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Fun at CiF

The Guardian ensures that purported authors at least read and approve of what goes out under their names.

Rilly?

I myself have ghosted pieces for this very newspaper when working as a press officer. When Mr. Seaton was running CiF in fact.

And while I\’d have been caught very quickly indeed if I\’d said something out of line, there wasn\’t in fact any formal checking process that I recall.

Umm, did you check that fact with the Guardian editors before you wrote the piece?

This is a little weird

You either think that encouraging an unlevel playing field for business so that the cheats get an unfair competitive advantage by not paying tax is fair, or you don’t.

Aren\’t we continually told that taxing business activity isn\’t a damaging thing to do?

In which case, not being taxed on business activity cannot be a competitive advantage, can it?

However, if not being taxed confers a competitive advantage then business activity being taxed must be damaging.

So we should abolish corporation tax then, yes?

 

No, Mr. Kettle, not satire but truth telling

And what is Hislop\’s principal message? Week in and week out, it is that most pretty much all politicians are corrupt, deluded, incompetent, second-rate and hypocritical.

Seriously, in a world that contains John Gummer, Tim Yeo and Chris Huhne, to mention just those on the current Coalition side on matters climate change, who could argue with this?

If all politicians are useless, then all government is useless, all authority is useless, and probably all sense of collective improvement is useless too. Ultimately, this view of politicians embodies a profoundly despairing individualist view of human affairs.

Quite correct, the major and killer argument against all and any form of collectivist politics is that, by definition, all politicians are useless, incompetent, self-interested cunts. Nobel prizes have been awarded for this insight although James Buchanan didn\’t use quite the same phrasing.

It is an infortunate fact that we do need government: there are some things that must be done and some things that must be done that must be done in a forced collective manner. This necessarily means politics and politicians. But given that they are all cunts we should limit their activities to only those things that both must be done and must be done by government.

Other than that small subset of what politicians currently engage themselves with we should do to them what cunts are actually built for: fuck \’em.

The Guardian and tax havens

No, leave aside the hypocrisy and look at the logic here:

A regular punter who tried to make his tax payments conditional on a guarantee of anonymity from officialdom and a reduced tax rate wouldn\’t get far. But where the punter in question has serious cash in some Alpine hideaway, then HMRC is suddenly reduced to a humble supplicant, and so it has now made concessions of precisely this sort in relation to Swiss banks.

Yes, this is true.

And tax havens ought to be easy enough to bring to heel: they survive only thanks to the defence and other protections extended by real states,

Note \”real states\” there.

Forcing the rich to pay their share is perfectly possible, but it will never happen while there is such an egregious failure of political will.

Well, yes, except for that problem of \”real states\”.

Another word for the same thing is \”sovereignty\”. Other countries get to determine what the tax law will be in those other countries just as we get to determine what is tax law here. The reason that HMRC is a humble supplicant in Switzerland is because Switzerland is one of those sovereign nations, you know, a \”real country\”, one which gets to make its own laws.

Now, we have had a system whereby a few favoured nations get to decide what the law is to be elsewhere. Get to decide who is a \”real country\” and who is not. Some grouping of Wogs, Ragheads, Toerags or Picanninies was not a real country and required pinkish European people to impose law upon them whatever their own personal preferences. Some of the smaller places inhabited by pinkish European people were also so treated (think of all the various statelets of Germany that Bismark etc vacuumed up, even the Cantons of Switzerland who have gone to war with each other more than once over whether everyone should celebrate Mass with transubstantiation or consubstantiation).

We also have a name for this system: \”Imperialism\”.

What amuses (or horrifies, to taste) is that those who claim most vociferously that Imperialism was and is bad, M\’Kay, are exactly those who would impose a new Imperialism of taxes.

Which is something of a pity really for I thought we\’d got all of this sorted out in the 20th century. You know, rights of sovereign nations and the rights of self-determination? Stalin doesn\’t get to tell Poland what the country\’s social and economic system is, nor the US what the UK\’s is, and Richard Murphy doesn\’t get to tell Switzerland what its tax system is?

