Wait, you mean building bigger barriers to international trade can cause your economy to slow down? Who could have predicted this??
Facebook, Google and Uber couldn't make it in China, what chance do UK service providers have?
Tongue in cheek:
After the industrial revolution kicked in britain's main innovative energies were spent on financial innovation and exploitation of a closed, huge global internal market, and being a colonial master at the expense of actually making better products or services.
Except for the rich nabobs coming home from India, I suppose. But there are only so many Savile Row suits and London luxury apartments one can sell to the global population.
UK was at the heart of industrial and scientific revolutions, and was a huge financial innovator. I presume the wealth from colonies in the 19th century killed the two former.
We import more from Germany than France does.
$19 to $19.5 trillion for the US, versus $16.5 to $17.5 for the EU (depending on your source, however they all universally agree the US is several trillion dollars larger).
And that of course is despite the EU having ~55% more people.
Considering Brexit being the likely cause of the UK sagging, I wonder if Trump might be having a similar effect on the US.
It may not be fair, but on the world stage, power matters. Inside the EU, we try (but don't always succeed) to be fair, but outside of it, power matters. A relatively small country like the UK doesn't have much leverage to get a good deal from other major powers, whereas the EU does.
You're implying that's some kind of great news. I'd say, real estate investors have lots of enthusiasm for sellers threatened with foreclosure. You can frame it as positively as you want but at the end of the day the UK's position at the negotiation table is simply weaker, and it's no surprise everyone suddenly wants to talk.
Nice, hehe :)
While that's definitely nice... there is the possibility that making a disadvantages agreement with the US, China, Canada, etc. is better in the long term.
It took years for the EU and Canada to reach an agreement. If one of them was in a less advantages position maybe it could be done faster... And maybe speed is more important than conditions of the agreement, who really knows?
EDIT: okay, the brits perhaps ought to know what disadvantages trade agreements can do... given their past experience making them with their colonies :)
I note that the brexit'ers probably didn't want disadvantages trade agreements :)
This does not even factor in tariffs that are in play to protect industries that some members have no interest in and as such negatively impact them.
It's like trying to agreeing a meal that everybody will eat between two people over agreeing a meal of nearly 30 people, and comparing steak with gluten free bread in some cases.
Remember trade deal can encompass everything or area's of trade/industry. That is when having just two parties becomes a positive.
Still, volume always helps, but more than enough upsides to offset that.
But this takes time, luckily much easier without everybody elses interests coming into play, as you have with trade blocks that have many members to all appease. Just look at how one vote against in the UN can kill of any moving forward and see how that can work out and you will start to see that volume at that price, is not as idyllic as it seems for trade deals.
Rule Britannia!
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/brexit-latest...
But perhaps you have other data that supports your case?
If you re-read the above you'll see that I didn't claim to have data on the matter. I'm perfectly open to the idea that a large share of the leave vote is anti-immigration (although that sentiment itself has a broad range of meanings from intolerant to reasoned), but my point was to highlight the perception of leave voters as being generally xenophobic members of the working class as being inaccurate or at the very least, a broad stroke of the brush. Through discussing the vote with the other leavers I know, not once was immigration mentioned as a concern, and we all work in average-to-senior software roles, not Dave the van man who rants about Polish people coming for his job.
Your anecdotal evidence is not very useful in a reasonable discussion, and it might be more interesting to have a data based discussion (if you have some data).
>Through discussing the vote with the other leavers I know, not once was immigration mentioned as a concern
You seem to be a bit obsessed with backing everything with data. Do you want me to make a survey for the people I've spoken to? I'm not trying to say "immigration is not the issue and I have proof!", I'm saying that immigration isn't the issue for everyone, and that there are people in the main HN - reading demographic (and more than just me and the 5 I know, although I'm sure you're going to ask for a citation) that A. Don't match the image in your head and B. Didn't vote the way they did as some kind of attempt to lock out immigrants.
Your suggestion that discussions can only be had by providing data is just not true. If I were trying to assert a claim large enough to need a sample size then sure, but I'm not.
