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Political Ramifications of Covid-19 Pandemic


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To be fair to the MP’s I would imagine most will use their £10,000 windfall to buy a 3D printer and print some PPE.

The tory MP’s could then sell that and probably be a few quid up on the deal.

Win win.

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Migrant farm workers from Mexico and Central America are considered essential workers in the USA. If they are essential, they should all be given immediate citizenship with no strings attached.

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The Economy Will Not Simply Bounce Back

'[...] There are good reasons for thinking, first, that the recovery will be slow and, second, that there will be long-term impacts. We can expect a slow recovery because the crisis means people have less to spend, businesses have less money coming in, and many of both are facing ruin. Personal financial catastrophes either now, or later, as debts held off come due in a few months are also on the cards.

Both will have longer lasting effects on the economy, because both imply lost demand and, for businesses, the permanent loss of jobs. The support offered by the government has been significant; but there are clear holes in provision, such as for the self-employed, and because the support has seemingly been designed to be unwound as quickly as possible, it is far less comprehensive and adequate that it needs to be.

[...]

But then we start to hit some of the potential longer-term effects. The WTO points to the disruption of supply chains in manufacturing, and the loss of trading partners for services. This would make the Covid-19 crisis a continuation of the pattern seen since the 2008-9 crash: of world trade growing far more slowly, and even regressing.

This disruption will impose costs on businesses, and lead to slower growth in general; meanwhile, the presence of a known pandemic risk – with additional surveillance, security, and healthcare measures required – would impose long-term costs on capitalism more broadly. Just as the 2008-09 crash led to permanently slower growth, so, too, might this crisis.'

(from: https://tribunemag.co.uk/2020/04/the-economy-will-not-simply-bounce-back)

This seems like a reasonable prediction to me. The behavioural changes - for individuals and governments - that coronavirus forces may well hamper growth for the medium term. But austerity will surely be much harder to implement this time, so get ready for much higher debt, and a political battle over whether the heaviest burden of increased taxation falls on consumption, income or wealth.

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We can expect a slow recovery because the crisis means people have less to spend

Thats a big assumption, There'll be more unemployed sure but sitting at home on 80% and no going out is going to be a plus on the money side I'd have thought. Sitting at home working on full pay is also going to be a pluson the money side. People going to work will be an even obviously

I don't get why people will have less to spend. Overall I would imagine at the end of this people will have some excess cash, especially when no holidays are taken too

Just don't get that logic

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3 minutes ago, bickster said:

Thats a big assumption, There'll be more unemployed sure but sitting at home on 80% and no going out is going to be a plus on the money side I'd have thought. Sitting at home working on full pay is also going to be a pluson the money side. People going to work will be an even obviously

I don't get why people will have less to spend. Overall I would imagine at the end of this people will have some excess cash, especially when no holidays are taken too

Just don't get that logic

Agree. People like spending money. Just look when Next reopened their website for online orders. Had to shut it down near enough straight away due to demand!

Maybe a few people will revaluate their priorities but i'd guess the majority won't. 

 

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3 hours ago, bickster said:

Thats a big assumption, There'll be more unemployed sure but sitting at home on 80% and no going out is going to be a plus on the money side I'd have thought. Sitting at home working on full pay is also going to be a pluson the money side. People going to work will be an even obviously

I don't get why people will have less to spend. Overall I would imagine at the end of this people will have some excess cash, especially when no holidays are taken too

Just don't get that logic

Yep. Assuming you remain on full pay, or even 80%, you should have a fair bit of income left over at the end of this. 

I've spent so little this month as a result of my furlough I don't know what to do with it :D 

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7 hours ago, Stevo985 said:

Yep. Assuming you remain on full pay, or even 80%, you should have a fair bit of income left over at the end of this. 

I've spent so little this month as a result of my furlough I don't know what to do with it :D 

Online order for socks?

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14 hours ago, bickster said:

Thats a big assumption, There'll be more unemployed sure but sitting at home on 80% and no going out is going to be a plus on the money side I'd have thought. Sitting at home working on full pay is also going to be a pluson the money side. People going to work will be an even obviously

I don't get why people will have less to spend. Overall I would imagine at the end of this people will have some excess cash, especially when no holidays are taken too

Just don't get that logic

The logic underpinning it is that income after the huge dip in the economy will be, on an aggregate level, lower. If the national output is significantly lower (than at the start of the crisis) then the income will also be, won't it? There's a direct relationship between product and income.

