Scotch Independence - the countdown

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Should Scotland be an Independent Country?

  • Yes

  • No

Results are only viewable after voting.
Spurf said:
Good question Mick and there are no guarantees of course but Scotland by its very nature is more likley to elect a left of centre government than a right wing government. The Labour party would heve to revert to something like its original self to become electable and anyway it would not be under pressure to appeal to so called middle Englanders as it has to now. The common Weal http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/common-weal-splits-from-reid-foundation.24935918 Is an example of how a growing number of people are looking at new ways for an Independent Scotland to be.

There is no point in voting for Independence just to become a smaller version of the Westminster project. This YES movement is now big enough and diverse enough that it will continue whatever the outcome of THIS referrendum, it's not going away, any time soon. I am working with Business for Scotland which I have mentioned before, this is over 2200 |Scottish companies who realise the potential of an Independent Scotland to have a prosporous exciting future rather just more of the austerity from Westminster so that they can finish their rape job. http://www.businessforscotland.co.uk/
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If you sit down and look at the figures, Government spending is approaching 50% of GDP. The question is what is an acceptable level before it starts killing growth? The darling economist of the Left, John Maynard Keynes stated that Government spending should never go past 25% of GDP in a healthy economy, that was back in the 30's when he was trying to encourage the Government to up it's spending from about 10% of GDP. If you think the UK is too neo-Liberal - what level of state spending are you suggesting in an independent Scotland?

The Tories are actually struggling to keep it below 50% at the minute, despite all the cuts - the UK is now paying £50 billion a year in interest to keep up the spending - if that interest was not there they could up the NHS budget by nearly 50%. The state's inability to control itself could be literally killing people, and we can't have a reasoned argument on how we fix it without ****s shouting about food banks or just demanding that we tax the baws out of all the rich ****s. How about you don't overspend in the first place (or maybe save a bit of money, like Norway!). It's ok blaming the banks, but Gordon Brown was borrowing £30bn a year during the boom, which hardly left the country in a good position when it all went tits up.

I couldn't find a chart for the UK (in 60 seconds of Googling), but here is the US figures for the last 100 years which closely mirror the UK. I'm not being a neo-Liberal when I point out that we can't keep growing the state at these levels, I'm being a realist.

You must log in or register to see images
 
MalteseMick said:
If you sit down and look at the figures, Government spending is approaching 50% of GDP. The question is what is an acceptable level before it starts killing growth? The darling economist of the Left, John Maynard Keynes stated that Government spending should never go past 25% of GDP in a healthy economy, that was back in the 30's when he was trying to encourage the Government to up it's spending from about 10% of GDP. If you think the UK is too neo-Liberal - what level of state spending are you suggesting in an independent Scotland?

The Tories are actually struggling to keep it below 50% at the minute, despite all the cuts - the UK is now paying £50 billion a year in interest to keep up the spending - if that interest was not there they could up the NHS budget by nearly 50%. The state's inability to control itself could be literally killing people, and we can't have a reasoned argument on how we fix it without ****s shouting about food banks or just demanding that we tax the baws out of all the rich ****s. How about you don't overspend in the first place (or maybe save a bit of money, like Norway!). It's ok blaming the banks, but Gordon Brown was borrowing £30bn a year during the boom, which hardly left the country in a good position when it all went tits up.

I couldn't find a chart for the UK (in 60 seconds of Googling), but here is the US figures for the last 100 years which closely mirror the UK. I'm not being a neo-Liberal when I point out that we can't keep growing the state at these levels, I'm being a realist.

You must log in or register to see images
Click to expand...

^this^
 
MalteseMick said:
If you sit down and look at the figures, Government spending is approaching 50% of GDP. The question is what is an acceptable level before it starts killing growth? The darling economist of the Left, John Maynard Keynes stated that Government spending should never go past 25% of GDP in a healthy economy, that was back in the 30's when he was trying to encourage the Government to up it's spending from about 10% of GDP. If you think the UK is too neo-Liberal - what level of state spending are you suggesting in an independent Scotland?

The Tories are actually struggling to keep it below 50% at the minute, despite all the cuts - the UK is now paying £50 billion a year in interest to keep up the spending - if that interest was not there they could up the NHS budget by nearly 50%. The state's inability to control itself could be literally killing people, and we can't have a reasoned argument on how we fix it without ****s shouting about food banks or just demanding that we tax the baws out of all the rich ****s. How about you don't overspend in the first place (or maybe save a bit of money, like Norway!). It's ok blaming the banks, but Gordon Brown was borrowing £30bn a year during the boom, which hardly left the country in a good position when it all went tits up.

