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The Positive Brexit Thread

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30 minutes ago, Herman said:

The generation coming after me can't even get a mortgage. 

Why not?

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10 minutes ago, Surfer said:

Here is another very long post - but do read it - as Brexit isn't done yet the pain is just about to begin.... 

How so?

Take the distinction between goods and services. Sounds simple right? Goods are things and services are, well, services - legal, financial, hairdressing, whatever. But actually that's a crude distinction that doesn't reflect the reality of how businesses work. Car companies, for instance, sell cars. But many of them also often offer the financing for the car, which allows the person buying it to pay in monthly installments. So in that capacity they're actually functioning as a mini-bank. And banking is…

A service.

Exactly. The same is true for loads of companies, like IBM, say, or Hewlett Packard. They sell things. But they also sell services. So even at this very basic level, going for a goods-only deal already has a massive knock-on effect on businesses. If they want to keep on selling the services in Europe, they have to internally restructure to get into the right regulatory regime. Sometimes that'll be big news - they'll close an office or factory. Sometimes it'll be a case of moving staff around or bulking up whatever office they have on the continent to get recognition there, and it'll slip under the radar. But the long-term danger is that all the high-knowledge, proper value-added activity goes to Europe.

 

This raises the point I seem to remember making some time way back in the Triassic Era. One Leave argument was that it wasn't a drawback that the UK was cutting itself off from the world's largest single market, which just happened to be on its doorstep, because the service sector was all that mattered, and with cyberspace distance didn't matter. Yes it might make trade harder for physical things, like cars, but who cared about that?

But all studies show that distance does matter with services, not least in part because they are often directly linked to the sale of physical objects, and cyber service trade is harder the further away the trading partners.

Of course the other point which this fallacious Leave argument tacitly accepted was that leaving the single market would have a damaging effect on trade in cars etc. Just another example à la Minford, of casually throwing an industry, and people's jobs, under a bus.

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1 hour ago, Van wink said:

Why not?

Housing too expensive - not enough housing in the right area - wages too low - jobs too insecure - very large deposits needed - saving impossible because of high rents. A multiple of things that are making it harder to get on the housing ladder.

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My lads have managed it, it’s not easy that’s for sure, but certainly still possible out of the main Cities. 
Help to buy assisted one of them, not a bad scheme.

Edited by Van wink

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9 minutes ago, Van wink said:

My lads have managed it, it’s not easy that’s for sure, but certainly still possible out of the main Cities. 
Help to buy assisted one of them, not a bad scheme.

This is nonsense argument. All the facts show it's much much more difficult to buy a house now than it ever was in our youth. I bought my first flat in London on 3 times my then modest salary at 23. Not 3 times me my partner just me.

I am really fed up with many of my generation and older who just can't (or won't) accept that we never had so good. Sure we struggled but home ownership was possible indeed the normal aspiration in your 20s. Have some empathy with the young. 

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12 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

This is nonsense argument. All the facts show it's much much more difficult to buy a house now than it ever was in our youth. I bought my first flat in London on 3 times my then modest salary at 23. Not 3 times me my partner just me.

I am really fed up with many of my generation and older who just can't (or won't) accept that we never had so good. Sure we struggled but home ownership was possible indeed the normal aspiration in your 20s. Have some empathy with the young. 

I said it’s not easy but still possible. I acknowledge it’s much more difficult. Try reading what is said before jumping.

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2 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

This is nonsense argument. All the facts show it's much much more difficult to buy a house now than it ever was in our youth. I bought my first flat in London on 3 times my then modest salary at 23. Not 3 times me my partner just me.

I am really fed up with many of my generation and older who just can't (or won't) accept that we never had so good. Sure we struggled but home ownership was possible indeed the normal aspiration in your 20s. Have some empathy with the young. 

I have empathy with all people that work hard and do not expect gifts on a plate.  I didn't buy my first house until I was almost 30, and made many efforts and sacrifices to retire at 52.  Do today's youngsters wish to make those sacrifices ?  I'm not so sure.

I met a young lady on holiday last year who was bragging about her uni gap year travels and complaining that she would never have a  pension and have to work into old age.  My response was that she will do unless she makes the effort.  By the time I was her age I had been working and contributing to a pension for five years. Many of my contemporaries were willing to work very hard to retire early and we did, and the youngsters of today can do the same but many simply have the wrong aims and negative mindset that makes it easier for them to blame the older generations for their failures rather than adopting a can do attitude.

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5 minutes ago, Van wink said:

I said it’s not easy but still possible. I acknowledge it’s much more difficult. Try reading what is said before jumping.

It was your initial comment 'Why not' that set the argument. Herman answered it quite well. There will always be exceptions but the facts are irrefutable. 'Help to buy' was a scheme trying to address this very problem!

