What Are Your Political Views, Generally?

[snowychap]

whats the comparision point to the scale?

what would you call the current Labour Party?

Centre?

Centre-Left

Left?

This is the international chart from the website so you can see where they think Gordo is.

One person, however, is not representative of an entire party.

Edit: Sorry, I just realised that you were talking about the poll and the original thread rather than the thread post-threadjacking. :oops:

[thetrees]

I think that this poll in general shows that it is far more acceptable to be left than right, although radical forms of both sides are equally damaging in my opinion, and that many strong left wingers prefer to be referred to as 'centre left'

If the centre left category were deleted and the numbers shifted 'left' on the scale I suspect that we would have a far more accurate view.

[Ads]

Economic Left/Right: 8.25

Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 3.69

:shock:

Wouldn't that have you sat alongside Augusto Pinochet?

Why?

[mjmooney]

The relative positions of Brown and Merkel on that chart are interesting.

[El Zen]

No neo-liberal would argue that anyone could know everything within the marketplace (defined more or less as who needs/wants what and who has what). Indeed, the very thing that Hayek argued was that it was impossible for anyone to know everything.

Neo-liberal economic theory relies heavily on rational-choice theory. The basic premisis for neo-liberalism must be that individual rationality leads to collective rationality (a theoretic 'fail' in its own right). How is rationality possible without full information? A neo-liberal argument is impossible without making (wild) full information-assuomptions. In my previous rant I may have tarred with too broad a brush when I said 'everything within the marketplace', what I meant was perfect information about the market processes each individual actor (be it one person or a company) are involved in. Indeed, any neo-liberal economic model I've seen is based on the assumption that individuals know the outcome of specific actions, and know what is the best action to take. I cannot see how anyone could make a neo-liberal case without making that assumption. I also cannot see how so many people fail to see how entirely unrealistic many of these models are.

The only way that control of the market can deliver as good an outcome as the free market is if someone knows everything within the marketplace

Regulated markets' triumph over the free market is empiracally proven, and what you say isn't really true anyway. Regulation is about creating safety mechanisms, based on empirical knowledge of market economics. Making statistical predictions doesn't require full information, it only requires relevant regularity. Pro market regulation-theory do not try to make deterministic predictions, as oposed to die-hard neo-liberalists who ramble about perfect markets. Thus, we don't need full information to regulate markets. Keynesianist-leaning theorists don't seek perfection, all too aware of the conjectural ups and downs of a collectively irrational marketplace, they only seek to prevent it from crashing.

One need only look at Wikipedia, which in a few short years has become the greatest repository of knowledge in history, to see how allowing individuals with individually relatively little (arbitrarily close to zero) knowledge to exchange and weigh tidbits allows for a body of knowledge greater than what could be known by any person or council of people.

What Snowy said, basically. If we are to use wikipedia as an analogy of the market, and I suppose that makes sense, you have just made an excellent argument in favour of market regulation.

It never fails to amaze me that most of the left-wingers on here (and in the broader world, I might add) would find preposterous the idea that a complex system (life) requires an extremely (perhaps even omni-) scient force to order it in order to work pretty well but generally accept that in order for a complex system (the marketplace) to work pretty well, an extremely scient force to order it is required.

You'll have to specify what you mean by 'life'. If you mean the evolution of species and nature, it isn't a good analogy as the first thing a social scientist worth his salt would admit is that social phenomena and natural phenomena are two different things all together. If we're talking about 'life' as social interaction, I would argue that the anarchic state of human nature is dysfunctional and self-destructive. Where social interaction works 'pretty well', it's because we create social regulatory devices such as norms and institutions.

[leviramsey]

Neo-liberal economic theory relies heavily on rational-choice theory. The basic premisis for neo-liberalism must be that individual rationality leads to collective rationality (a theoretic 'fail' in its own right). How is rationality possible without full information? A neo-liberal argument is impossible without making (wild) full information-assuomptions. In my previous rant I may have tarred with too broad a brush when I said 'everything within the marketplace', what I meant was perfect information about the market processes each individual actor (be it one person or a company) are involved in. Indeed, any neo-liberal economic model I've seen is based on the assumption that individuals know the outcome of specific actions, and know what is the best action to take. I cannot see how anyone could make a neo-liberal case without making that assumption. I also cannot see how so many people fail to see how entirely unrealistic many of these models are.

