How would you get the UK economy moving again?

Mallotum_X

MrRee wrote: »

Simple really.

Instead of printing money and giving it to the Banks to hoard .... give £20,000 to each household this Xmas.

This will be in the form of shopping vouchers, house purchase vouchers, car purchase vouchers - doubled up if the item was made in the UK (exept house, of course!).

No saving of this money - and an expiry date of end March 2012.

Abandon Stamp Duty on house purchases and give FTB's an additional £20,000 for a house purchase only.

You just watch growth take off!!

Inflation would take off, which is not the same as growth.

ILW

Mallotum_X wrote: »

Inflation would take off, which is not the same as growth.

Wish someone explain that to Mervyn King.

Conrad

Remove masses of employment regulation and also relax FSA lending rules (remember most UK mortgages demonstrate the orderly makrket we have). FSA lending rules mean millions are forced to rent which supresses ambition and the home improvment industry.

Mallotum_X

ILW wrote: »

Wish someone explain that to Mervyn King.

I'm sure hes well aware already!

I dont think the BoE are as daft as maybe people on here give them credit. The easiest way out of the debt is to inflate it. Its waht we have done in previous times of significant debt.

MacMickster

Mallotum_X wrote: »

We need to make it easier for companies to set up and generate income in the UK, at the same time I think we should (as a Europe wide initiative) be exporing whether there are some imported goods that we can protect though tariffs - but this would only work EU wide.

Recession tends to be a time when the bad stuff fails and you start to get the new start ups as more people have to try and work for themselves. Unless everything blows up again (banks, EU, credit crunch II) then we should hopefully start to notice some improvements maybe even this year.

Locally to me I have noticed an increase in building work and a reduction in empty shop units, it may be the first initial signs of things starting to get better, perhaps by the end of 2012 we will see more of these signs and we may start to see some recovery.

This is key to getting the economy going, but the ongoing lack of support by the banks is stifling start-up businesses.

We need a new type of bank set up and supported by the government (well they have supported the current banks without much success) where people can become investors rather than savers, with returns based upon the success of those new businesses.

Introduce a lower tax rate, or higher personal allowance for the self-employed, and further enhanced allowances for each employee they have.

Reduce corporation taxes, and again give allowances for each employee.

Have a media led campaign to buy British (the government can't do it) even if goods cost more than Chinese or Kortean imports.

Tax foreign holidays heavily. Money spent abroad benefits foreign economies rather than ours.

Decide whether we are going for the nuclear power option, and if so, invest in the construction of new plants immediately.

We need government intervention to reduce house prices (maybe punitive levels of stamp duty once a property is sold for more than twice the average house price) which would save our children from having to tie up all of their income in housing, and leave them with more money to spend which would circulate in the economy.

Ignore all professional economists.

Mallotum_X

I doubt the banks are going to do very much in the short term. I would have thought that whilst things are not too bad at the moment they are very much aware of the risks from the EU/Euro collapse/new banking or debt crisis could have on them.

The Government will continue to support the large banks as we would be in a massive mess if a large bank fell. This is going to be a long slow process. I would expect the finance to get small businesses going will have to come from somewhere other than the big high street banks. Whether Virgin can do something via NR, or via some "new" way of banking - the use of the post office, a new version of TSB, a new girobank. I doubt the existing way of doing things can get money out to small businesses in any significant way (or even larger ones). The banks are not lending on any significant level.

chewmylegoff

Declare war on Scotland.

paddyrg

Small business is the key - there is no lack of entrepreneurial spirit in the country and engineering and manufacturing skills abound - if only it were competitive to do so. If we construct a framework that encourages small startups to take a chance, we have more chances of more successes, which can lead to more exports.

Can we compete with China? Not on mass-production, no, but on innovation, absoblinkinglutely. China copies, and copies well, and they will mass-produce and disregard copyright. But specialist, niche and quality items can be made here and there is a market for home-grown, well-supported, quality-service products.

At the moment we have a lot of red tape around employment - I'm not arguing against a fair deal for employees, I just want to make it easier for people who are prepared to take a punt to do so.

JoeCrystal

How about re-establishing space program and aims to land on Mars. Think of all potential benefits from new technologies that could be discovered or dreamed up. We do have quite good space industry already. To ensure it success, let put £30 billion into trailblazing our way through space industry per year at the start. NASA took 4% of Federal Budget peak. Let start with 5% of revenues for now. NASA for example get almost £12 billion this year.

Cheers

Joe

sheffield_lad

cut public spending (proprely), cut tax's for all.

Print more money! It sounds daft but deflation is currently a bigger worry than inflation. Remember around 1% comes off the inflation figures post Jan due to VAT being the same as last Jan so no yoy increase. If we dont print more £ we could be below 2% by next Nov!