I see PM falls into his own elephant trap of his own making below. Nevermind.

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My initial comment was a genuine question, Herman had said this generation can’t even get a mortgage, I wanted to know why he thought that because from the experience of my family that statement is incorrect.

Now if you want to discuss housing and problems young people have in that respect that’s great, it’s something I am interested in and a field I have worked in, to protect tenants and vulnerable people from rogue landlords, but please don’t attribute views to posters which are way off the mark.

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6 minutes ago, Van wink said:

My initial comment was a genuine question, Herman had said this generation can’t even get a mortgage, I wanted to know why he thought that because from the experience of my family that statement is incorrect.

Now if you want to discuss housing and problems young people have in that respect that’s great, it’s something I am interested in and a field I have worked in, to protect tenants and vulnerable people from rogue landlords, but please don’t attribute views to posters which are way off the mark.

Fair enough. We'll both accept it's far far more difficult for the average bod to buy or save for a house now than it was in 70s.

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25 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

Fair enough. We'll both accept it's far far more difficult for the average bod to buy or save for a house now than it was in 70s.

Do youngsters really try to save nowadays ?  There are just so many temptations to spend their money on such as mobile phones, holidays abroad etc that the older generations never had.

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2 hours ago, Herman said:

Housing too expensive - not enough housing in the right area - wages too low - jobs too insecure - very large deposits needed - saving impossible because of high rents. A multiple of things that are making it harder to get on the housing ladder.

It was never easy to get a mortgage. It took a lot of saving to get a deposit together. Then one had high interest rates. 

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2 hours ago, Rock The Boat said:

It was never easy to get a mortgage. It took a lot of saving to get a deposit together. Then one had high interest rates. 

You hit the nail on the head there RTB, i bought my house back in 1978 and within a year or two as we entered the 80s i can recall having to endure interest rates at a staggering 15% for quite sometime...it increased my monthly mortgage repayments hugely. The younger ones trying to get on the property ladder these days may be tied down in other areas but theyve not had to experience interest rates anywhere near that kind of level. Its really swings and roundabouts for every generation.

Another cause  nowadays is simply the population explosion, mostly  having come from immigration these past years. England is already the most crowded nation in Europe and everyone  ants a place to live, naturally. But  nearly everything associated with  extra population, be it more homes, more hospitals, more utility servicing, has not been able to keep pace.

Just take locally, at central Norwich, for decades in the 20th century it had remained  constant at around 120.000. The 2011 census had it at 132.000 and the 2021 census is expected to push it well beyond 140,000 and this picture is painted all over the country. Be it governments, politicians, authorities, but mainly society as a whole, it has been allowed to happen and as it continues with no real grasping of the nettle to deal with it, things will only become harder to deal with.

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"But  nearly everything associated with  extra population, be it more homes, more hospitals, more utility servicing, has not been able to keep pace."

Keep pace? They haven't even attempted to try.

The simple facts was previous generations had large amounts of housing stock. Social and council housing with affordable rents. Employment was reasonably spread around the country and not predominantly based around the south east. Schooling has been shrunk. (My town had 5 secondary schools when I was a kid, it now has 2. )Hospitals have dissappeared (again my town has lost 75% of its hospital including the A&E.)

Yes the population has grown but if successive governments do absolutely nothing to address this, and other changes to the way people live, by not  building more schools, hospitals and importantly housing then inevitably the country goes pop, does something stupid and damaging  but still forgets to address the real problem

Edited by Herman

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13 minutes ago, How I Wrote Elastic Man said:

It isn't.

👍

Aye, it's miles behind the Netherlands, Belgium and Malta and roughly the same as Germany and Italy. Also, only less than 10% of the UK is built on, which tends to get overlooked.

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8 hours ago, Rock The Boat said:

It was never easy to get a mortgage. It took a lot of saving to get a deposit together. Then one had high interest rates. 

 

5 hours ago, Essjayess said:

i bought my house back in 1978 and within a year or two as we entered the 80s i can recall having to endure interest rates at a staggering 15% for quite sometime...it increased my monthly mortgage repayments hugely. The younger ones trying to get on the property ladder these days may be tied down in other areas but theyve not had to experience interest rates anywhere near that kind of level. Its really swings and roundabouts for every generation.

Another cause  nowadays is simply the population explosion, mostly  having come from immigration these past years.

