Salmond and Sturgeon Want the English Fish for More Fat Subsidies

chewmylegoff

Shakethedisease wrote: »

Missed the entire point of the article then ?

http://moneyweek.com/one-less-thing-to-think-about-in-the-scottish-referendum-debate/

No I managed to read it. you have highlighted the bits which make it clear why it isn't relevant because the article is talking about tax revenues rather than government spending.

Furthermore, if your view is that it is impossible to work out what Scottish tax revenues are then doesn't this rather call into question SNP demands for Scottish NI and VAT revenues to be kept by Scotland?

chewmylegoff

Shakethedisease wrote: »

Hamish can 'cover' what he likes. He doesn't work at the Treasury. And he's kind of like the Daily Record these days. Everything needs to be taken with a huge pinch of salt given his perspective ( as you do with posters like myself of course ). No offence meant.. but you can't quote Hamish as a 'source' then expect everyone to go 'Ooooh that's right, because Hamish said so'.

Forget Hamish. Why don't you have a look yourself into 'unidentified expenditure' and what it means.. then mabye tell us what you think. It's all guesswork and making things 'fit'.

http://moneyweek.com/merryns-blog/the-pointless-numbers-in-the-scottish-referendum-debate/

You do realise that expenditure and revenue are not the same thing don't you?

chewmylegoff

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

I thought we proved it was not London's money that subsidises the rest of the country.

They need London, South East, Scotland and East as the 4 top contributors to surpass 50% of the GDP.

I also showed many areas outside London which contribute above the UK average.

Why do you continue to ignore clear facts in favour of this political fallacy gesturing?

The trouble is that you keep posting GVA or GDP per capita figures and constantly ignoring the fact that these are not measures of how much any area contributes to government revenues. Just because a region has a higher GVA per head than the UK average does not mean it is making a net contribution to anything.

chewmylegoff

Leanne1812 wrote: »

And round and round and round it goes.......

Can we please have a detailed breakdown of spending? Where it goes exactly and how much? No, of course we can't because the 'unidentified' spending is just that. You cannot say with any certainty that Scotland does not hold her own can you?

There is no "Unidentified spending". There is spending which is "non-identifiable" in a geographical context because it cannot be attributed to any specific areas because it benefits the whole nation.

The fact that the Scottish government's own figures show that it is running a budget deficit greater than the UK's deficit is fairly conclusive evidence that Scotland does not "hold its own".

Non identifiable expenditure is primarily a per capita share of defence and debt interest payments. The total amount of transport cost included in non-identifiable expenditure apportioned to Scotland is about £25 million so the SNP fan club can keep whinging about HS2 but it isn't skewing the figures I'm afraid.

IveSeenTheLight

Froggitt wrote: »

And I don't understand why how much each region puts in has any relevance to how much each region gets out.

Would you not think it is a fair calculation.

Can't remember the exact figures (and can't be arsed to go back and verify once more), but West Midland GVA was circa 17000 and got back circa £8,500, meaning their contribution to Westminster was circa £8,500

Scotland contributed circa £21,000 and got back circa £10,500, meaning their contribution to Westminster was circa £10,500.

Now both regions got back similar relation to what they contributed in percentage terms.

Scotland got more back, but at the same time contributed more than the West Midlands

I can't see what the big issue you guys are all making out of this.

IveSeenTheLight

chewmylegoff wrote: »

The trouble is that you keep posting GVA or GDP per capita figures and constantly ignoring the fact that these are not measures of how much any area contributes to government revenues. Just because a region has a higher GVA per head than the UK average does not mean it is making a net contribution to anything.

Explain that in more detail for me please.

If a regions GVA figure is higher, how is that not a reflection of the Gross Value Added revenue generated?

The examples used earlier had Scotland at circa £21,000 GVA per head, whilst West Midlands was circa £17,000 per head.

The link I gave showed an even further breakdown citing many areas have a higher GVA than the UK average.

Maybe it would help if I clarified my definition of contribution is the amount of revenue generated for the whole UK pot

IveSeenTheLight

chewmylegoff wrote: »

The total amount of transport cost included in non-identifiable expenditure apportioned to Scotland is about £25 million so the SNP fan club can keep whinging about HS2 but it isn't skewing the figures I'm afraid.

HS2 is just the current hot topic, but is a good example of "UK" spending which seems to only benefit certain regions and not the whole of the UK.

Why shouldn't the spending be proportionally attributed to the regions it is benefiting?

chewmylegoff

IveSeenTheLight wrote: »

Explain that in more detail for me please.

If a regions GVA figure is higher, how is that not a reflection of the Gross Value Added revenue generated?

The examples used earlier had Scotland at circa £21,000 GVA per head, whilst West Midlands was circa £17,000 per head.

The link I gave showed an even further breakdown citing many areas have a higher GVA than the UK average.

Maybe it would help if I clarified my definition of contribution is the amount of revenue generated for the whole UK pot

GVA is the value of good and services produced in a region.

Government revenue is generated by taxing goods and services. The government does not tax goods and services at 100%.

To simplify say the entire Scottish economy was the production of an amount of oil which was exported to Timbuctoo for £1bn and nothing else whatsoever happened in the Scottish economy. Say the £1 billion of oil is taxed at 50% so the exchequer gets £500m of that. Let's say the UK government then spends £600m paying benefits to Scottish people (who for the purposes of this example do not spend the money...) and there is no other public expenditure.

Your argument, which you have just repeated again in the post above the one I am replying to, appears to be that in that scenario Scotland has made a "Westminster contribution" of £400 million whereas in fact Scotland has received a subsidy of £100 million.

Generali

chewmylegoff wrote: »

GVA is the value of good and services produced in a region.

Government revenue is generated by taxing goods and services. The government does not tax goods and services at 100%.

To simplify say the entire Scottish economy was the production of an amount of oil which was exported to Timbuctoo for £1bn and nothing else whatsoever happened in the Scottish economy. Say the £1 billion of oil is taxed at 50% so the exchequer gets £500m of that. Let's say the UK government then spends £600m paying benefits to Scottish people (who for the purposes of this example do not spend the money...) and there is no other public expenditure.

Your argument, which you have just repeated again in the post above the one I am replying to, appears to be that in that scenario Scotland has made a "Westminster contribution" of £400 million whereas in fact Scotland has received a subsidy of £100 million.

They're living in a fantasy world where the only thing preventing Scotland bestriding the world like a Colossus is [STRIKE]the theiving English barstewards[/STRIKE] Westminster.

IveSeenTheLight

chewmylegoff wrote: »

GVA is the value of good and services produced in a region.

Government revenue is generated by taxing goods and services. The government does not tax goods and services at 100%.

Ok, so on what basis is the claims that London supports the rest of the UK made?

chewmylegoff wrote: »

Your argument, which you have just repeated again in the post above the one I am replying to, appears to be that in that scenario Scotland has made a "Westminster contribution" of £400 million whereas in fact Scotland has received a subsidy of £100 million.

Again, I have never denied that Scotland has a deficit as does the UK.

The discussion is trying to ascertain what is contributed in revenue and what is returned as expenditure.

Something I was trying to break down even further across the whole of the UK to ascertain where contribution is higher than the UK average.