Knowledge, as in a certain degree of certainty, isn't required: every participant is gambling. However, the more participants that join a given market, the more information that each knows/believes to be true (which is where we get into epistemology... there really isn't much of a practical difference between what we know and we believe to be true) is transmitted into the market and the prices within that market incorporate and weigh that information. Since market regulation by and large tends to result in mutually beneficial transactions not being undertaken (and thus their effects on price discovery never occurring).

Regulated markets' triumph over the free market is empiracally proven, and what you say isn't really true anyway. Regulation is about creating safety mechanisms, based on empirical knowledge of market economics. Making statistical predictions doesn't require full information, it only requires relevant regularity. Pro market regulation-theory do not try to make deterministic predictions, as oposed to die-hard neo-liberalists who ramble about perfect markets. Thus, we don't need full information to regulate markets. Keynesianist-leaning theorists don't seek perfection, all too aware of the conjectural ups and downs of a collectively irrational marketplace, they only seek to prevent it from crashing.

Perfect markets are complete bullshit. The classic riposte of there never being $20 bills on the street (because if there was one, someone would have picked it up by now) and the existence of the other Mr. Buffett are devastating to that position.

The current crisis is the direct result of regulations combined with greed. The fundamental problem was out and out fraud by Wall Street actors (most notably the credit-rating agencies who have an effective oligopoly due to regulation). Since greed cannot be taken out of the picture (ignoring the issue of whether Gordon Gekko was right or not... that's another issue entirely), then the fix lies in removing regulation. The artificially high prices in mortgage securities were largely a result of them being over-the-counter and nearly impossible to sell short and impossible to sell short by 99.999% of the public (thanks to regulations to "protect" small investors): the effect is akin to what happens in a one-party state. I saw a crash coming in RMBS back in 2004, but more or less put it aside, as there was absolutely no way of making use of that information (except for deciding not to buy a house until after the crash, but that isn't really a profit-making action, just a loss-avoiding action).

Regulation will always benefit the established interests, who are more often than not the wealthy (who if nothing else have more time to attend hearings on regulations to make their concerns known). If nothing else, it cannot incorporate interests who do not yet exist. Markets are fundamentally wealth-levelling, a comparison of wealth (not income) distributions between the Scandinavian countries and the USA makes this clear (e.g. the richest 1% of Swedes owns over 40% of the wealth, while the richest 1% of Americans owns under 15% of the wealth).

As for Keynesianism, it sounds great in theory, but it is akin to a dictatorship in a state of emergency: it may be needed while the emergency is there, but turning it off when the emergency has passed is easier said than done.

What Snowy said, basically. If we are to use wikipedia as an analogy of the market, and I suppose that makes sense, you have just made an excellent argument in favour of market regulation.

The wikipedia editors are not external to the market (nor are they particularly scient). They have been elevated by its participants to police things, most generally by locking articles or requiring edits be made by logged-in users: it is voluntary self-regulation, not external regulation.

You'll have to specify what you mean by 'life'. If you mean the evolution of species and nature, it isn't a good analogy as the first thing a social scientist worth his salt would admit is that social phenomena and natural phenomena are two different things all together. If we're talking about 'life' as social interaction, I would argue that the anarchic state of human nature is dysfunctional and self-destructive. Where social interaction works 'pretty well', it's because we create social regulatory devices such as norms and institutions.

I mean the first as an example of spontaneous self-ordering.

Norms and institutions are generally required for the market to function. However, those norms and institutions should not be externally imposed: externally imposed norms and institutions, specifically those imposed by governments, generally do a very poor job of adapting to new realities.

[wiganvillain]

The relative positions of Brown and Merkel on that chart are interesting.

As evidenced by their and their Governments actions on the recession I believe

[snowychap]

What Snowy said, basically. If we are to use wikipedia as an analogy of the market, and I suppose that makes sense, you have just made an excellent argument in favour of market regulation.

The wikipedia editors are not external to the market (nor are they particularly scient). They have been elevated by its participants to police things, most generally by locking articles or requiring edits be made by logged-in users: it is voluntary self-regulation, not external regulation.

Though they are specifically external to each transaction within the market upon which they exercise their power of regulation, aren't they?