I couldn't find a chart for the UK (in 60 seconds of Googling), but here is the US figures for the last 100 years which closely mirror the UK. I'm not being a neo-Liberal when I point out that we can't keep growing the state at these levels, I'm being a realist.

You must log in or register to see images
Click to expand...

Foodbanks
 
Sir Cliff was dead against independence.

Over 200 public figures from sport, cinema, television and literature have written an open letter to the people of Scotland in advance of next month’s referendum which says: “Let’s stay together”.

Other signatories include Helena Bonham Carter, the actress, Tom Daley, the Olympian, and singers Dame Vera Lynn and Sir Cliff Richard.
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But wee Margot has rented a house off the state for 30 years, never took up the option to buy, and the subsidy she received for her extra bedrooms that she doesn't need and (wee Stacey and her 4 weans have been on the waiting list for a house for 18 months) had her benefits cut because the State is nearing debt equal to 90% GDP, not because Google dodges a bit of CT, but because the State is grossly overspending.

Now, depending on who you believe, Scotland will have a defecit, whereas the Tories are trying to close the deficit in the next parliament. For some reason, people think that the State should not act responsibly with THEIR money. If I earn £20k a year and spend £22k in year one, £23k in year two plus the interest on year one's overspend, and this goes on for 20 years, then I'll be ****ed.

All we're doing is condemning the next generation to our debt legacy and ruining the future of the UK. Quite how showering ****s with benefits will fix this is really perplexing.
 
MalteseMick said:
If you sit down and look at the figures, Government spending is approaching 50% of GDP. The question is what is an acceptable level before it starts killing growth? The darling economist of the Left, John Maynard Keynes stated that Government spending should never go past 25% of GDP in a healthy economy, that was back in the 30's when he was trying to encourage the Government to up it's spending from about 10% of GDP. If you think the UK is too neo-Liberal - what level of state spending are you suggesting in an independent Scotland?

The Tories are actually struggling to keep it below 50% at the minute, despite all the cuts - the UK is now paying £50 billion a year in interest to keep up the spending - if that interest was not there they could up the NHS budget by nearly 50%. The state's inability to control itself could be literally killing people, and we can't have a reasoned argument on how we fix it without ****s shouting about food banks or just demanding that we tax the baws out of all the rich ****s. How about you don't overspend in the first place (or maybe save a bit of money, like Norway!). It's ok blaming the banks, but Gordon Brown was borrowing £30bn a year during the boom, which hardly left the country in a good position when it all went tits up.

I couldn't find a chart for the UK (in 60 seconds of Googling), but here is the US figures for the last 100 years which closely mirror the UK. I'm not being a neo-Liberal when I point out that we can't keep growing the state at these levels, I'm being a realist.

You must log in or register to see images
Click to expand...

Mick I am not an economist and I am not going to pretend to be one. I can answer in more general terms. The first thing to say is that Scotland is thre only area of the UK to have a balance of trade surplus, all the rest have a deficit. The question of GDP and spend is a political one as well as an economic one and this is all about priorites. How a country chooses to spend its money is just as important if not more important than how much it spends. Privatisation is justified by saying it saves the state money and improves eficiency and we know that neither is true. If we sell off a profitable industry like British Telecom or British Gas the state not only has to now buy these services it also lose the income it generated. On the other hand state enterprises like steel in the end cost us all a fortune.

The answer is a mixed economy and projects like the Common Weal are looking at finding new ways to run a capitalist economy and with Hume & Smith Scotland has produced new ideas in the past and there is no reason why thay cannot do it again, it just needs the will to work at it. You cannot ignore the banking crisis repair it and carry on in the same way thinking that everything will be ok. So far we get away with it in the UK because our economy is too important for the West to allow it to fail. This importance is diminished each year as China and India move further forward.

The UK is one of the oldest democracies in the world but as a result we have one of the most backward systems in the world. We have to change and an Independent Scotland would be the first progressive event in modern British history.
 
CITIZEN SNIPS said:
But wee Margot has rented a house off the state for 30 years, never took up the option to buy, and the subsidy she received for her extra bedrooms that she doesn't need and (wee Stacey and her 4 weans have been on the waiting list for a house for 18 months) had her benefits cut because the State is nearing debt equal to 90% GDP, not because Google dodges a bit of CT, but because the State is grossly overspending.

Now, depending on who you believe, Scotland will have a defecit, whereas the Tories are trying to close the deficit in the next parliament. For some reason, people think that the State should not act responsibly with THEIR money. If I earn £20k a year and spend £22k in year one, £23k in year two plus the interest on year one's overspend, and this goes on for 20 years, then I'll be ****ed.

