After a brief trip through the best organised parts of India, I am back in England. Both the road to Indira Gandhi International and the airport itself are smart and efficient; foreign travellers aren't even required to complete an exit form any more, depriving them of this last dose of paperwork. This should be home, I am no longer a traveller, and with this it feels that my weak self-justification for writing has now disappeared. I could cite examples of great writers who have used this transition to see with fresh eyes, perhaps George Orwell or Aldous Huxley, but I'd sicken myself with the pretentious connection to greatness. Now I am in England, I am just one of the thousands of people shouting their own opinions about every-day events as loud as they can to anyone who will listen.
I didn't remember this much drinking in the streets. I did remember the deliberately-loud pseudo down-and-outs who frequented the parks and drank. This group, I feel, are acting a part. But this is about the only direct observation I can make on England, London at least. To talk about politics becomes abstract and media informed. Still, it's impossible not to be covered by the waves of politics after the council and Euro elections. Politics is full of complex culturally-weighted terms, but engineers see a far simpler world of systems which need to be fixed. UKIP stand against the influence of Brussels, so now a greater number of their representatives will inhabit Brussels (and Strasbourg, because the French government will waste money for their own vanity). But this anti-Europe sentiment isn't limited to the UK. The nationalist, far right, and anti-Europe parties, have been successful in many countries. In effect these parties, which find the control of Brussels so disagreeable, are in agreement. As these parties now form part of this parliament, it's decisions must be less disagreeable. In effect this diminishes UKIP's entire reason for being, it's strange how democracy works, when we stop considering dem foreigners as different to ourselves. If so many countries have turned on Europe in a time of economic weakness and rising anti-immigration sentiment, this is as strong a demonstration of common European mood as there ever was.
In England, the unions make the point best of all. No level of benefit cuts can press, by means of the stick, 2.2 million unemployed (March) into 650,000 vacant jobs (last year, UKCES), 146,000 of which are due to a shortage of skills. Any system where a man through no fault of his own is left idle must be considered unfair. Unemployment benefits, or as branded 'job-seekers allowance, are viewed as a temporary solution; but what if the consequence of economic development is efficiency and automation which continually decreases the need for unskilled labour. At the very least, recessions seem sufficiently frequent to appear inevitable. This surplus pool of labour must suffer unless the government takes the required ultimate step, not a guarantee of an unearned 'living dividend', but a guarantee of employment or training. All debates around the idleness of benefit claimants, and even responding to these, are designed to divert attention from this inevitable duty. Even with the admission by the Tory pretension to disinterest, 'Policy Exchange', that to encourage people into work the minimum wage might have to rise to 'make work pay', and not just cut benefits, avoids dealing with the mismatch. How could a government find employment for these people? The Cuban government loaned employees to private companies at fixed government wages. As a socialist capitalist this level of government control sounds a frightening idea, but what if it is in fact inevitable, even if differently named (Because in politics a shovel must be a self-empowering job-facilitator). If employment can't be found for unskilled labour which could pay sufficiently to meet the minimum wage, or better a living wage, then there are only two options: training or subsidy. In effect governments have chosen a mixture of denial and acceptance. Training without acknowledging this as a right, and short of what the CBI claims is required, and without human development of living standards which might be necessary for people in poverty to develop. And small steps which don't acknowledge the final goal. The conned libs have stated an aim to raise the minimum tax payment threshold, which reduces the tax burden, bringing the cost of a low paid employee and the money they receive slightly closer together. If, providing national insurance and income tax are merged, this threshold can be brought up to the minimum wage, then the government will have solved half of the problem (if the artificially separated 'employer contributions' are included in this merger). At this point the cost of an employee is only the living wage they need to receive. The next step is only significant artificially on the basis of the sign, when the government has to apply a positive subsidy to employment. The effect of this is to provide a wage closer to the living cost, without raising the obligations of companies and giving the incentive for further efficiency. I don't claim to know how far the cost of an employee would have to fall to achieve full employment, or whether Britain is already part of international agreements which prohibit subsidised labour, preserving the sacred free market system. Both Labour and the Conned Libs have attempted to decrease the importance of one of Britain's existing state-labour generators for disabled persons, Remploy. The idea of a state owned employer-of-last-resort seems unpopular, why? Am I alone in believing there are people who will never have anything to offer private industry.
There are of course other options, I'm not an economist. Perhaps the economy will again grow to full employment, and a solution will be found which prevents future recessions. (I would then argue that the minimum wage should be linked to the absolute GDP, to really make growth inclusive). A shorter working week is sometimes suggested, which according to the proponents would increase the demand for workers to achieve the same output and solve the supply and demand problem. I would love to live in a world where rising productivity results in greater free time, for holidays, or to leave work earlier. But in a way, this strategy has already been considered. The EU mandated the maximum number of hours in a working week, but we have each added exceptions to the point where excepting from this rule is a formality. They have reason, unless any strategy to improve working conditions is global it fails in the race-to-the-bottom world of competition.
