our way out of [s]recession[/s] credit crisis had pretty much been the labour plan all along. Ass hats.

+1

we're truly doomed as a nation of ass hats

I think one aspect that has become clear is that the short term-ism that pervades politics is not conducive to successful economic policy. Is there another way that economic planning can be undertaken outside of government without becoming a body that could literally hold the country to ransom?

I think one aspect that has become clear is that the short term-ism that pervades politics is not conducive to successful economic policy. Is there another way that economic planning can be undertaken outside of government without becoming a body that could literally hold the country to ransom?

Dictatorship.

😉

Is there another way that economic planning can be undertaken outside of government...

I think you'll find that economics is politics in its purest form, so divorcing the two would be problematic.

CaptainFlashheart - Member
Dictatorship.

F*** it, let's do it. At least we wouldn't be lying to ourselves anymore.

F*** it, let's do it.

Well we have a banker's dictatorship - won't that do ?

[i]"As a minister, I experienced the power of industrialists and bankers to get their way by use of the crudest form of economic pressure, even blackmail, against a Labour Government. Compared to this, the pressure brought to bear in industrial disputes is minuscule. This power was revealed even more clearly in 1976 when the IMF secured cuts in our public expenditure. These lessons led me to the conclusion that the UK is only superficially governed by MPs and the voters who elect them. Parliamentary democracy is, in truth, little more than a means of securing a periodical change in the management team, which is then allowed to preside over a system that remains in essence intact. If the British people were ever to ask themselves what power they truly enjoyed under our political system they would be amazed to discover how little it is, and some new Chartist agitation might be born and might quickly gather momentum"[/i]

T. Benn

ernie_lynch - Member
I think you'll find that economics is politics in its purest form, so divorcing the two would be problematic.

Has it ever been divorced?

I understand what you're saying but is that because of politicians approaching economists with a 'we want this, please work out a model for us'/economists looking for economic answers to political questions rather than starting with a 'what would be the most sustainable way to run an economy'?

Guess it comes back to what kaesae (sp?) was saying earlier with regards to (what I understood to be) a resource based economy.

But could one country run a resource based economy? Surely it would take every country working in 'I'd like to teach the world to sing' harmony to achieve this?

It is because the only power that matters is economic power. If the government doesn't have economic power then it doesn't have power.

Dictatorship

TJ in charge, that ok with everyone?

.

that ok with everyone?

I'm not sure whether you've quite got the hang of this dictatorship malarkey.

😀 @ Ernie!

It's what I like to call consultative dictatorship, it's the way forward IMO.

Ernie, that's the best post of the thread. But shouldn't it have been on the jokes page. On a par with the best of them

They TB quote was interesting, but surprised that neither he nor anyone else mention the civil servants. How much power does the W'hall apparatus yield behind the scenes?

kimbers - Member

building some new council houses- kil 2 birds with one redbrick?

ernie_lynch - Member
F*** it, let's do it.
Well we have a banker's dictatorship - won't that do ?

"As a minister, I experienced the power of industrialists and bankers to get their way by use of the crudest form of economic pressure, even blackmail, against a Labour Government. Compared to this, the pressure brought to bear in industrial disputes is minuscule. This power was revealed even more clearly in 1976 when the IMF secured cuts in our public expenditure. These lessons led me to the conclusion that the UK is only superficially governed by MPs and the voters who elect them. Parliamentary democracy is, in truth, little more than a means of securing a periodical change in the management team, which is then allowed to preside over a system that remains in essence intact. If the British people were ever to ask themselves what power they truly enjoyed under our political system they would be amazed to discover how little it is, and some new Chartist agitation might be born and might quickly gather momentum"

T. Benn

This.

So how to end it?

It's fairly simple, and i think do able if I still had that youthful fire of enthusiasm.

Basically what is needed is an egalitarian call to arms, not necessarily a 'bloody revolution' but certainly a revolt against the current system.

The weapon a seriously organised group called use?

Tax Strike.

'They couldn't jail all of us'

So if all the tax paying individuals could come together and demand a different system, a system where the politico's have to have had some experience in the real world before they become politico's, a sensible citizens charter of rights and responsibilities, maybe even a proper constitution.
A value scale of a mans worth, a day of his labour, a scale of when enough to live forever without working anymore, is enough and excess is not necessary at the detriment of others.
The level of profit that may be extracted from the proletariat by those that would supply essential services.