All we're doing is condemning the next generation to our debt legacy and ruining the future of the UK. Quite how showering ****s with benefits will fix this is really perplexing.
Click to expand...

The hole in my logic, and yours is that Scotland has oil. Everywhere else in the world the Government can only tax what people create, but in Scotland it can tax what they dig out of the ground. Scotland might be able to do a Norway and maintain ridiculously high public spending through oil revenue, maybe... but from what I can tell there's not as much oil in Scotland as Norway, and anyway even Norway is starting to bring in market reforms to try diversify its economy, away from its oil dependence.

You don't need really high levels of state spending to bring about a decent social system either - Singapore's government only spends 17% of GDP yet over 80% of its population live in Social Housing - they also subsidise up to 80% of health care, and have the 2nd most efficient system in the world. If I was starting a new state I'd be more interested in the Singapore model (bar maybe their ridiculously conservative social laws) where they tax what the people create (since they have no natural resources), rather than chucking all the eggs in one big oil basket like Norway.

Anyway Scotland is currently ****, vote Yes and change it.
 
Spurf said:
Mick I am not an economist and I am not going to pretend to be one. I can answer in more general terms. The first thing to say is that Scotland is thre only area of the UK to have a balance of trade surplus, all the rest have a deficit. The question of GDP and spend is a political one as well as an economic one and this is all about priorites. How a country chooses to spend its money is just as important if not more important than how much it spends. Privatisation is justified by saying it saves the state money and improves eficiency and we know that neither is true. If we sell off a profitable industry like British Telecom or British Gas the state not only has to now buy these services it also lose the income it generated. On the other hand state enterprises like steel in the end cost us all a fortune.

The answer is a mixed economy and projects like the Common Weal are looking at finding new ways to run a capitalist economy and with Hume & Smith Scotland has produced new ideas in the past and there is no reason why thay cannot do it again, it just needs the will to work at it. You cannot ignore the banking crisis repair it and carry on in the same way thinking that everything will be ok. So far we get away with it in the UK because our economy is too important for the West to allow it to fail. This importance is diminished each year as China and India move further forward.

The UK is one of the oldest democracies in the world but as a result we have one of the most backward systems in the world. We have to change and an Independent Scotland would be the first progressive event in modern British history.
Click to expand...

Stopped reading at this point.

Idiot.
 
MalteseMick said:
The hole in my logic, and yours is that Scotland has oil. Everywhere else in the world the Government can only tax what people create, but in Scotland it can tax what they dig out of the ground. Scotland might be able to do a Norway and maintain ridiculously high public spending through oil revenue, maybe... but from what I can tell there's not as much oil in Scotland as Norway, and anyway even Norway is starting to bring in market reforms to try diversify it's economy, away from it's oil dependence.

You don't need really high levels of state spending to bring about a decent social system either - Singapore's government only spends 17% of GDP yet over 80% of it's population live in Social Housing - they also subsidise up to 80% of health care, and have the 2nd most efficient system in the world. If I was starting a new state I'd be more interested in the Singapore model (bar maybe their ridiculously conservative social laws) where they tax what the people create (since they have no natural resources), rather than chucking all the eggs in one big oil basket like Norway.

Anyway Scotland is currently ****, vote Yes and change it.
Click to expand...

I've always been a fan of Singapore ever since I found out my granda was captured their by the Japs. Interesting that Singapore and Hong Kong, both former British possessions have similar sized populations to Scotland. Even more interesting for me that it was a Scottish civil servant who was creditied with Hong Kong's growth from fishing port to one of the biggest financial centres in the world http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_James_Cowperthwaite. Cowperthwaite advcated free market economics, small state and low tax.

Tragic for the country that as the land of some of the most celebrated economists in history, we are cursed with a left leaning media brainwashing the idiots into thinking the state should be responsible for everything from houses to jobs, healthcare to pensions.
 
CITIZEN SNIPS said:
I've always been a fan of Singapore ever since I found out my granda was captured their by the Japs. Interesting that Singapore and Hong Kong, both former British possessions have similar sized populations to Scotland. Even more interesting for me that it was a Scottish civil servant who was creditied with Hong Kong's growth from fishing port to one of the biggest financial centres in the world http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_James_Cowperthwaite. Cowperthwaite advcated free market economics, small state and low tax.

Tragic for the country that as the land of some of the most celebrated economists in history, we are cursed with a left leaning media brainwashing the idiots into thinking the state should be responsible for everything from houses to jobs, healthcare to pensions.
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Aye, ye cannae move for left-wing media types right enough. TV and papers are full of ****s blaming the poor for all the evils in society but, aye, they're leaf-leaning right enough <doh>
 
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