The parody singularity approaches

Health experts blame passive overeating for global pandemic, warning in the Lancet that governments must tackle obesity now

\”Passive overeating\”.

What, you mean the pokers aren\’t putting the food into their own mouths? Digesting it to produce flobbling rolls of glutinous fat?

They\’re just absorbing the over-weightness from the passing air?

Swinburn\’s paper comes up with a clear primary culprit: a powerful global food industry \”which is producing more processed, affordable, and effectively-marketed food than ever before\”.

He said an \”increased supply of cheap, palatable, energy-dense foods\”, coupled with better distribution and marketing, had led to \”passive overconsumption\”.

Nutritious food, ever cheaper. The thing that all and every species has been searching for since that very first set of chemicals learnt how to copy themselves in the oceans of 3.5 billion years ago.

Twats.

I do not think conviction rate quite means this

Fraud cost the British economy more £38 billion in the 2010/11 – just £2 billion less than the entire defence budget.

More than half of all fraud in Britain – around £21 billion – involves public sector money. Tax fraud accounts for £15 billion a year while around £1 billion in benefits are illegally claimed.

Central government lost around £2.6 billion to fraudsters last year compared to £2.1 billion lost by local authorities.

The most serious fraud cases are heavily dependant on forensic accounting to gather evidence. Last year, the Serious Fraud Office processed around 70 million documents – the equivalent to a paper stack 200 miles high.

Because of the paper trail left behind by perpetrators of fraud it has a conviction rate of around 84 per cent – among the highest for any crime.

Umm, no, not really.

What they\’ve used there is the conviction rate from being charged to being convicted. For we most certainly are not seeing 84% of those who nick £38 billion a year spending time at Brenda\’s Pleasure.

Fraud is a hugely under-reported cime and also a hugely under-prosecuted crime, precisely because of the difficulty in building a case: paper trails or no.

What is the definition of \”waste\”?

Research has shown that one in three women leave the shower running while they shave their legs, wasting around 50?billion litres of water a year.

You might think that women are wasting the globe\’s precious razor blade reserves by shaving their legs at all. You might think, as Thames Water seems to, that women are wasting water by shaving their legs in a manner that is convenient to those women.

However, \”waste\” is one of those things, as with value, which is the eye of the consumer, not the beholder of said consumer. As long as women are paying the price for the water they use then their decision to use it in a particular manner is not waste. It is simply their preferred method of consumption.

If they\’re not paying the full and just price then the problem is with the price being charged which is what has to be changed.

To take a different but logically the same example. If I buy Bollinger and pour it down the neck of some young pretty to seduce her am I wasting Bollinger? Is the answer different if she does or does not know her cava from her spumante?

The correct answer is that it\’s none of your damn business: I\’ve paid for the champers and shall use it as I wish, thank you very much.

(As an aside it\’s just occured to me that young prettys should in fact be on offer free to middle aged men. Under a proper and truly socialist system of course. For the charms of the young prettys are simply natural endowments, no more the product of their labour than land and thus righteously available to all at no fee.)

Retail sales: I\’m not convinced by these numbers

We\’ve got the CoOp telling us that even food sales are falling:

Peter Marks said that for the first time people have been cutting food budgets – normally an area that is relied upon as \”recession-proof\”.

\”People are spending less on food – that\’s a first,\” said the Co-op\’s chief executive. He added that he and other retailers are having to cut prices radically to shift stock.

While normally around a quarter of products are on promotion, approximately 40pc are discounted at the moment, Mr Marks said. He added: \”We\’re not into \’buy one, get one free\’ – we\’re into \’buy one, get two free\’.\”

He added: \”It has been a tough six months, the toughest I\’ve ever experienced in my 40 years of retailing. I don\’t think we have come out of recession since 2008… I\’ve operated through several recessions – this is by far the longest.\”

The Co-Op, which is Britain\’s fifth biggest supermarket group, unveiled a fall in first-half pre-tax profits to £230.8m. Group sales fell from to 6.89bn in the six months to July, down from £6.95bn during the same period last year. Food sales were £3.7bn, 4.6pc lower than last year.