Etc etc, I'm sure a set of aspirations could be drawn up, a political movement established with the ultimate threat of withdrawal of funding for the current bunch if they do not accede to the demands, or of course a party could be formed an election fought in the old style but I doubt it would be as effective.

Just to give some balance from quoting a Labour Party sympathiser, today the Telegraph delivers much the same message:

[b]None the less, the significance of a double dip is more political than economic.[/b] Even if the GDP had grown a little, depriving Mr Balls of this moment of triumph, it wouldn’t have changed the big picture, which is of an economy deeply impaired by a continuing banking crisis. The gap between 0.1 per cent growth and a 0.2 per cent contraction is too small to be of anything more than symbolic importance....

[b]The all-too-depressing reality of this downturn is that there are no quick fixes. [/b]If the Chancellor made a [b]mistake, it was in believing that the mere act of deficit reduction would rekindle growth.[/b] This was never very likely with everyone else – households, banks and major export markets in the eurozone and beyond – all deleveraging at one and the same time. [b]But this doesn’t mean that the strategy is wrong.[/b]

An overblown banking sector makes Britain particularly vulnerable to the sort of sovereign debt and financial market contagion we have seen sweep the eurozone. To engage in further fiscal stimulus at a time when the Government is already adding to the national debt at the rate of about 10 per cent of GDP a year would be to take extreme risks with interest rates. Any significant rise in the cost of money for a country as indebted as Britain would be catastrophic.

[b]The differences between Labour and the Coalition on macro-economic policy are in any case more about rhetoric than substance. [/b]Continued economic contraction has caused the automatic stabilisers to kick in, slowing the pace of deficit reduction to one that is actually not so very different to that planned by Labour before it lost power. [b]In a way, the Government is already doing what Labour demands, [/b]to the dismay of those who thought a Tory-led administration would match words with actions in pursuit of a smaller state. The automatic stabilisers of welfare spending would in many other countries, including the US, be counted as a discretionary fiscal stimulus.

It has long seemed to me that the Government has got the broad outline of the consolidation about right – just enough to keep the markets sweet, but not so big that it causes a vicious cycle of decline in the economy. [b]Yet whether it is right about the composition of deficit reduction is much more questionable.[/b]

[i]anagallis_arvensis - Member

But I welcome the change of course you have taken there.

wrote the same thing about five pages back actually.
[/i]

That wasn't what I was referring to.
🙄

Anyway, Excellent !.
The bickering, it would seem, knows no end.
I am not amazed.
Are we getting anywhere ?.
Should I forward this thread to the Treasury, in order to enlighten them ?.
Don't any of us have bikes to ride, clean, maintain ?.
😀

Here !
[img] [/img]

[i]the significance of a double dip[/i]

Is that there isn't one.

How can you have a [i]double dip[/i] recession ?.

You've all been duped, again, by the popular media.

Contraction, is, err, contraction.
Eventually, contraction stops.
It stops when we have growth.
If, at some later point, growth stops and we have contraction.
Thats not a double dip is it.
😆

It is because the only power that matters is economic power.

If the government doesn't have economic power then it doesn't have power.

How can we expect to have exponential growth? Everything has to contract some time, the illusion of endless growth hides the truth - it's a requirement to keep the current economic framework together and is only possible because of borrowing and inflation. Inflation is theft.

tonyd: well spoken.

The significance is not the "double dip". When your bumping along the bottom there will be little ups and little downs, -0.2% is not the end of the world.
The significance is the -3% in a key economic leading indicator, the construction sector.
If the Office for National Statistics is accurate, and why would they be wrong this time, then expect things to get much worse this year.

How can we expect to have exponential growth? Everything has to contract some time

We all know this. But somehow [s]the morons[/s] our lords and masters have managed to base the entire global financial system on the assumption that it is. Great!

Actually, everyone knows it can't go on for ever, but people can continue to make money out of it whilst it is going on.

With the dotcom boom, analysts kept saying 'why did no-one see this coming?' Everyone knew it was coming, but people were keeping it going as long as possible so they could keep converting artificially created money into real money in their own bank accounts.