That is reasonably obvious, and not useful basis for a discussion on Brexit.
If you want to gain a better understanding of why people in general voted for Brexit, data would be valuable. Everything else is anicdotal, and not very useful.
How would you support the claim that people in the “HN demographic” voted in significant numbers for leave?
For example this poll from the referendum shows that the no. 1 reason people voted to leave was 'decisions about the UK should be taken in the UK'
http://lordashcroftpolls.com/2016/06/how-the-united-kingdom-...
Edit: typo
It also suggests that leave voter see multiculturalism, feminism, the Green movement, globalisation and immigration as negatives (80%). Overall I see this as supporting the notion that the leave vote was anti-immigration, perhaps as part of a wider distrust of outside influences.
As just a single example the housebuilding industry has been consistently able to build fewer houses than there are people arriving by a large number, and the statistics over how many people are arriving are themselves deeply suspect - they don't correlate with any other population related statistics, and are based on airport surveys that ask a subset of people whether they plan to stay for a long period.
If politicians allow immigration at levels significantly above the speed at which infrastructure can be built out to support the new people then infrastructure reliability and availability will decline. It is reasonable to be concerned about that if you rely on that infrastructure.
The idea of Brexit voters as incorrigible racists isn't supportable, no datasets of any integrity show that and the brief spike of "omg britain is so racist" died down very quickly after the referendum, simply because the UK is and remains by far the most racially diverse nation in Europe.
There simply aren't any economic projections of a trustworthy nature right now.
That said, not all price hikes are attributable to Brexit. The significant hike in butter prices is apparently more due to a supply shortage across Europe.
That's sort of the point. The uk has rejected market distribution as a fair mechanism
So as a simple matter of logic there are things you can do after Brexit you couldn't do before - because parliamentary supremacy has been restored.
The closest argument you could make is that if the UK still didn't want to follow EU law when it was in breach then it'd have to make a decision of paying fines (because it'd legislated to give the EU to right to fine it) or leave the EU.
All those experts (~90%) predicted a sharp 20% increase in unemployment in the period between the vote and the finalized deal when surveyed by the bank of England just before the vote because of "uncertainty".
Unemployment didn't spike a massive 20%. It went DOWN.
I'm not even a leaver but seriously... fuck the economists. You're not a smart person if you trust them.
My favorite experience when it comes to economists was back in highschool (~15 years ago), when my teacher showed us a recording of two economists arguing with each other (on the news, I think). One was an expert in macroeconomics, the other in microeconomics.
They were using the exact same evidence to argue opposite positions.
Given that many people who work are in poverty it would be more meaningful to track the numbers in poverty.
That's bullshit of course. For the reasons you mentioned.
Still didn't go up. Still went down.
We've been in the transitional period for over a year now. The whole period is only supposed to last about 30 months or so.
Moreover, as far as I can tell zero of leading indicators (shipping, retail, etc.) indicate that this cataclysmic 20% drop will ever come.
We haven't even had a quarter of contraction that can be blamed on Brexit - and we had one of those in 2013!
At what point do you stop saying "too soon to tell"?
It sort of sounds like you're still trying to argue that the prediction was correct. Are you?
I think it takes a certain amount of bravery to accept that there are no "experts" when it comes to predicting the future.
Unless you want to argue that the recent economic signs are positive?
Last I checked the UK had a 6-7% GDP trade deficit.
The UK needs another supply-side revolution, and not to turn it in to some beggar-thy-neighbour mercantile trading powerhouse. Brexit is small potatoes in the grand scheme of the real economy.
If you go read press releases made about trade deals they always have apparently huge numbers but spread over a very large number of years. Modulo what's said elsewhere about the uselessness of economic predictions, the predicted impact is usually very low. Probably because tariffs are already quite low and falling globally, most trade barriers are now regulatory in nature and those tend to be relatively unaffected by trade deals.
The UK has never created barriers and does not want barriers.