Their externality is decided on these terms not their past involvement with a marketplace.

[CarewsEyebrowDesigner]

Can anyone justify why a Doctor can earn 10x the amount of a hard working single mum?

The divide between rich and poor in modern society is sickening IMO.

Yes, i understand the Doctor has a more demanding job, and should be paid more, but not to such a gross extent.

IMO, i think wage gaps should be severly shortened and alot more even, with the lowest paid jobs paying around 20k a year, and the highest around 45k a year. Something like that anway, and as the country grows richer, the limits increase to say 30k for the poorest and 55k for the highest.

Or does such an idea already exist? I don't know.

This seemed the best thread to put this idea, thats the best way i can explain it but it probably makes no sense.

[mjmooney]

Can anyone justify why a Doctor can earn 10x the amount of a hard working single mum?

Mmm, possibly.

But a top footballer earns - what? - 300 times a nurse's salary?

[Danwichmann]

Can anyone justify why a Doctor can earn 10x the amount of a hard working single mum?

The divide between rich and poor in modern society is sickening IMO.

Yes, i understand the Doctor has a more demanding job, and should be paid more, but not to such a gross extent.

IMO, i think wage gaps should be severly shortened and alot more even, with the lowest paid jobs paying around 20k a year, and the highest around 45k a year. Something like that anway, and as the country grows richer, the limits increase to say 30k for the poorest and 55k for the highest.

Or does such an idea already exist? I don't know.

This seemed the best thread to put this idea, thats the best way i can explain it but it probably makes no sense.

Does such an idea exist? With an economy controlled to that extent I'd say yes, it's called Communism.

That would be a very worrying development in my opinion. Would say you can reach this far and no further and ambition would be severely limited, progress would stop and the whole nations economy would fall quickly behind others that weren't restricted in this way.

[CarewsEyebrowDesigner]

Can anyone justify why a Doctor can earn 10x the amount of a hard working single mum?

The divide between rich and poor in modern society is sickening IMO.

Yes, i understand the Doctor has a more demanding job, and should be paid more, but not to such a gross extent.

IMO, i think wage gaps should be severly shortened and alot more even, with the lowest paid jobs paying around 20k a year, and the highest around 45k a year. Something like that anway, and as the country grows richer, the limits increase to say 30k for the poorest and 55k for the highest.

Or does such an idea already exist? I don't know.

This seemed the best thread to put this idea, thats the best way i can explain it but it probably makes no sense.

Does such an idea exist? With an economy controlled to that extent I'd say yes, it's called Communism.

That would be a very worrying development in my opinion. Would say you can reach this far and no further and ambition would be severely limited, progress would stop and the whole nations economy would fall quickly behind others that weren't restricted in this way.

Yeah i know Communism.

But no, ambition wont be severly limited IMO.

Then again, i'm not motivated by money and have no interest in the stuff. Besides, if a whole country has this system, then there would be shared ambition in other areas surely?

For example, a Doctor earning the hypothetical top wage, can focus on the treatment of his patients rather than the money he is earning. A buisnessman can focus on the quality of his service rather than the bonus at the end of the year. A politician, can actualy be a public servant rather than a corrupt liar claiming stupid expenses? Surely then ambitions would be focused away from earning the mega $$$, and instead it would go towards creating a better, fairer society?

I know, alot of people Are motivated by money, as money brings power and power is an attractive thing.

But i digress, this IMO would be a perfect society, but even at my young age i know humans are far from perfect. I know that greed will eventually corrupt such a system.

[snowychap]

IMO, i think wage gaps should be severly shortened and alot more even, with the lowest paid jobs paying around 20k a year, and the highest around 45k a year. Something like that anway, and as the country grows richer, the limits increase to say 30k for the poorest and 55k for the highest.

Or does such an idea already exist? I don't know.

This seemed the best thread to put this idea, thats the best way i can explain it but it probably makes no sense.

It makes a lot of sense and it is something which has been suggested (though the limit was a great deal higher), recently by Andrew Simms at the nef.