However this is a little more fundamental. People are already beginning to wonder when they will have to change tack and start investing in alternatives.

I agree that those in the know want to keep the plates spinning to get that last few quid, or to pull money out before it hits the fan. Twas ever thus.

My problem is that it's the 'ordinary' folk who are spoon fed nonsense by the politicians and main stream media that are left in that Wile E Coyote predicament - still running when the ground has disappeared from under them. It's these people that get affected the most, and they're the ones that can least afford it.

I know we are all ultimately responsible for our own actions but not everyone has the time to understand what is happening (or wants to face the truth of it). If only someone in the public eye had the fortitude to stop lying and stand up and tell us how it really is - the party is over and now it's time to take the pain. The sooner we take that pain and readjust the sooner we can recover and rebuild.

How can we expect to have exponential growth? Everything has to contract some time

We all know this. But somehow the morons our lords and masters have managed to base the entire global financial system on the assumption that it is. Great!

Don't worry - the google guys are going to get stuff from asteroids!

GDP can keep increasing. Back to business as usual. Carry on.

Tonyd: amen, again.

I know we are all ultimately responsible for our own actions but not everyone has the time to understand what is happening (or wants to face the truth of it). If only someone in the public eye had the fortitude to stop lying and stand up and tell us how it really is - the party is over and now it's time to take the pain. The sooner we take that pain and readjust the sooner we can recover and rebuild.

Ultimately I agree with most of this, except.... The people taking the pain are those who were least at fault, and those can can least afford it, while those at the top continue on their merry way with no pain whatsoever. If we were talking about everyone having to readjust lifestyles etc I'd be right there with you.

The fact is there is still lots of money floating around, but more and more of it is in the hands of an ever shrinking group of people.

Could be that one of the biggest problems is the proliferation of virtual money. If I sell my house and buy another, larger house and take out a bigger mortgage, then the person that buys my house transfers money from his lender to my lender and I transfer money from mylender for my new house, no "real" cash changes hands and this process pyramids onwards and upwards. As long as everyone in the chain plays the game and keeps making the payments, then it's happy days. The trouble is when the links start to break up the whole thing falls apart and people start looking round for the "real" money that never existed in the first place.

Good point & people like me are waiting for that to happen so I could maybe actually afford a house.

There is such a massive vested interest from the majority in keeping house prices up, whatever it takes.

oooooo: We probably frequent other forums. HPC?

pyramids

grum - I'm with you, which is why I said earlier that it's those that can least afford it that get hit the hardest. For those lucky enough to be in the right place the gravy train continues, but for the vast majority of us the sooner the profligacy ends and we cut our cloth accordingly the better.

As for houses, don't get me started. We've been trying to find something reasonably priced for 3 years now, unfortunately we live in one of the more affluent areas of the country. Folk round here refuse to accept that things aren't what they were and still expect the same paper profit they thought they had 5 years ago. Some sell, a lot don't.

Edit: I lurk at HPC 🙂

Housing sums up why the notion of a quick recovery is flawed.

Mortgages on paper look cheap - the Halifax Mortgage Earnings Ratio is well below the 83-12 average in all regions and at a minimum in Scotland. But can you actually get the mortgage in the first place?

House prices on the other hand remain above the same average in all regions except Scotland. The housing market is not working properly. Supply seems still to be limited and therefore prices remain too high.

Another reason why and overreliance on QE is an error.

http://www.lloydsbankinggroup.com/media1/economic_insight/halifax_house_price_index_page.asp

What's HPC Matt? I definitely don't post there 🙂

HPC = [url= http://www.housepricecrash.co.uk/ ]House Price Crash[/url]

Very informative and active forum. As with most places there are some loons, but there is also a lot of very good commentary and analysis. Recommended reading if you're a bit disillusioned with the cost of housing and state of the economy in general.

Well none solution to this might be to build infrastructure - perhaps council houses - jobs in construction, money into the economy, something concrete at the end of it.

Rather better than paying people to sit around doing nowt, could even have some apprenticeships as well.