Let's  be objective about this. I am sure that @Rock The Boat, like many Boomers started work early in life, did work hard, save, go without things they would have liked and made good choices. Equally in terms of acquiring what they have they were lucky to have been born when they were. Mortgages may have been difficult to get but houses were much cheaper in comparison with wages. In addition the economy was generating "good jobs" where many stayed with the same employer for life knowing their retirement would be cushioned by final salary occupational pension schemes. Not all of their wealth was earned, the so called "property ladder" was politically designed to keep the generation quite: borrow as much as you could and you were pretty sure that house price inflation would erode your debt while general and wage inflation quickly reduced your payments. While you saved your deposit you also got a pretty good rate of return. It was in effect a giant ponzi scheme creating assets that were not earnt, but instead created by economic policy.

Like all ponzi schemes it reaches a point of collapse with the cost of entry too high for new entrant e.g. our young people. Legally they have to stay in school until 18 and very few good jobs exist, or apprenticeships,  if they don't have a degree, driving up student numbers. The collapse of social housing has driven up rental costs making saving hard with low interest rates making it not very productive. Low inflation means the "property ladder" is more of a property step. Buy to let landlords use their financial muscle to unproductively suck money out of the economy and squeeze out first time buyers.

This is not swings and roundabouts as @Essjayess puts it but a one way side now benefitting one particular generation. To blame this on immigration just looks like and excuse (even if we ignore other, less savoury interpretations)

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6 hours ago, Essjayess said:

You hit the nail on the head there RTB, i bought my house back in 1978 and within a year or two as we entered the 80s i can recall having to endure interest rates at a staggering 15% for quite sometime...it increased my monthly mortgage repayments hugely. The younger ones trying to get on the property ladder these days may be tied down in other areas but theyve not had to experience interest rates anywhere near that kind of level. Its really swings and roundabouts for every generation.

Another cause  nowadays is simply the population explosion, mostly  having come from immigration these past years. England is already the most crowded nation in Europe and everyone  ants a place to live, naturally. But  nearly everything associated with  extra population, be it more homes, more hospitals, more utility servicing, has not been able to keep pace.

Just take locally, at central Norwich, for decades in the 20th century it had remained  constant at around 120.000. The 2011 census had it at 132.000 and the 2021 census is expected to push it well beyond 140,000 and this picture is painted all over the country. Be it governments, politicians, authorities, but mainly society as a whole, it has been allowed to happen and as it continues with no real grasping of the nettle to deal with it, things will only become harder to deal with.

Interest rates I think touched 15% for less than 1 day.

We had MIRAS  (tax relief) was it on 30K.

Then of course you had a property that the building society had only lent 3 times your salary on (so your could generally afford the more typical 8% - and the variability)  - and of course this was in the first place an affordable/achievable property. My flat I mentioned in London would now be about 500 - 600K. Good luck with that as as as first time buyer at any interest rate!

As to housing shortage - mainly due to lots more of people now living singly or 1 parent families (divorce) and us all living a  lot longer plus yes a little immigration.

I know these facts don't tally with the myth that the youngsters complain too much and are snowflakes. The real truth is that we, the boomers didn't (and still don't generally) realize how lucky we where and are frankly the real snowflakes - always trying to shift the blame onto other demographic groups for our own shortsightedness. We don't even it seems want to pay for our own 'social care'!

 

 

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6 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

Interest rates I think touched 15% for less than 1 day.

We had MIRAS  (tax relief) was it on 30K.

Then of course you had a property that the building society had only lent 3 times your salary on (so your could generally afford the more typical 8% - and the variability)  - and of course this was in the first place an affordable/achievable property. My flat I mentioned in London would now be about 500 - 600K. Good luck with that as as as first time buyer at any interest rate!

As to housing shortage - mainly due to lots more of people now living singly or 1 parent families (divorce) and us all living a  lot longer plus yes a little immigration.

I know these facts don't tally with the myth that the youngsters complain too much and are snowflakes. The real truth is that we, the boomers didn't (and still don't generally) realize how lucky we where and are frankly the real snowflakes - always trying to shift the blame onto other demographic groups for our own shortsightedness. We don't even it seems want to pay for our own 'social care'!

 

 

You could have a deposit of less than 10K in today’s money 30 or 40 years ago. That would get you a cardboard box these days. 

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8 minutes ago, Hoola Han Solo said:

Mouse brain strikes again 🐭🧠 

One thing I'll never truly understand about modern life is how people have every piece of information ever produced, within a couple of touches of a button, on a device no bigger that a diary and yet, and yet........

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8 minutes ago, Herman said:

 

One thing I'll never truly understand about modern life is how people have every piece of information ever produced, within a couple of touches of a button, on a device no bigger that a diary and yet, and yet........

It’s because lying Brexiteer idiots like Swindo will desperately look for arguments to support their views. It doesn’t really matter if it’s accurate or a pack of lies, as long as they’re “right” in their head. 

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