Now for a maximum wage

Someone is having a laugh. Jean Pierre Garnier, chief executive of GlaxoSmithKline, was up to get £22m if fired, but thought himself "pretty much at the bottom of the pile". The top-earning UK director last year made £9.1m, then walked off with £16m after a boardroom fall-out. Companies like Tesco, BP and Vodafone now have six or more directors taking home more than £1m. The Guardian's recent survey revealed a laughable poetic symmetry - shares fell 24% as boardroom pay in the top 100 companies rose 23%.

The struggle to control ludicrous pay clearly needs a new weapon. A minimum wage was one of the key achievements of New Labour's first term. Now it could tackle income inequality from the other end and propose a maximum wage. It matters both because the economic case for high executive pay in terms of company performance doesn't hold up, and because highly unequal societies have a habit of falling apart.

The justification for high executive pay has always been that the motivational effect on the senior executive and the aspirational impact on mid-level executives are greater than the demotivational impact on other employees.

But the academic research is extremely patchy, and empirical evidence is even less convincing. A study by a UK management consultancy, Kepler Associates, found that in 2000 there was an inverse relationship between pay and performance in the FTSE-100. The typical boss of a poor performing company was earning £175,000 a year more than a world-class player. Hardly an elegant free-market solution. Moreover, staff at the wrong end of big pay differentials tend to compensate in other ways, such as taking more sick leave. And, whatever the economic theory, the practice of setting executive pay is deeply flawed. It has been captured by a self-serving clique. In 2001, just 392 people, some sitting on more than one committee, made up the remuneration committees of 98 of the largest UK companies.

Following the introduction of the maximum wage, pay restraint could become the norm. Say it was set at £1m - no one could seriously argue that this was inadequate pay, no matter how high the stress, how long the hours or how brilliant the performance. It could be half that, and still be over 50 times more than the earnings of someone on the minimum wage working a 40-hour week. More than 100 years ago, business guru JP Morgan said no company should have a differential between highest paid and lowest paid greater than 10. He thought that enough to create motivation. The Royal Navy, for example, has had a de facto differential of eight.

The current system traps top management in the law of primary purpose. Highly paid chief executives excel, first and foremost, in being highly paid. It is what establishes their status, so it becomes the focus of their drive and creativity. A pay ceiling would free directors to use their skills more in the long-term interests of their companies than in manoeuvring for their own short-term gain. Big share options in pay packages create a perverse incentive for senior management to push short-term share-price inflation over a company's long-term well-being.

Social cohesion is the other argument for a maximum wage. Crime and unhappiness stalk unequal societies. In the UK the bottom 50% of the population now owns only 1% of the wealth: in 1976 they owned 12%. Our economic system's incentive structure, instead of "trickle-down", is causing a "flood-up" of resources from the poor to the rich. Inequality leads to instability, the last thing the country or world needs right now.

Even the former hardline conservative head of the International Monetary Fund, Michel Camdessus, has come to the conclusion that "the widening gaps between rich and poor within nations" is "morally outrageous, economically wasteful and potentially socially explosive".

Above subsistence levels, what undermines our sense of well-being most is not our absolute income levels, but how big the gaps are between us and our peers. Allowing the super-rich to live apart from society is as damaging in its own way as the exclusion of the poorest.

A maximum wage may sound strange. But there are already examples of similar approaches. Some Japanese firms voluntarily impose pay ratios limiting the gap between top and bottom pay. US basketball teams take a total remuneration package and pool it between players, with limits on any individual's pay. Another voluntary scheme would be for an organisation to levy a 100% marginal tax rate on its executives above a certain level, with receipts going to charity.

Average overall packages for the FTSE-100 companies are now fast heading towards £2m per year. But how much does any senior executive really need to earn, however good he or she is? Let's start the bidding.

[chrisp65]

so if I'm a doctor the most I can earn is £45k

if I improve the productivity of my surgery £45k tops

save 50% more lives than the next doctor £45k

work an 80 hour week £45k

risk being struck off and earning nothing £45k

cure cancer £45k

or do the minimum hours, run an average surgery, don't bother with the icky stuff, don't do call outs, £45k

it's a tough call

a lovely idea to rely on altruism, unfortunately 90% of us buggers are essentially selfish or lazy and need to be motivated, society is currently set up to be motivated by irrelevant shit, you know, holidays that involve air travel but no cultural exchange, 3D tv, nice badges on new cars, these things cost money and encourage people to earn more.

take away a core desire for irrelevant shit and cure a lot of the problem of greed and a lack of fairness.