For some individuals, there may be some excess cash but we must be careful not to assume that this will be so across the board, not also to assume that people's propensity to consume will not be changed after this event, or that future financial events (postponed payments - from VAT deferrals for businesses, to CC/loan repayments for individuals) will not bring future shocks.

I also don't think you're giving enough weighting to the relative effect on income of that increase in unemployment and you're giving too much to the increase in disposable income that may arise for those people being at home on 80%.

Add on to that the more than temporary pay cuts that people continuing to work (or who are furloughed) may have accepted in order to keep their jobs, any continued uncertainty as a result of the virus and whether it may continue to have future impacts (future lockdowns, &c.) and a need to bolster spending capacity by taking on increased credit (and a reluctance on the part of people to do that or even a difficulty, at however low the interest rates are, to obtain that credit) and I don't know that the excess cash that some people will have would really put any sort of noticeable dent in the delta between consumption now (*edit - obviously, I meant consumption before the crisis/dip started*) and consumption when we start to come out of this.

Edited by snowychap
added in clarification
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37 minutes ago, snowychap said:

The logic underpinning it is that income after the huge dip in the economy will be, on an aggregate level, lower. If the national output is significantly lower (than at the start of the crisis) then the income will also be, won't it? There's a direct relationship between product and income.

For some individuals, there may be some excess cash but we must be careful not to assume that this will be so across the board, not also to assume that people's propensity to consume will not be changed after this event, or that future financial events (postponed payments - from VAT deferrals for businesses, to CC/loan repayments for individuals) will not bring future shocks.

I also don't think you're giving enough weighting to the relative effect on income of that increase in unemployment and you're giving too much to the increase in disposable income that may arise for those people being at home on 80%.

Add on to that the more than temporary pay cuts that people continuing to work (or who are furloughed) may have accepted in order to keep their jobs, any continued uncertainty as a result of the virus and whether it may continue to have future impacts (future lockdowns, &c.) and a need to bolster spending capacity by taking on increased credit (and a reluctance on the part of people to do that or even a difficulty, at however low the interest rates are, to obtain that credit) and I don't know that the excess cash that some people will have would really put any sort of noticeable dent in the delta between consumption now and consumption when we start to come out of this.

I’d agree with all of that.

There will be people that have not recovered their position from the crash 10 years ago. People that had well paid jobs and took a real hammering for years, that maybe don’t earn in 2020 what they were earning in 2010.

Now, with all that debt still being paid down by tiny increments each month, now they are unemployed, or furloughed or taking a 20% pay cut. These people, that already had debt can’t phone the bank and get an easy deferral of the mortgage or the credit card because their debt already existed before mid March.

There are a significant number of people really significantly **** by this. 

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Yes, you can’t shutter the economy for months at a time where very little work is being produced and then expect the majority of people to have more money than if it had stayed open.  Otherwise we may have accidentally stumbled onto a secret of economic prosperity!

Some people might come out of this ahead but society is going to be paying for this for a long time to come.

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I mean, a million people had applied for Universal Credit just by the 1st of April. I don't have any more recent numbers than that, but I imagine it's been increasing rapidly for the last 17 days as well. The notion that we're going to come out of this with a higher ability to spend on aggregate is barking.

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Hong Kong Democracy Arrests

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Police in Hong Kong have arrested 15 of some of the city's most high-profile pro-democracy activists.

The group includes 71-year-old media tycoon Jimmy Lai as well as a number of prominent lawmakers. 

They are accused of organising, taking part in or publicising unauthorised assembles during last year's mass protests in the Chinese territory.

They are due to appear in court next month.

The government has not explained the high-profile arrests but they come days after Beijing's most senior official in the city called for a new security law to deal with dissent.

We really do have to re calibrate the relationship with China after this, and I don’t mean ask pretty please to be allowed to have them build more nuclear power stations and 5G network for us.

Really is absolutely zero point in skunking money on trident whilst being a tiny business and trade bitch for China.

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I’m getting utterly sick, and I hope the media are starting to feel the same, about the politicians being asked these questions (mostly in the daily presser) just avoiding every single question. 
 

Like Gove there they don’t answer anything. They just avoid the question in any way possible 

“we’ll issue a response later”

”it wouldn’t be right to discuss that”

”I can’t comment on that now”

”it would be unfair to discuss those issues”

every remotely challenging question. 
it **** pisses me off. No other profession would you get away with doing some sort of presentation and just avoiding any question anybody had. 

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