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Comment by j_col | Hacker News Reader

Any thoughts on how possible Scottish independence might affect this?

Hardly at all. At the risk of a flame war (it's a perma-warm topic in the UK) Scottish Independance will have minimal up or downside when considered broadly.

There are lots of clever Economists who expalin how different choices will cost / bring in millions or billions but I have yet to see anything promising more than 2k per citizen - and to be honest I doubt anyone will move house to get a 2k pay raise, so the overall effect - minimal

of course some areas of Scotland are long term grindingly poor and recieive lots of start up credits (they are called enterprise zones) - but they are nit focused on HN style startups, services and light industry is the bigger recipien of enterprise grants.

of course some areas of Scotland are long term grindingly poor and recieive lots of start up credits

My area in northern England is like this - you can't move for constant advertisements for "start-up events," in the local newspapers, on the local radio and so on. It just feels like a way of spending EU money. I don't think they actually hand out many start-up grants or credits, they just run these endless "events."

I live in a small town of 8,000, and they even have them every month there, plugged ceaselessly on the local radio station. It's quite a good way of propping up the local media with advertising revenue, but I'd be interested to know how many people actually get anything out of this.

some areas of Scotland are long term grindingly poor and recieive lots of start up credits (they are called enterprise zones)

I grew up near Greenock, which fits that description fairly well and found that the Scottish Enterprise system round there was not at all geared for anything remotely ambitious. Although I found that the people on the front line were great, as I delved further into the depths of the monster I just got circulated between stuffy box tickers, who seem immune to novelty as it is never their department. The whole experience was just depressing and completely unrewarding.

"(it's a perma-warm topic in the UK)" No, most English people don't give a toss. It is a warm topic in Scotland so long as you don't ask how its going to be paid for.

Highly unlikely. Remember Scotland already has a separate legal system and different bank notes from England & Wales.

The only way things could change massively would be if a newly independent Scotland left the EU, which as far as I know, noone wants. Scotland in the EU would mean Scotland would have access to the EU single market (which includes England etc.). This means there'd be no customs, visas etc with England (etc.)

Personally I don't see it affecting any of the five points raised: however, if you're looking to start a new business there may be some financial considerations. But to be honest, despite all the talk true independence is really quite a long way off, and certainly not until the EU financial situation has generally calmed down (so, a long way off!).

Isn't Scotland holding in 2014 a referendum on independence from the UK?

The Scottish National Party (ruling party in Scotland) is trying to hold it in the weeks just after the 700th anniversary of the greatest Scottish victory over the English at Bannockburn.

It's unlikely they are hoping for a nationalistic fillip but more a negotiating position over the actual wording of the referendum - but it is an amusing bit of chutzpah and what one expects of the SNP leader :-)

Yeah sorta. There's a lot of details to be worked out. The main political party in the Scottish Parliament wants independence. But in the UK/Westminster Parliament (of which Scotland is a part), the Conservative ("Tory") government isn't so keen on the idea.

There's going to be a lot of horsetrading and politicing over what the referendum will actually say, e.g. if there was 2 questions "Do you want independence? Yes/No If not, do you want Scotland to have more power Yes/No", then the Scottish independence people can almost win either way, if 50.00001% vote for independence, they can claim it, if not, but a majority say "more power", then they can claim more power for Scottish Parliament

The Scottish government has been pushing to lower corporation tax for a while now. They've been prevented from doing so by the English government as they fear that companies will simply hop the border to reduce their taxes.

It's a small point but that would be the UK government, there is no English government.

Not much. They are likely to stay using the pound and Scotland already has its own legal system. And it would remain in the EU.

You can't become independent, and remain using the UKs currency. Won't happen.

If they do become independent, they will have to create their own currency, or join the sinking Euro.

Sure you can. The notes look different anyway, so you could just peg the new Scottish pound at 1:1 with the UK pound.

No reason you can't use the same currency as another country. Some non-EU countries (Montenegro and Kosovo) use the Euro and aren't in EU.

Quite a few countries are currently pegged to the US Dollar (e.g. Cayman Islands dollar), so it is not a new process for a country. Pegging to the UK pound would work better right now than going for the euro.

On a currency side note, I do wish someone would not divide their main currency into 100's (decimal) so pennies wouldn't exist. How about being a nice non-decimal 12?

The UK tried using non-100 divisors and gave up in 1971. http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/customs/questions/mo...

Yeah, but thats beyond even 100 divisions, they had 240. I was more thinking along the lines of 12.

What's wrong with pennies? Just aesthetics? Some countries don't go below 0.05 which is essentially dividing it into 1/20s.

In the US, it is a cost issue. Pennies cost too much to make and people tend to lose them.

I wish the US would get rid of the penny and nickel and go to a one decimal digit system instead of two. It would be better to go to 12 -> 1 just because of divisors (10: 1, 2, 5 or 12: 1, 2, 3, 4, 6). Much better for dividing food bills.

12 isn't the key divisor it's 60 - basis of the Babylonian system (hence minutes and seconds, and 360 degrees in a circle) and historically the basis of the 'old money' in the UK (as those of us who can remember it call it):

* pound - 240 old pence * 10 bob note - 120 old pence * crown - 60 old pence * half crown - 30 old pence * florin/2-bob bit - 24 old pence * shilling/bob - 12 pence * sixpence - 6 old pence * thrupenny bit - 3 old pence * penny, ha'penny (and before my time, farthing - one quarter of an old pence).

Missing intervals are the groat (4 old pence) in the old Scotch money.

Agreed on the value of using 60 except it is too many divisions to make a coin profitably.

Why divide at all? The yen has no fractions.

OK, you could in theory, but it'd be stupid to base your currency on a country you just separated from, unless you wanted to be completely beholden to their economic policy.

Lots of countries do it. Ireland got independence from UK and pegged the currency for 50 years. When a country gets independent their economies are often quite tightly tied already, so the smaller country is often beholden to the larger country already.

The Republic of Ireland broke parity with the pound sterling in either 1973 or 1976, I forget which. So there was either a 51 or 53 year long period in which you could take Irish currency to the Central Bank on dame Street and exchange it at par. It can be done without the actve co-operation of the country whose currency you're pegging.

On a more mundane note the SNP currently seems to be aiming for devo-max, (devolution maximum) where Foreign and Defence policy stay with Westminster and in other matters Scotland is for practical purposes independent. Devil's in the details of course.

That depends on their tax policies. Spending plans less English handouts leaves a huge gap to fill. Of course they'll try to support fledgling businesses but if the large wealthy businesses (and people) leave then ...

I know plenty of businesses eyeing up moves across the border.

Perhaps it would simply come down to what happens to the tax rates show a local government have the ability to raise and lower taxes? Lower taxes and more grants for small businesses === more people willing to try their hand at their own business.

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