I didn't remember this much drinking in the streets. I did remember the deliberately-loud pseudo down-and-outs who frequented the parks and drank. This group, I feel, are acting a part. But this is about the only direct observation I can make on England, London at least. To talk about politics becomes abstract and media informed. Still, it's impossible not to be covered by the waves of politics after the council and Euro elections. Politics is full of complex culturally-weighted terms, but engineers see a far simpler world of systems which need to be fixed. UKIP stand against the influence of Brussels, so now a greater number of their representatives will inhabit Brussels (and Strasbourg, because the French government will waste money for their own vanity). But this anti-Europe sentiment isn't limited to the UK. The nationalist, far right, and anti-Europe parties, have been successful in many countries. In effect these parties, which find the control of Brussels so disagreeable, are in agreement. As these parties now form part of this parliament, it's decisions must be less disagreeable. In effect this diminishes UKIP's entire reason for being, it's strange how democracy works, when we stop considering dem foreigners as different to ourselves. If so many countries have turned on Europe in a time of economic weakness and rising anti-immigration sentiment, this is as strong a demonstration of common European mood as there ever was.
In England, the unions make the point best of all. No level of benefit cuts can press, by means of the stick, 2.2 million unemployed (March) into 650,000 vacant jobs (last year, UKCES), 146,000 of which are due to a shortage of skills. Any system where a man through no fault of his own is left idle must be considered unfair. Unemployment benefits, or as branded 'job-seekers allowance, are viewed as a temporary solution; but what if the consequence of economic development is efficiency and automation which continually decreases the need for unskilled labour. At the very least, recessions seem sufficiently frequent to appear inevitable. This surplus pool of labour must suffer unless the government takes the required ultimate step, not a guarantee of an unearned 'living dividend', but a guarantee of employment or training. All debates around the idleness of benefit claimants, and even responding to these, are designed to divert attention from this inevitable duty. Even with the admission by the Tory pretension to disinterest, 'Policy Exchange', that to encourage people into work the minimum wage might have to rise to 'make work pay', and not just cut benefits, avoids dealing with the mismatch. How could a government find employment for these people? The Cuban government loaned employees to private companies at fixed government wages. As a socialist capitalist this level of government control sounds a frightening idea, but what if it is in fact inevitable, even if differently named (Because in politics a shovel must be a self-empowering job-facilitator). If employment can't be found for unskilled labour which could pay sufficiently to meet the minimum wage, or better a living wage, then there are only two options: training or subsidy. In effect governments have chosen a mixture of denial and acceptance. Training without acknowledging this as a right, and short of what the CBI claims is required, and without human development of living standards which might be necessary for people in poverty to develop. And small steps which don't acknowledge the final goal. The conned libs have stated an aim to raise the minimum tax payment threshold, which reduces the tax burden, bringing the cost of a low paid employee and the money they receive slightly closer together. If, providing national insurance and income tax are merged, this threshold can be brought up to the minimum wage, then the government will have solved half of the problem (if the artificially separated 'employer contributions' are included in this merger). At this point the cost of an employee is only the living wage they need to receive. The next step is only significant artificially on the basis of the sign, when the government has to apply a positive subsidy to employment. The effect of this is to provide a wage closer to the living cost, without raising the obligations of companies and giving the incentive for further efficiency. I don't claim to know how far the cost of an employee would have to fall to achieve full employment, or whether Britain is already part of international agreements which prohibit subsidised labour, preserving the sacred free market system. Both Labour and the Conned Libs have attempted to decrease the importance of one of Britain's existing state-labour generators for disabled persons, Remploy. The idea of a state owned employer-of-last-resort seems unpopular, why? Am I alone in believing there are people who will never have anything to offer private industry.
There are of course other options, I'm not an economist. Perhaps the economy will again grow to full employment, and a solution will be found which prevents future recessions. (I would then argue that the minimum wage should be linked to the absolute GDP, to really make growth inclusive). A shorter working week is sometimes suggested, which according to the proponents would increase the demand for workers to achieve the same output and solve the supply and demand problem. I would love to live in a world where rising productivity results in greater free time, for holidays, or to leave work earlier. But in a way, this strategy has already been considered. The EU mandated the maximum number of hours in a working week, but we have each added exceptions to the point where excepting from this rule is a formality. They have reason, unless any strategy to improve working conditions is global it fails in the race-to-the-bottom world of competition.
The animated TV series Futurama deals with the subject best, on the improvements in efficiency introduced by a bureaucrat in a forced labour camp. In this case unemployment thankfully resulted in release of the characters, a far cry from our world.
"My Hermes got that hellhole running so efficiently that all the physical labor is now done by a single Australian man"
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