WE might as well get something concrete for the money rather than paying people to sit around doing nowt.

id call my self a socialist tory. clearly the coalitions plan has nt worked how they would have liked.. but which country is booming in europe? where is the share price up inflation at 2.5 of less and growth of 3-5%? where has not had to make cuts reduce spending?
which countries have carried on spending the way they were or even increased?
i dont see a ''viable alternative way'' if i was borrowing 25% of what i was spending each week i'd have to stop spending at some point it seems simple to me.
as for a double dip recession.. in rochdale were still on the way down on the first one 0.1% 0.3% makes NO difference either way to me or mine or thousands locally
practically for me things cost more esp. fuel of all types the shopping costs more. my income is static mrs tts income is static (for 3 years now and two more predicted)
so we ve done what i assume everyone has done .. reduced spending paid off debts hunker down till the storm blows over. i cant see anyone whose spending more and borrowing more to pay for it.

id call my self a socialist tory. clearly the coalitions plan has nt worked how they would have liked.. but which country is booming in europe?

I'm not sure why you think the coalition plans have "not worked how they would have liked". There was always an extremely high risk that the UK would experience a so-called "double-dip" recession - a whole broad spectrum of people predicted that precisely this would happen, and Cameron and Osborne aren't exactly what you could describe as "stupid", no matter how much anyone might disagree with them.

I think the coalition strategy (at least the Tory's strategy - let's face it they are the ones calling all the shots) is very much going to plan. Had the UK not gone into a double-dip recession (with a lot of luck that might have been possible) then that simply would have been a huge bonus. But shrinking 0.02% or growing 0.01% has minimal effect, apart from the significance of newspaper headlines.

As far as which country in Europe is booming is concerned, well you have to see it in the context that out of the 27 EU countries, for example, 24 of them have conservative governments, so you can expect them all to follow very simular economic policies. There are countries in the world who's economies are "booming" but you generally need to look beyond Europe. Although Europe does provide some stunning examples of how austerity doesn't work.

ernie_lynch - Member
There was always an extremely high risk that the UK would experience a so-called "double-dip" recession - [b]a whole broad spectrum of people predicted that precisely this would happen,[/b] and Cameron and Osborne aren't exactly what you could describe as "stupid", no matter how much anyone might disagree with them.

...I guess we should count the OBR out in terms of this broad spectrum of people (oh, and the BoE!). Economic forecasting is a perilous occupation at the best of times but the new and the old here have hardly covered themselves in forecasting glory. Still they can join big-hitters like Roubini!! 😉 (although not get paid like him!]

If I tossed a coin and asked the media to comment on it, 50% of them would write about how great they are and how they saw heads coming but none of the tailers listened to them...

Oh dear, the news from Spain puts yet another nail in the coffin of a speedy recovery. Without an attempt at an orderly re-alignment of FX rates into a 2 or 3 speed Europe I fail to see how the outlook can improve.

24% UN and 52% for the <25 years - leaving aside Spain's structural issues, how can locking yourself into an uncompetitive exchange rate help? How terrible for the youth of Spain.

24% UN and 52% for the <25 years - leaving aside Spain's structural issues, how can locking yourself into an uncompetitive exchange rate help? How terrible for the youth of Spain.

Except the figures are bollocks. There's a huge undeclared economy here, there's nowhere near 24% unemployment.

Still high enough, of course, but it's nothing like as high as the official figures.

Oh look

Usa, Germany. UK all followed similar policies until the tories got in when no more stimulus only cuts applied by the tories

read the graph and weep

[img] [/img]
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2012/apr/25/uk-sinks-double-dip-recession-gdp

~countries that are following sensible mixed policies are doing far better than we are - the tories only success is in persuading folk that the cuts are right - they are clearly wrong. Just look at the date the graphs diverge

MOlgips - read my history - i predicted this 18 months ago - it was that obvious that a nurse with no economic training but a smattering of sense could see it was going to happen. tory supporters - you have been conned

teamhurtmore - Member

I fail to see how the outlook can improve.

Open your eyes to the alternative to the Tory cuts - open your mind.

yes you fail to see it because you are wedded to the tory austerity agenda and you believe as axioms the assumptions backing this.

Economic stimulus is required. construction sector mainly. Lets build houses.
fur hunnere 🙂