OK: I\’m not arguing with those figures. Rather with what interpretation you might put upon them. For it\’s essential to distinguish between some possible cyclical reasons (ie, the economy\’s in the toilet) and a structural reason…..and there could be any number of those. Perhaps there\’s fewer people about, perhaps we\’re all now on diets, maybe, well, think up your own unlikely cause.

My likely cause is that, at least in part, we\’re seeing a structural change in the way that people buy things. Yes, even food. For:

Internet sales
Based on ONS experimental Internet sales series, the non-seasonally adjusted average weekly
value of Internet retail sales in July 2011 was £523.4 million which was approximately 9.1 per
cent of total retail sales (excluding automotive fuel), compared with July 2010 which was £395.8
million which was approximately 7.1 per cent of total retail sales (excluding automotive fuel).

We really do have a structural change going on. And yes, that structural change is affecting even food sales. From box deliveries of organics through Ocado to Amazon now offering groceries.

I don\’t say that internet sales are the full and only cause of retail problems: yes, I\’m sure that recession and general pennilessness have an effect. But I do think that this structural change (look, nearly 10% of retail sales are over the net now, up from nothing a decade ago and they\’ve expanded by 2% of total retail sales in just the last twelvemonth) is the cause of at least part of it.

Does this matter though? In some cases no: if you\’re an investor in retail stocks then why doesn\’t matter. Falling sales are bad, M\’Kay? But in two other senses yes. The first is just the general accumulation of woe and gloom about the economy. Lower storefront sales aren\’t solely to do with woe and gloom in the economy therefore they shouldn\’t be taken as signs of woe and gloom in the economy. Solely.

The second is whatever might be a policy response to events. It the change is a structural one then things like lower interest rates, QE III, fiscal expansion, these aren\’t going to make a difference to that part of it which is structural.

Or, in short, as I\’ve said a number of times recently, if 10% of retail sales are now over the internet who is surprised that 10% of shops are empty?

Our ever glorious Retired Accountant

A while back we were told that the heavens were falling because there were tax debts: money legally owed but which HMRC couldn\’t collect.

This was of course proof perfect that HMRC should get lots more money to hire more people to collect it all.

When the total outstanding debts now owing to HMRC are added to these two sums, which when last estimated was £28 billion, ….

It is very obvious that the UK cannot afford this tax gap. It is equally obvious that if investment were made in additional resources for HMRC then this tax gap could and would be substantially reduced.

From the same source today we get an explanation of that uncollected tax debt.

And 90% of the bad debt is due by companies that have gone bust. So there’s not a hope of the Revenue getting the cash. I know that because the Revenue have said so.

I wonder why the same source is saying such different things about the same situation? Myself, and I know it\’s deeply uncharitable of me, I have the merest smidgeon of a soupcon of a suspicion that the difference is explained by the manner that the first point was made in a report funded by PCS, the union to which the tax peeps belong.

You know, \”hire more union members and pay them more\” being the sort of thing that unions like to see in union funded papers?

 

 

So what\’s the dividing line?

But investors can too often also be speculators, seeking profits on bond trades affecting millions of families and jobs.

An investor is seeking a profit on his bond trade. A speculator is seeking a profit on his bond trade.

So, umm, what\’s the dividing line?

In Guardianspeak it\’s obvious of course: an investor is someone putting their money somewhere the Guardian approves of, a speculator is someone putting their money somewhere The Guardian does not approve of.

But out here in the real world: where is that dividing line?

Dear God Almighty, I think I\’m going to faint

It\’s The Guardian, of all places, who actually managed to get this story correct in its opening lines.

The value of holding a degree has been eroded as the share of the population with a university education has more than doubled over two decades, a study shows.

Glory be, that straight old supply and demand thing. Increase supply and price paid will fall so as to match up demand for that greater supply.

What troubles me though is that their education editor seems to have a greater command of economics than either their economics leader writer (Mr. Chakrabortty) or any of their columnists.

So just who is a child then?

But that sense of relief is exactly the reason why GCSEs should be abolished – because they perpetuate the idea that 16 is the gateway to adulthood.

