SNP Win - The Economics of D-I-V-O-R-C-E

ruggedtoast

Its interesting that then most cogent part of the SNPs argument for Scotland's economic viability is that they will be able to sit back and receive oil revenues without having to actually do anything.

Scotland joined the Union after having bankrupted themselves with their own colonial endeavours, and as far as I can see they have been complaining about it like a sulking child ever since.

Scotland enthusiastically reaped all the benefits of expansionist imperialism and has accepted exactly none of the guilt, preferring to take on some absurd and wholly inaccurate mantle as an oppressed people.

Post empire they have been sheltered from Nazism, Communism and post war economic collapse by the Union.


Meanwhile the English voter has the worst of all worlds, as one delusional Westminster government after another acquiesces to their every demand to keep them happy (a non sequitur) and stop the last vestige of a long defunct Empire going.

Now they find themselves massively over represented in our government and living in some sort of socialist utopia bankrolled by England.

Good grief, English students pay £9000 a year, Scottish ones pay nothing for degrees that are one year longer. The English pay prescription charges, they do not. We have to pay to park in hospitals, they do not. And the biggest employer in Scotland is the public sector.

If they really are paying for that lot themselves then good luck to them. Otherwise I wish them a speedy farewell and look forward to seeing how Westminster goes about marginalising English representation when only England, a devolved Wales and NI remain in the Union.

tomterm8

Generali wrote: »

Switzerland can't back banks like UBS yet they exist. Iceland had banks that were strongly recommended on this very website that had liabilities far greater than Iceland's GDP.

I guess I walked into that. Switzerland is an exception, for historical reasons. But both the Irish and Icelandic banks were relatively small on international terms. Large compared to their economies. But HBoS alone employs 78,000 people. From what I can tell, all the banks involved in the Icelandic crises employed substantially less than 1/5 that number of people. In fact, if you combine ALL the irish banks and ALL the icelandic banks together, I'm pretty sure they end up being smaller than HBoS.

And HBoS is SMALL compared to Royal Bank of Scotland.

Radiantsoul

I have always felt that if I was Prime Minister the first thing I would do would be to grant Scotland independence on day 1.

I would then re-invade and conquer them. No mercy would be granted: - the womenfolk would be sold into the prostituton industry, the men would be chained up and forced to build roads. Most of the land would be used for nuclear weapons testing and as a large open air landfill sight. All cats and dogs would be elimiated.

ninky_2

out of interest what qualifies you to be a 'scottish' student? if you spent a gap year living in scotland would that then qualify you for scottish level fees?

IveSeenTheLight

Generali wrote: »

From an economic standpoint, a split between England and Scotland would be fascinating (for me). I don't have answers to what would happen but would like to kick off a conversation.

Given that Scotland was, AIUI at least, basically broke when they joined the Union, how would the national debt be split between the remnants of the UK and Scotland? Would you use the Barnett(sp?) Formula for example, ie Scotland gets a higher spend per head so gets more debt per head?

Interesting theory, however possibly missguided consideration giving the following

Backbiter wrote: »

Googling the level of subsidy brought up this (not exactly up-to-date):

According to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barnett_formula) the actual per capita expenditure for 2006/7 was England £7,121, Wales £8,139, Scotland £8,623 and Northern Ireland £9,385.

Scotland subsidizes the UK. Scotland's population makes up 8.6% of the UK yet raises 10.41% of ALL UK Tax revenue

Read more: http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Is_Scotlan...#ixzz1Iab1sxv7

Scotland is one of the few regions of the United kingdom who earns as much revenue as it spends.

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/a...ing-britain.do

The latter link shows that the region of the UK that receives the highest subsidy relative to the amount of tax it pays is not Scotland or Wales but Northern Ireland. Followed by NE England.

Generali wrote: »

What about the bank bailout? The biggest part of the bailout was HBOS and RBS. Presumably any transfer of the bank assets would include also passing on the bank liabilities. Could Scotland sustain that given that the liabilities of those banks must be 1 year's GDP for Scotland easily?

If you pass on the liabilities, please also pass on the shares bought by the bailout..
I'm sure that this will result in a positive outcome

Generali wrote: »

Then there's oil. Contracts were signed with the British Parliament, not the Scottish Parliament and at the time it was British oil. Can the SNP unilaterally decide that the oil belongs to Scotland when MPs that were returned by Scotland to Westminster were a part of passing legislation allowing drilling in the North Sea and the money pass to The Treasury rather than just Scotland?

True, despite the revenue received from essentially Scottish waters over the last 40 years, the UK still managed to amass such a debt.
Maybe you need to go back to point one and consider how much Scotland has contributed to the UK economy.

Also consider other issues such as the net exportation of water and electricity.

The country also has a target of providing 100% of the countries domestic electricity requirements by 2020.

Not to mention fishing, agriculture and tourism.

With such resources at our disposal, we are on course to be self sufficient.

Generali wrote: »

I wonder if they'd keep The Queen? James I of England was king of England and Scotland so there is precedence. If not, what would happen to her Scottish assets and also the assets of the Crown Estate? Would she keep Holyrood for example?

If you want to go back in history, wasn't Mary Queen of Scot's the rightful heir to the Throne and as such the monarchy should have passed down the Scottish heritage instead of the German one

From my point of view the referendum is unlikely to be posed until 2015 and even if it returned a positive result, there would be a number of years of hardship whilst establishing ourselves trully independent on a global stage.

That said, once through these years of hardship, the country would be in a far better shape than if being held back by Westminster.

IveSeenTheLight

IronWolf wrote: »

I honestly dont think it will ever happen, the Scottish people don;t want it

Possibly.
I'd guess it'd have a better chance than the AV referendum

IveSeenTheLight

purch wrote: »

One piece of good news.

We could ban all talk of Scottish houseprices, on this English forum :T

Is this an English forum? I've seen Martin's face painted in the saltire on St Andrew's day

IveSeenTheLight

ruggedtoast wrote: »

If they really are paying for that lot themselves then good luck to them. Otherwise I wish them a speedy farewell

If it was this simple, why would our current Prime Minister vow to campaign against independence?
Given they do so poorly in political elections, there must be some reason for them to wish to keep the unioin

http://news.scotsman.com/news/David-Cameron-vows-to-campaign.6566054.jp

TheHangingJudge

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

If it was this simple, why would our current Prime Minister vow to campaign against independence?
Given they do so poorly in political elections, there must be some reason for them to wish to keep the unioin[/URL]

David Cameron & a shower of English toffs campaigning in Scotland to retain the Union ?

Wow, that'll win the Scottish electorate over.

I haven't a clue how they'll split the debts. Total it up, divide it by the total population of the UK & times it by Scotland's population sounds the best way. As to oil revenue, sort out the boundary line in the North Sea and anything in Scottish waters they get to keep. Trident ? Doubt England could afford a nuclear deterrent ... give the missiles back to the USA and tow the submarines back to Devenport for decommission. EU membership ? Lucky Scots if they manage to escape from the EU, they'll flourish outside all those stifling rules & regulations.

Prudent

ninky wrote: »

out of interest what qualifies you to be a 'scottish' student? if you spent a gap year living in scotland would that then qualify you for scottish level fees?

You have to be a Scottish resident for three years.