I almost replied on this yesterday but didn't. Exporting more than you import is not the great thing you make it. Japan did it for years with a huge imbalance (positive) of payments and it just caused a problem. Again Japan is trying to export more at the moment by devaluing its currency, so where does that sit with your model? The value of your currency is made up of a number of elements in these welcome days (outside of the EU) of floating currency rates. If Scotland had its own currency and allowed it to float it would weaken against the £.
The currency is the biggest issue for as I have mentioned already it cannot be considered an asset as it is a unit of measurement and has no value in itself which can be divided. Alex Salmond sought to make it an asset to create this bogus idea that we had some obligation to share it. No country is obliged to form a currency union with another however due to the inherent risks. When he then suggested Scotland would welch on it's share of the national debt (much of which was run up bailing out banks of which RBS was a huge beneficiary) he played on an insecurity for the RUK as this would not have been good for us. In truth it would have been unlikely he would have done so as he would likely have ensured Scotland be possibly rejected by many other countries and institutions. The amount of countries who came out in favour of the union and the worries of nations such as Spain who fear their own break up could have led to Scotland starting out as a bit of a basket case. If establishing their own currency ( soros rubbing his hands together already) they would likely have found it much weaker against the pound in little time at all and it could have caused huge devaluation in pensions and savings etc. The Euro option would have taken time and met likely resistance, so what it would likely have done is kept the pound without a currency union, meaning Independence was purely a notion held within the imagination and that the country was far from independent when another controls the currency you are choosing to use. I feel the Euro or their own currency is the only way to go but it's a long term strategy which will likely mean some short to medium term pain. Had the UK not been exposed to risk due to the National debt and trident AS would have had no bargaining chips at all and the argument would likely have never got off the ground, he would have been coming down with his mandate without any bargaining power at all. The RUK now have time to get their house in order to ensure they are not as vulnerable to such things when the question come around again.
Mick, as I am the one who supposedly has no idea, it is strange how I remember some important facts from the world outside of Scotland. You might have heard of a Canadian called Mark Carney. He is not a politician, he is the Governor of the Bank Of England. He made a speech the week before the vote in which he categorically ruled out a currency union. In the world according to Alex Salmond (a non-Westminster elected liar) they were going to share the Pound. That was why all of the financial institutions registered in Edinburgh had plans to re-register in London on Friday morning. Plus there was talk of a run on the banks as people took their money out, drove South of the Border and re-deposited it. The top honcho at the EU had warned Scotland that they would not automatically get membership. Several leaders of failing EU members had expressed their view that a “No” result would be the best result. The ability to trade with Europe is not contingent upon membership of the EU. If we quit the failing socialist project, we can still trade with them just like non-members do. Fascinating notion that RUK would lose its seat on the Security Council over Trident. Did that one come from Alex Salmond? The Irish “Tiger” economy was founded on an unrealistic expectation. It crashed and burned, they needed a bailout from the ECB as the Euro nosedived and they even received a bailout from us. I would suggest that it might be an idea to look at all the jobs that the defence industry actually creates in Scotland. Not just the RAF and Naval bases but the employment that creates in the surrounding environs supplying services. There are vast oil reserves off the coast of Scotland but as they become more and more difficult to realise (or possibly uneconomic) and the money has been spent on welfare and cannot be replaced, just where does the Scottish economy go? I would suggest that you go and look at the history of Scotland’s Parliamentary seats. You only have to go back over the last thirty years to find that there actually used to be quite a lot of Conservative MPs. It is one of the vagaries of our First Past The Post political system that they have virtually no representation North of the Border at this time as Scots have become more socialist and Nationalist. Here in Yorkshire, I live in a safe loony left Labour constituency but I never vote. Miliband wants to kick the West Lothian Question into the long grass because he knows that he can never govern without his 41 Jock MPs voting on laws that do not apply in their own constituencies.
Mick, what did I argue? I couldn't and wouldn't argue on this topic as I haven't a clue . Fascinating though.
I can visualise a new Faulty Towers sketch. "You started it", " No I didn't", "Yes you did, when you mentioned monetary union" [video=youtube;yfl6Lu3xQW0]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yfl6Lu3xQW0[/video]
Sorry Bluesky, of course a currency has value. The Exchange rate is a price, nothing more nothing less. Every time you change money you ask what is the price of your notes and coins. And like most prices it goes up and down depending on the perceived value.
You are referring to an exchange rate Bustino, this is just changing one unit of measurement for another, what you are purchasing however is not an asset just another unit of currency WHICH then you can buy assets with in your new unit, so to explain using your example a dollar and a pound are both units of measurement and if you exchange a dollar for a pound you get a variable amount of the other depending on the current rates. Currency as measured by the above units can be used to buy assets such as property or goods or services but you can not divide the unit of measurement in the way AS was asking. What he wanted was permission to use the same unit of currency and when refused stated we had no right to refuse as it is an asset. It makes no sense. You can share a certain sum of currency such as £10 but it's value is only due to what it represents as purchasing power not the unit itself. So what we could divide with Scotland is everything that has value but you cannot divide the unit used to measure the value. Were you to be married and then divorce there will be a division of assets, you will likely divide property, savings, investments etc , you would have negotiations upon how much each asset was worth using the local unit of currency and then a division of each, you would never raise the question with your ex-wife of sharing the unit itself in which the value of the property were measured because it is nonsensical. You could divide the sum of savings but again they only represent their purchasing power. We all knew what AS meant but his request should have been honest and put like this We need to use your currency which is backed by the Bank of England as if we don't we have no alternative which I could promote with any real credibility at present, I need something to persuade you to allow me this and I have some bargaining chips which I am now going to attempt to use. I will walk away from my percentage of the debt we both ran up if you don't let me. I don't actually want to be so humble as to recognise I am asking you for something however you see, so I am going to dress it up as our right, to do this I am going to claim it as an asset. So my claim is that sterling is a unit of measurement and cannot be divided in itself and that what was sought was permission to use it. If you are claiming sterling itself is an asset how much is it worth? and what unit are you now using to measure the previous unit?
Mark Johnston could not vote as he lives in England Lucinda Russell had let it be known she was voting "no thanks"
Fascinating stuff but this could be debated forever without actually getting anywhere. How about taking up my challenge earlier (here)?
There is no where for it to get Ron as it is just a debate, none of the debates we have on here end up anywhere beyond a sharing of views and opinions. It's a good idea what you suggest but it's impossible to do without accurate figures. We would be producing our equivalent of AS's white paper which ran into many hundreds of pages and even then was highly disputable due to the figures being estimated on many issues.
That's the problem Blue, 100s of pages. A few pages with the most significant facts and reasoning is what's needed. All the calculations and trivia should be out of the way. A management summary so to speak. Worst scenario, best scenario, most likely scenario. Recommendations to investigate further the most significant areas of uncertainty.etc
I don't think Nobel Prize Laureates will agree with you about Currency Bluesky. But I'm bowing out now anyway.
Money in the bank is an asset, it doesn't actually have to buy anything. Even at zero interest, it's still considered an asset.
Yes a sum of money is an asset and of course can be divided. If the UK had a bank account with 500 million pound in it that can be considered an asset and be divided. AS was stating the currency unit itself was an asset, he was not asking that we share £5 million pound he was asking that we share the £ itself as a unit. I am not sure what a noble prize laureate would say Bustino but I am pretty sure an economist would understand the difference.