Umm, but 16 is the gateway to adulthood. Sure, 16 year olds aren\’t the finished mature item but that can be said about 48 year old men like me. 16 is when you start to gather certain rights and liberties: to sex, work and so on.

And, if we\’re to be frank about this, if at 16 you\’re old enough to fuck then you\’re old enough to go to work and buy your own damn condoms.

Why don\’t journalists bother to look up statistics?

Try this from Clive Aslet:

Well, no. If there were a demand for new housing, builders would be putting up properties left, right and centre on their massive land banks. As it is, the rate of building has slowed to little above zero.

Umm, there\’s \”litte above zero\” and there\’s \”little above zero\” Mr. Aslet.

Here are the actual figures.

We\’re building around and about 100,000 houses a year, 25,000 a quarter. Adding to the housing stock at the rate of (ish, ish) 0.4% a year (assuming 25 million households) and 0.1% a quarter.

Private housebuilding seems to be holding up better than social landlords as well.

Seasonally adjusted housing starts in England fell from 25,680 in the March quarter 2011 to 23,400 in the June quarter 2011. This is a nine per cent quarter on quarter fall. Starts are still 51 per cent below their December quarter 2005 peak, but 62 per cent above the trough in the March quarter of 2009.

So even when the economy was boom all the time, all the time boom, we were only adding 0.2% per quarter to the housing stock. We\’re at half that now.

This may or may not be the \”correct\” figure. Perhaps we should be building more, perhaps we shouldn\’t. But it just ain\’t \”little above zero\”.

So, umm, why is it that journos don\’t look up statistics then?

Shrink the university system!

The number of degree students ending up in low to lower-skilled jobs has grown from 9pc to 17pc over the past 18 years, a fresh analysis by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) has revealed.

The increase is largely due to the number of people with a degree rising at a faster rate than the number of high-skill jobs available in the UK since 1993, the earliest comparable data, according to the report.

One in five graduates now earn less on average than someone educated to A-level standard, while 15pc earn less than those with GCSE or equivalent-level qualifications, the ONS report showed.

We\’re simply educating too many people too much.

So we should stop doing so.

Fortunately, as students now get to see the full cost (and pay the full cost) of their education, this problem will be self-resolving.

Which is, although few will openly admit it, the real underlying reason for insisting that students take out the loans to finance their education.

They\’ll whine about this won\’t they?

Council workers could be forced to take a week\’s unpaid leave each year as part of radical plans to minimise job losses, it emerged yesterday.

They\’ll whine about it at the same time as they praise Germany\’s reaction to the recession: making lots of people work part time for less money.

It\’s exactly the same basic situation: instead of 5% of the people losing 100% of their income, have 100% of the people lose 5% of their income. Share the pain, you know?

OK, so I don\’t know that they\’ll whine, I just think they will. But if they do we\’ll learn something interesting about the UK labour market. Which is that we can\’t have the sort of consensual German system where unions and management plan together how best to deal with hard times: for the UK unions won\’t plan together like the German ones.

Timmy elsewhere

I\’ve the Thunderer column in today\’s Times. Well tomorrow\’s, today\’s, umm, you know.

I can\’t link because it\’s not linkable. You\’ll just have to buy the paper. So there etc.

Business Binge Drinking

Nice piece about binge drinking in China.

Essentially, in business, you\’ve got to do it.

Sadly, it\’s reportage, it doesn\’t explain the real reason, which is that it\’s a low trust society. Or, looking at it another way, a low rule of law society making it a high trust society.

I got this when in Russia in the 90s. Most people you tried to do a deal with wanted to see you drunk before they agreed to do a deal with you. You could agree a deal, sign contracts all you wanted, but if something went wrong you couldn\’t depend upon the law to sort it all out fairly. You had to depend upon the bloke you\’d done the deal with. So what sort of bloke you\’d done the deal with was vitally important. And you measured this by their behaviour while drunk.

Someone who became vicious, who lied, or let slip stories about how they\’d screwed people over, not so interesting. Someone who got cheerier as they got more pissed a rather better prospect.

In essence, in the absence of that rule of law you had to rely upon an estimation of character: and for that, in vino veritas.

Mebbe.