The EU is creating barriers to entry into it's economy for purposes of punishment (their words) - like the gym that makes you pay extra when you leave?
The UK is now free to negotiate deals with any nation in the world - and not restricted to taking what the EU provides it - this is not restrictive.
UK can now chose exactly whom it wants to migrate - this is not restrictive.
If it were up to the UK, the EU nations would be considerably less economically restrictive than they are today.
Finally - wages are up in the UK considerably, and property prices are down a little - which is exactly what we all want to hear when thinking about 'affordability'.
'Open trade' of real estate creates crazy bubbles and holds regular citizens under the tyranny of the massive cash-flows of foreigners who are able to hold their own citizens in indentured servitude. There are more empty flats in London than there are homeless people.
And the weak pound + slow down in migration from the EU has caused wages to rise - which is awesome.
Mass migration is 100% a downward driver on wages, only in very specific cases is it not - it's an issue some have a hard time grappling with. In the Alberta Oil Fields they want to increase migration for what they call 'labour input costs' - which is literally a different way of saying 'high wages'. In other words: 'wages are too high, we need more immigrants' - it's all rather obvious.
There are issues that should have been addressed by the EU, but they won't - so we have full revolt.
There's no reason for UKIP, True Finns, AFD, Sweden Democrats to exist - they exist because EU leadership won't listen to reason. In many ways America is the same - Trump is the ugly response to a system that wouldn't bend for some reasonable causes.
Brexit was an ugly choice, hopefully a real wake up call for EU leaders, sadly, they seem to be doubling down and it won't end well.
Of all countries on planet earth, it's frankly nothing less than comedy that we're seeing 'this eu realpolitik is unfair!' arguments from the UK. Anyway, no trade barriers, just one on real estate?
Anyway, frankly the UK today enjoys approximately the same circumstances pre and post vote. It's way too early to look at current metrics and say 'look, nothing going on or even an improvement' when the brexit vote has occurred, but the actual brexit is years away.
>And the weak pound + slow down in migration from the EU has caused wages to rise - which is awesome.
Also, I'm lacking some crucial context. Sure, wages are up, have you looked at inflation? In globalisation a weakening pound creates jobs and makes goods more expensive, can't have your cake and eat it too. Real wages are actually down in the UK, surprise.
> In the Alberta Oil Fields they want to increase migration for what they call 'labour input costs' - which is literally a different way of saying 'high wages'. In other words: 'wages are too high, we need more immigrants' - it's all rather obvious.
I've never really fully followed the reasoning. Let's not let anyone into our countries because hey, we want to keep the high-paying jobs for ourselves. Oh damn, jobs are moving overseas cause it's cheaper or dropping our wages to stay competitive, well let's bring back protectionism. Oh wait no, we believe in free trade.
Look I'm sympathetic to brexit voters, but I think one way or another, the west has to come to terms that the only way isn't up anymore, and that their relatively position of power will weaken no matter what policy path is taken. Whether you allow or disallow migrations, allow or disallow free trade, things have changed and they'll never be the same again. Literacy in India from British rule (1947) was 12%, now it's over 75%, and India is below the world average. That's close to a billion more literate competitive agents. No policy can simply isolate you from that. And that's just one metric from one country. The nationalist rhetoric isn't the solution, it's simple scapegoating.
No, you're not, if "the UK" is the government and London elite. Brexit voters are a demographic of their own, in a nation run by another demographic hostile to them.
> keep the high-paying jobs for ourselves
isn't the issue average wages vs top wage jobs? ie what the wage of unskilled labour is. Which demographic is saying "Oh damn.. well let's bring back.. Oh wait no.."? factory workers, or owners?
> Literacy in India
EU would require you prioritise a Pole over an Indian immigrant, it is protectionism at a European scope.
Rework your thinking with floating rate currencies.
Nobody is claiming 'unfair' - we're pointing out that the EU is not this bullst idea of 'Europeans coming together in solidarity' it's just a selfish entity, mostly for the benefit of the elites.