Replace the desire for shit with a desire for peace, love and the respect of others and job's a goodun.

There you go, the new testament re written in 20 words.

[heystally!]

Problem is that because we live in the modern world with free trade and the ability to possess what we want, closing up wage gaps will seem unfair to people in jobs considered more important. It will probably be impossible to bring everyone down to the same level of wages, despite the fact that a job should be nothing more than a contribution to society. But no one will see it like that. It needs to be enjoyable so people are motivated, and it needs to be paying at a level that makes doing it worthwhile.

Only way to have such a system is literally emigrate to a deserted island, set up a colony, become entirely self-sufficient, and allow people in based a) their desire to live in such a system, and if they will be useful to society.

[Danwichmann]

Can anyone justify why a Doctor can earn 10x the amount of a hard working single mum?

The divide between rich and poor in modern society is sickening IMO.

Yes, i understand the Doctor has a more demanding job, and should be paid more, but not to such a gross extent.

IMO, i think wage gaps should be severly shortened and alot more even, with the lowest paid jobs paying around 20k a year, and the highest around 45k a year. Something like that anway, and as the country grows richer, the limits increase to say 30k for the poorest and 55k for the highest.

Or does such an idea already exist? I don't know.

This seemed the best thread to put this idea, thats the best way i can explain it but it probably makes no sense.

Does such an idea exist? With an economy controlled to that extent I'd say yes, it's called Communism.

That would be a very worrying development in my opinion. Would say you can reach this far and no further and ambition would be severely limited, progress would stop and the whole nations economy would fall quickly behind others that weren't restricted in this way.

Yeah i know Communism.

But no, ambition wont be severly limited IMO.

Then again, i'm not motivated by money and have no interest in the stuff. Besides, if a whole country has this system, then there would be shared ambition in other areas surely?

For example, a Doctor earning the hypothetical top wage, can focus on the treatment of his patients rather than the money he is earning. A buisnessman can focus on the quality of his service rather than the bonus at the end of the year. A politician, can actualy be a public servant rather than a corrupt liar claiming stupid expenses? Surely then ambitions would be focused away from earning the mega $$$, and instead it would go towards creating a better, fairer society?

I know, alot of people Are motivated by money, as money brings power and power is an attractive thing.

But i digress, this IMO would be a perfect society, but even at my young age i know humans are far from perfect. I know that greed will eventually corrupt such a system.

But what reason does the doctor have to focus on treatment? He's not going to get any extra reward for his extra efforts. If he feels he works hard enough then there is not gain for him in working harder. In fact, as his wages have been slashed already, he's probably not feeling like working very hard at all.

At the end of the day, if people don't feel they can be fairly rewarded for working harder, they won't do it. Doctor A will look at Doctor B, both earning the maximum £45k or whatever and say, "He only does x amount of work for his £45k, so that's what I'm going to do."

Reducing inequality is a nice ideal, but this isn't the way to do it.

[thetrees]

Public sector workers on fixed 39 hour weeks, flexi-time, 'sickness' time allowance, final salary pension schemes, golden handshakes to reward failure etc yes.

People who work their nuts off 80 hours a week to create wealth should be able to earn what they like.

Then they and their employers can pay hugely unfair tax and N.I. to pay for the public sector

[snowychap]

unfair tax

?

That requires an explanation if one attempts to justify the point made.

[thetrees]

unfair tax

?

That requires an explanation if one attempts to justify the point made.

The uncapped employers NIC is an unfair tax, plain and simple.

Why should successful businesses that generate wealth by way of the tax that their employees pay and the corporation tax that they pay have to then pay NIC on their entire wage bill?

Tax in general is about the same in most countries. Our 'low' upper rate of 40% is jacked up by the aforementioned N.I.C., and general lack of tax relief, something that is enjoyed by our European counterparts.

The only real objection that I have about the tax I pay is that it is completely wasted by the incompetents who receive it.

But then if I let that drive me crazy I'll be crazy for a long time :winkold:

[shambles]

My grandad was a staunch Conservative until he died, with old-school morals and values, and my dad is a socialist and was a union leader at Lucas in the 70's and early 80's. I think I've inherited a mix of their ideals.