Do you think we could have avoided recession if the Tories were in power?

bendix

Really2 wrote: »

Depends if you would like others enjoying your misfortune eg losing your job and kicked out of your house.

If you would not mind that enjoy it as I am sure you will rejoice when it affects you as bad as others.

Well, as much as I would like to put others' interests ahead of my own, life really isnt like that, is it? I'd like to be more ninky-esque in my outlook, but - well - I guess I prefer to think in more Hobbesian terms.

Having just arrived back in the UK relatively cashed up, why shouldn't I feel good about the fact that prices are low (thanks to the weak pound), house prices are falling and shares are being sold at a discount?

I wish i could be more altruistic, I really do. Perhaps I'm not a very nice human being.

Ho hum.

ninky_2

bendix wrote: »

I'd like to be more ninky-esque in my outlook

got my own adjective now? blimey, keep feeding my ego like that and i really will turn into pol pot......

i bet you're a secret altruist. the fact you feel guilty suggests something of a social conscience.

have you ever done a kind deed?

Really2

I prefer to think treat people as I like to be treated. (and visa versa)

I see little to find entertaining about a recession lots of people are going to lose a lot.

Savers, home owners, pensioners.

One mans loss may be another's gain but I can't help feeling any gains I make during this time will be through someone else losing somthing.

lostinrates

bendix wrote: »

Well, as much as I would like to put others' interests ahead of my own, life really isnt like that, is it? I'd like to be more ninky-esque in my outlook, but - well - I guess I prefer to think in more Hobbesian terms.

Having just arrived back in the UK relatively cashed up, why shouldn't I feel good about the fact that prices are low (thanks to the weak pound), house prices are falling and shares are being sold at a discount?

I wish i could be more altruistic, I really do. Perhaps I'm not a very nice human being.

Ho hum.

I kind of know what you mean. I would like to have more faith in humanity and that the decisions from 'on high' in government were for the best interest of the majority, but I recognise that just as I am fallible so are they, in judgement or in character. Its why any talk of restriction, even when presented as protection, as I know it is designed to be, instinctively puts me en guarde.

True story: In Venice I once overheard some British people with children getting very worried about the open water (you knowm the canals and lagoon that Venezia is famous for?:rolleyes:). They said, and I kid not, ''They should really fence all this off, put barricades up - it wouldn't be allowed inEngland, wonbder how many kiddies drown each year'. Well I think it would be allowed, I have managed o recklessly jump into rivers locally to swim, for example, but the idea, the mentality behind it makes me concerned, thats not quite the righ word but its the best I can do now.

Anyway, I'm not altruistic in the way you describe as Ninky esque, but I don't believe I'm less good, nor better. I just have a very diferent outlook, and different perspecive of how means justify ends, or not, and even what those ends should be. Perhaps neiher of us is right, there might be a big answer no one has yet found.

Oh, very depressing post, really. Sorry.

Degenerate

bendix wrote: »

I don't want to divert this fascinating discussion with mundanities, but a rather wicked thought crossed my mind just now.

Am I a bad person for rather enjoying this recession / depression / whatever? Does anyone else share my rather guilty - and entirely selfish - secret?

I'm enjoying it, not out of schadenfreude, but because I've never been richer. I'm fortunate to have a secure job, and my mortgage payments are the lowest they have ever been.

To attone for my good fortune, I have decided to give aid to the struggling economies of Eastern Europe. In a couple of weeks I shall be in Hungary administering a direct injection of precious foreign currency via the delightful employees at various upscale Gentleman's establishments.

mewbie_2

bendix wrote: »

Am I a bad person for rather enjoying this recession / depression / whatever? Does anyone else share my rather guilty - and entirely selfish - secret?

My usual feeling of schadenfreude when watching bad news (think floods, airport chaos, messy divorce cases) has been entirely spoilt with regard to the economic apocalypse due to the fear it might be coming my way next.

Sir_Humphrey

Generali wrote: »

You can't assume what a policy would do in Government by what they say in opposition.

FWIW, I think the Tories would have had a similar looking banking system in January 2007 to the one that Labour had. The big difference would most likely be the fiscal position - I doubt that the Tories would have expanded public sector employment and spending in the way Labour have.

They would have cut taxes for the rich, with a similar negative effect to the public finances (qv Reagan and Bush II in the USA).

JayScottGreenspan

Sir_Humphrey wrote: »

They would have cut taxes for the rich, with a similar negative effect to the public finances (qv Reagan and Bush II in the USA).

Which specific taxes are you saying they would have cut?

kabayiri

bendix wrote: »

I don't want to divert this fascinating discussion with mundanities, but a rather wicked thought crossed my mind just now.

Am I a bad person for rather enjoying this recession / depression / whatever? Does anyone else share my rather guilty - and entirely selfish - secret?

There is something in all of us which enjoys a disaster type scenario. Look how bad news dominates in the press. I'm not sure what defines it, but I'm confident the psychologists have it defined.

That doesn't make someone a bad person, does it?

We don't seem to be able to use this recession to take stock of what we value in life though. It is a great opportunity to rebalance society, and focus on things like local trade; pride in design and engineering and innovation.

bendix

ninky wrote: »

have you ever done a kind deed?

No

Well, none I like to talk about :A