UK needs +7 Million immigrants to keep debt down

grizzly1911

TruckerT wrote: »

The collapse of property prices was being predicted by the punter on the street for several years before 2007. But the experts turned a deaf ear.

When I took out my liar loan in summer 2007, it was because I had calculated that it was probably my last chance to get my hands on so much easy money. I was right, and I repaid the loan according to plan.

Why was it so obvious to me, and millions of others, but invisible to the elite?

TruckerT

Common sense?

kabayiri

grizzly1911 wrote: »

And all the infrastructure to go with them transport, schools, hospitals, energy loading, water supply, sewage and waste disposal etc.

I thought they were going to be net contributors.

Some months back, there was a panorama or similar program showing how the cost of infrastructure was much higher in areas of greater population density.

Intuitively, this makes sense. It takes longer with more expense to build a new commuter transport system through London, than to link a collection of relatively rural towns in NW UK say.

A really coordinated government policy would try to redistribute work out more evenly throughout the country. Economic migrants of all types would then follow the work and spread out.

I really can't see this happening. We have seen wealth centralise in specific areas, which is pretty much the opposite.

TruckerT

kabayiri wrote: »

Some months back, there was a panorama or similar program showing how the cost of infrastructure was much higher in areas of greater population density.

Intuitively, this makes sense. It takes longer with more expense to build a new commuter transport system through London, than to link a collection of relatively rural towns in NW UK say.

A really coordinated government policy would try to redistribute work out more evenly throughout the country. Economic migrants of all types would then follow the work and spread out.

I really can't see this happening. We have seen wealth centralise in specific areas, which is pretty much the opposite.

There has been a bit of an attempt recently by some London boroughs to move some of their housing waiting list out of the southeast, and it may be that the recent benefits cap will assist the process.

As Clapton has previously pointed out, economic migration has always played a part in the shaping of human populations.

Arguably, it would be as sensible to force our unemployed to emigrate, as to allow 7m foreigners to immigrate.

TruckerT

TruckerT

grizzly1911 wrote: »

Common sense?

That simple, huh?

TruckerT

John_Pierpoint

OffGridLiving wrote: »

Use a 'guest worker' scheme where economic migrants can work here and pay income tax but a lower level of national insurance and no citizenship entitlement. They will be entitled to NHS, etc. as they pay tax but won't qualify for a state pension. Once they finish work, they return to their original country.

Everyone's a winner.

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Could never be done.

Equal rights simply wouldn't allow it. For good reason to, it's outright exploitation.

I think it is freedom and education, I don't feel exploited by Switzerland.
Perhaps taking people out of peasant villages in Turkey, or sink estates in the UK; allowing them to work hard as "guests" in someone else's land and they return home with their horizons broadened and with some capital to invest in their own stagnant society. They have learned the lesson of working hard with few "rights", as if they step out of line, or lose their job. they know they will be on their way back home.

The remitances home from such migrants are an order of magnitude greater than the posturing of politicians using our money as international aid; and I am sure it is more effective and more appreciated by the locals.
Would we really want nice young or cynical middle aged people, with perfect teeth, riding round in our community in white Toyota Land Cruisers telling us how to run our lives.

Back is Stuart times there was an attempt to impose Scottish immigrants on a native population with a different religion, it still seems to be causing problems centuries later.

antrobus

kabayiri wrote: »

I agree they have to try.

But if we wind the clock back to 1983 say, who would have predicted things like
- the dramatic resurgence in the Chinese and Indian economies
- the break up of the Soviet Union
- the GFC, and record low interest rates not seen in hundreds of years

The margin for error must be pretty large.

Yes, but none of those cited events would have had the slightest effect on UK demographics and the financial implications of changes in said demographics.

All the OBR has done is to construct a economic model and look at what the UK's fiscal position is going to be like over the next fifty years or so. One of the conclusions of that exercise is that we need more workers to support an ageing population.

N1AK

kabayiri wrote: »

Do they not accept the possibility of increasing GDP per capita?

Economic improvement through efficiency gains is often at the heart of many a company, after all. Why should it not apply?

There projections are based on increased GDP per capita. If you mean why don't they accept the possibility that the growth should be higher per capita then I expect it is because there are no policies in place that can be expected to achieve this.

My job is process improvement. We hire employees selectively to build a workforce that can support that kind of growth. We expect people to improve and we let some people go if they won't, can't or because there simply isn't the demand for them any more.

I think we should expect more of people. Anyone earning less than £25 a year is almost certainly a net drain on the economy. However it would take a large change in mindset, which the population aren't in favour of, to achieve. Additionally, a company can let go of people who don't pull their weight which is an option countries tend not to have.

CLAPTON

antrobus wrote: »

Yes, but none of those cited events would have had the slightest effect on UK demographics and the financial implications of changes in said demographics.

All the OBR has done is to construct a economic model and look at what the UK's fiscal position is going to be like over the next fifty years or so. One of the conclusions of that exercise is that we need more workers to support an ageing population.

One might say that the break up of the Soviet Union has had an effect on the number of East European immigrants and hence the current demographics.

antrobus

CLAPTON wrote: »

One might say that the break up of the Soviet Union has had an effect on the number of East European immigrants and hence the current demographics.

But it doesn't change the fact that the UK has an ageing population and the long term financial implications thereof.

What the collapse of communism and the break up of the Soviet Union has meant in those terms is that, to the extent that the UK requires immigrants, it can now get them from former Eastern Bloc countries rather than from somewhere else. .

chewmylegoff

Sampong wrote: »

Oh well that revelation ends it then. Thank you chewmylegoff for finally bringing the debate to a conclusion. It's all to do with football - why didn't I think of that.

It's a perfectly acceptable anecdote. These sort of threads always descend into people insisting that person a's source is biased whislt quoting their own equally biased evidence to prove it. By nature many people have formed a view already and only consider 'evidence' which supports that view, dismissing contrary 'evidence' as flawed. No different to a 'debate' on climate change or any other contentious subject for that matter.

And there's no point trying to attack me on immigration since my views on the subject lie about seven miles to the right of yours...