And by the way - it's not 'realpolitik' - it's stupid-politik - because 'punishing' leavers may create some kind of barrier to others thinking about it - but in reality - it exposes the schizophrenia if the EU for what it is.
A 'strong' EU is what others want to join.
Only weak and inauthentic entities like the Soviet Union and the EU need to 'punish' people for daring to leave.
Can you think of other movements that punish people for leaving? China? Cuba? Soviets? North Korea?
The EU and UK should seek a 'good deal' with one another. The EU is afraid of falling apart and is seeking vengeance.
The EU is fundamentally broken and were it to have developed a degree of self awareness, would have remedied the issues and there would be no 'right wing movement' in the EU - it would not have had a chance to exist.
"Whether you allow or disallow migrations, allow or disallow free trade, things have changed and they'll never be the same again. "
"disallow free trade"
The UK wants free trade with the EU, it is the EU which is denying the situation.
As far as migration - the UK accepts considerably more migrants only only from EU countries - but also from non EU countries than effectively any nation in the EU.
But you do agree that's bullshit as well, don't you?
I mean, the EU's goals is to serve the collective best interests of all and every single member-state. Now you're seeing a nation that intentionally placed itself out of that privileged group, and you're complaining that their best interests aren't being considered by everyone else.
I mean, that's like taking up a spa membership to enjoy massages, then deciding to drop the service, and then complaining that the spa is a selfish entity that caters to the elites just because you expected to keep receiving massages after you got your wish of dropping your membership.
That's clearly not what it's trying to do right now. For one the UK is still a member state and still paying its dues, but the EU is acting in an extremely hostile way. Unless you reflexively define the best interests of the EU Commission and related institutions as "the best interests of all and every single member state", it is certainly not the case.
Consider: The EU is setting things up such that in just over a year trucks will start to pile up at ports, costs will rise across Europe and the UK, many European firms will be cut off from the financing they receive from London, airplanes will be grounded, Irish politics will destabilise due to the introduction of a hard border and that's really just the beginning. None of this is in the interests of any person in any EU member state at all. And it can all be easily avoided.
Your spa analogy is very badly off by the way. Trade isn't something countries sell like a product itself, despite the EU's attempts to package it that way. Countries that strike free trade deals do not "buy" them, they negotiate and agree to them. Think about neighbours cooperating more than a consumer buying a product.
No, it isn't. Spa membership doesn't dictate what you cannot do outside the spa. Spas do not collude other competing spas to exclude you from interacting with them.
Second, some privileges are real, and some manufactured to punish outsiders. Prioritization and restrictions on trading with non-EU is an example of this, which addresses the "hypocrisy of protectionism" point.
Finally, "because that fits their needs and suits their best interests" who's interest? Brexit voters? They got one vote premised on an EU promising the moon, and little control or feedback sibce then until the recent Brexit vote.
Wages are stagnant and prices are down significantly in real terms. GBP won't go very far when you leave this island, and it's not like the island produces much worth purchasing.
I'm acutely aware of this since I foolishly bought a house 6 months before the vote. I expect to emigrate within the next few months after a refinance and pay off much more easily with foreign currency.
The UK has never created barriers and does not want barriers.
Mind, of course, that so much talk of EU barriers to trade are actually required for trade: standards and international law, and further to prevent social dumping and races to the bottom in social provision. If you think the UK will do well without social provisions, you haven't seen how nasty the underclass is getting. I've had to change my commute to avoid getting attacked, I've had three scooters stolen in the past year, and almost everyone I know knows someone who's had a phone stolen.
The UK is a deeply broken country; if it was a company, only the south-east would be worth keeping. The education system isn't fit for purpose, and the mass of the workforce is not going to make it in global competition.
The WEF rates the UK's "Education and Skills" as seventh best in the World, just ahead of Germany and five places ahead of the USA.
For "Business dyamism and innovation" the UK is sixth, behind the USA and Scandinavia but four places ahead of Germany.
https://www.weforum.org/reports/the-global-competitiveness-r...