Cameron: "Years of Pain Ahead"

ruggedtoast

The prime minister said there would be no “trampoline recovery” of the economy. He warned there was a “serious problem” with forecasts inherited from Labour of robust 3% growth next year.


“There is a huge amount of debt that has got to be dealt with. Crossing our fingers, waiting for growth and hoping it will go away is simply not an answer,” he said.



“The country has got an overdraft. The interest on that overdraft is swallowing up things that the nation should otherwise be spending money on. We have got to take people with us on this difficult journey.”

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article7144906.ece

Looks like hes not on message with Mr Clegg.

IveSeenTheLight

I don't understand why we need to be in debt.
We should live within our means.
If you want to have something now instead of tomorrow / next year, then ther following years budget should be reduced to compensate for that additional previous weeks / years spend.

there are reports that we have a debt of £156 Billion.
From my calculations, this means each person in the UK effectively owes £2,600 (£156,000,000,000 / 60,000,000)
Lets get that money in by saving on non essentials or raising taxes, then we do not have the yearly interest debt to pay.

Maybe the government should visit the DFW board.
I may be naivie, but I'm sure I could as well as many others find loads of ways to reduce our spending and cut this debt relatively quickly.

Have a few years of harshness, cut back on all non essentials.
It may be hard, but a bit of pain now, will provide a lot of gain going forward.

norfolkshops

tax the banks that will get us money

bendix

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

there are reports that we have a debt of £156 Billion.
From my calculations, this means each person in the UK effectively owes £2,600 (£156,000,000,000 / 60,000,000)
Lets get that money in by saving on non essentials or raising taxes, then we do not have the yearly interest debt to pay.
.

It's a lot worse than that. The debt isn't £156 billion. The budget deficit is £156billion, which means we are currently living beyond our means to the tune of £156billion per annum.

Debt is closer to one trillion, built up over years of increasing budget deficits.

IveSeenTheLight

norfolkshops wrote: »

tax the banks that will get us money

I'm all for raising the taxes and cost cutting as far as possible as long as it does not hurt the economy.

The quicker we reduce and clear the debt, the quicker our taxes can be used more efficiently.

petebates26

I couldn't agree more, I'veseenthelight!

When we fall into debt as individuals, we're made to feel like failures, moral burdens on society who've sinned and need to put things right. It's a familiar cry on here 'You spent the money, you have to pay it back!'

So what happens when the government's in debt? They change interest rates, they cut services that they promised to spend tax money on, they juggle things around and effectively consolidate their debts. Do they urge us to produce more commodities so that we can boost our country's income? Do they encourage actual belt tightening? Do they hell - they re-arrange the figures and we stay in debt.

I'm not educated in politics or economics - but it seems like debt slavery must suit some people. There's more powerful people than the government making money from debts, so that's the way it'll stay.

IveSeenTheLight

bendix wrote: »

It's a lot worse than that. The debt isn't £156 billion. The budget deficit is £156billion, which means we are currently living beyond our means to the tune of £156billion per annum.

Debt is closer to one trillion, built up over years of increasing budget deficits.

All the more reason for use to live within our means.

if the debt is one trillion, I understand why the government has been championing immigration to spread the debt.

Of course, this would indicate that an easier method of getting ourself out of this is to have a period of mass inflation as was in the 70's

Puddleglum

:think: Here's an idea - not sure if it would work.......

Consolidate all our debts on to just one 0% apr credit card. We should be able to get at least 6 months free to start making inroads into the capital with all the money we are saving on interest. No pain and lots of gain.:money:

Now not being totally naive I realise that with a debt this big the government may find it tricky to find a bank willing to give them a credit card with such favourable terms so ........:whistle:

.... divvy up the debt between all of us and we can each find our selves a good credit card to do the job for them.

Well....just a thought!

:beer:

stealeruk

Puddleglum wrote: »

:think: Here's an idea - not sure if it would work.......

Consolidate all our debts on to just one 0% apr credit card. We should be able to get at least 6 months free to start making inroads into the capital with all the money we are saving on interest. No pain and lots of gain.:money:

Now not being totally naive I realise that with a debt this big the government may find it tricky to find a bank willing to give them a credit card with such favourable terms so ........:whistle:

.... divvy up the debt between all of us and we can each find our selves a good credit card to do the job for them.

Well....just a thought!

:beer:

I think you'll find there's too many people already maxed out on credit cards.

Bullfighter

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

I don't understand why we need to be in debt.
We should live within our means.
If you want to have something now instead of tomorrow / next year, then ther following years budget should be reduced to compensate for that additional previous weeks / years spend.

there are reports that we have a debt of £156 Billion.
From my calculations, this means each person in the UK effectively owes £2,600 (£156,000,000,000 / 60,000,000)
Lets get that money in by saving on non essentials or raising taxes, then we do not have the yearly interest debt to pay.

Maybe the government should visit the DFW board.
I may be naivie, but I'm sure I could as well as many others find loads of ways to reduce our spending and cut this debt relatively quickly.

Have a few years of harshness, cut back on all non essentials.
It may be hard, but a bit of pain now, will provide a lot of gain going forward.

This is where the main stream media & politicians have been very disingenuous. They keep on referring to the "Deficit" and hope that people assume it is a fancy word for "Debt". Deficit is the amount we are "overspending". Our "Annual Overspend" is £156bn "Debt" is close to a £trillion. Plus we pay interest on that debt.

If an individual posted such atrocious financials to the Debt Free Wannabe forum I seriously doubt they would get many (Hugz).. especially when they admitted that it was your money they had borrowed!!!!

StevieJ

Looks like Davey lad is trying to play down the perfectly responsible future growth forecasts for next year