Kaiserschmarrn wrote:The vast majority of welfare spending has nothing to do with economic recessions and we'd need it even if there were none.
Kaiser do I have to go and do a graph of the history of the welfare state in the UK from its inception to now and have to pull out speeches on the Parliament floor of why it was adopted and who were the ones fighting to not fund the welfare state? Do you have an idea of why it is necessary? What happens to workers who are laid off their jobs sometimes jobs they have worked for decades because the capitalist industry changes and they either have to fold or move out of the country to make higher profit margins Kaiser? If there is no welfare at all? How do these workers fare in the UK? Do they stay at home watching their bank accounts hit zero and getting turned out in the street for lack of funds to pay the rent? What kind of anger does this kind of lay off produce? Didn't you have some 'troubles' in the 1980's with the coal miners in Northern English cities because of lay offs or lack of work? As a government if you are feeling a bunch of angry workers hitting your streets and creating chaos and mayhem what solution is there to that but some kind of economic band aid to keep people from exploding politically and financially against the upper classes? Do you think Tories think giving away money from taxes is done because they care about the working class? Tories according to Corbyn have been taking payoffs to cut or slash public services? Why? If they are all loving the working classes? Explain. Discuss Kaiser. Go ahead?
Seems to me that Charles Dickens wrote some fictional novels that I loved called
Oliver Twist,
Little Dorrit and many others that were about child labor, poverty, work houses, debtors prisons in England of the 19th century. It wasn't a pretty picture. How did these nasty by products of the Industrial Revolution of Capitalism in England suddenly get transformed into the modern welfare state we witness today? Because the Toffs and the upper classes grew a heart and decided the suffering had to be dealt with? Or was it some kind of political pressure that was unbearable and the upper crust House of Lords had to concede some public funds to avoid being routed or beaten politically? Go ahead give me your non-economic explanation Kaiser I am all ears.
With the exception of the Brexit party, the Tories are the party which is most in line with the democratic will expressed in the referendum. Those MPs who wish to obstruct or downright ignore the referendum result come mainly from parties further to the left.
The Tories were benefiting from the EU as your earlier graph stated (the upper income people were pro EU remainers, the supposedly lower income bracket were not generally wanting to stay in the EU and were Brexiters). So it is up to you to prove why the lower bracket people are not happy with that and apparently they outnumber in democratic votes the remainers. More lower bracket income British citizens than Toffs and middle class ones. So? Why aren't they happy? You tell me? I gave you my take on why they are not happy. They don't see real economic benefits and more economic ills in remaining. A conflict of class interests. Classic Marxist theory explains it. Not Tory double speak. Next.
Maybe you can educate me then. If we have no state to force people to pay their taxes, where does the money for welfare come from?
You need to open a book on socialism. I already told you what kind of socialist I am Kaiser. International Socialist. E. Fromm school of Humanist Communitarian Socialism. I also back Richard Wolff's form of Economic development. That is WHO I AM. Not an anarchist. But you need an education on anarchism. One of the best is talking to that 16 year old new member who lives in Damascus, Syria who knows his Anarchism front and back, right and left. Or go to the anarchism threads and figure it out. There are actual societies that thrived under Anarchism. Most of the most successful ones were Spanish Anarchists who had schools, communities and a lot more that did collect forms of communal money and ran a structure that functioned stateless. But I am not surprised you never heard of them because instead of being thorough and being able to attack with knowledge your ideological or political enemies with some real knowledge on every damn political philosophy out there you run around assuming and not reading hard facts and definitions on every type of political thought. A sign of a non-intellectual thinker Kaiser. Do your homework. You are a moderator in an international politics forum not in a Tory only website where everyone agrees. If I were debating anarchists? I would be studying a lot of anarchist theory. How else would I defend my international socialism which does still use a state structure Kaiser. It is not a Tory conservative rotten value one for sure. Lol. Ave Maria mujer.....a trabajar. Work!
Anarchy might not be your ideal, but you prefer it over a Tory government, which means you prefer no state compared to one with the Tories in power which dedicates most of its 40% of GDP spending on welfare, pensions, healthcare or education, around GBP500 billion in total. How do you propose these services would be provided under your preferred anarchic system?
See above answer. The anarchist literature is in these fora. Go and read them and analyze and distill anarchist theory. Go and ask anarchist members on here who are good at defending it. There are societies that function without a state structure. Do your political homework. My homework and promotion of political philosophies is international socialism not anarchism. The reason why the Tories are brought kicking and screaming into spending billions is called, political pressure from the working classes and keeping capitalists from spending on working families from their pockets. Farm it out to the state so they can keep more of their monies. The excuse they give is that the state is doing a bang up job and they can keep wages low and profits high for investors in their industries. Until another crisis happens. Politics Kaiser is about what politicians are pressured into conceding not in what they think is the 'moral' thing. Didn't you notice that before unemployment insurance, welfare cash payments, free health care, and food allotments for widows, and for seniors and dependent children, etc. what would happen to those people and what kind of political problems arose if you ignored them for a long time? Have you studied the history of the welfare state in your nation? NZ or in the UK? Figure it out.
The main issue was that decisions about the UK be made in the UK and not in Brussels.
Didn't the EU explain to Westminster what joining up would entail according to the EU member rules? If the UK agreed? Then they need to hold up their part of their agreements. If they want to dissolve the relationship? Accept the economic hit. That is the way the cookie crumbles Kaiser. For international pacts and agreements.
I'm not so paternalistic to assume that working class people can't make their own minds up and must be "exploited" if they don't vote as I want them to vote. What I'm pointing out to you is that in reality your assumptions about them aren't correct. People don't define themselves entirely by their income and their preferences in the value domain are generally more aligned with conservatives.
Tories are treating them like children. Their job in a democracy is to reflect their will. If that means blowing up their preferences for remaining because their socioeconomic class is not happy with the will of the Brexiters? So be it. Suck it up. Lol. But they are bucking under the pressure because they are found out for the two faced liars that they are. They want to go against the will of the lower bracket income people because it goes against their own interests. Now they are exposed and it is a mess. People don't define themselves by their incomes? How many people of all income brackets in the UK have to sit down and assess every day practically if they are earning enough money to pay their homes, their bills, their debts and their children's needs and educations? How much are income considerations affecting this UK PM choice and the problems associated with frustrations with the system both political and economic in the UK? If everything is ok on the homefront there in the UK then why all this anxiety?
That is your society Kaiser....I don't patronize working class or underclass people. I am come from extremely poor people from the lowest class in my own societies. It just so happens they (my people or family) got an education
despite all the issues with others trying to deny them everything. A few people survive all the bullshit Kaiser and become leaders despite being thrown with every damn obstacle known to humankind.
People are not passive victims Kaiser. All of them watch all these two faced liars and know exactly how rotten it all is. Many think the others are non thinkers. Nothing could be further from the truth. People watch their socioeconomic status like hawks...watching for many things. That is what political conflicts often are Kaiser, differing power groups fighting and pressuring for their interests.
@skinster I think Corbyn is a consistent dude. That is how he gained a lot of power when before it was less. Being consistent. That is a good thing in a lot of opportunistic boot lickers.