Nissan halts investment plans

[sasguru]

Or simply allow them to re-establish the Eastern Bloc?

Whatever their goal, they've succeeded in weakening the US and the UK.

[LondonManc]

Whatever their goal, they've succeeded in weakening the US and the UK.

There's certainly less of a centre-right and centre-left these days; everyone's a commie or a Nazi depending whether they're left or right wing

[sasguru]

There's certainly less of a centre-right and centre-left these days; everyone's a commie or a Nazi depending whether they're left or right wing

I don't think the sensible people have disappeared - we just don't seem to have a voice at the moment.
I would consider myself centre right but there's no party I can reasonably vote for.
The current Tory Brexit ideologues are completely anti-business - Brexit is their religion even if all businesses leave.
They're all multi-millionaires of course, so insulated from the effects of their politics.

[Cirrus]

Three Guesses

How will labour costs be cheaper due to a drop in the pound?

Now this is really difficult: when the pound goes down, things that are paid for in pounds go....



... that's right : D O W N

All these companies are multinational. They don't give a tulip about UK PLC. If they want to pay for 10000 Qashqais delivered to Holland they want to know how many euros they need to fish out the kitty.

Only 20% of Nissan UK stays in the UK. Component costs will rise due to the pound falling but remember the Tories are not going to put any tariffs on imports, so UK costs will go up but that's just a side show.

[Old Greg]

I don't think the sensible people have disappeared - we just don't seem to have a voice at the moment.
I would consider myself centre right but there's no party I can reasonably vote for.
The current Tory Brexit ideologues are completely anti-business - Brexit is their religion even if all businesses leave.

The ideologues are taking a long view IMO. This is a once in a generation opportunity to reshape the UK to a US model in terms of workers' rights (fire at will etc.), social protection (move from benefits to SNAP / food banks, move to healthcare models with less emphasis on need and more on ability to pay). Although this disaster capitalism approach would impact negatively on existing models of production in the short to medium term, it would change the post-war settlement, to give less of a share of wealth to working people (which if you look at the US includes the middle class) and more to the capitalist class. They should remember Lord Hailsham's statement:

[QUOTE]If you do not give the people reform they are going to give you social revolution.[QUOTE]

If threatened with social revolution (from the left), the ruling class has the 1930s strongman playbook in their back pocket, so there's a need to keep an element of the populace on board with a continuing narrative about the dangers of immigration, gay rights etc., so that they can be mobilised in extremis behind a far right political grouping to preserve the new economic order.

I may have misread this, but it's the best way I can see of making sense of this from the point of view of the pro-Brexit wing of the ruling class. Two other interpretations would be that it's a hedge fund conspiracy, and I don't really buy into conspiracies, or that there's a collective madness at the top, which also seems unlikely to me.

[Eirikur]

I don't think the sensible people have disappeared - we just don't seem to have a voice at the moment.
I would consider myself centre right but there's no party I can reasonably vote for.
The current Tory Brexit ideologues are completely anti-business - Brexit is their religion even if all businesses leave.
They're all multi-millionaires of course, so insulated from the effects of their politics.

Same here Tories under Cameron were like a liberal centre right party, until he made the mistake of calling the referendum. LibDems seem to be the only reasonable alternative

[sasguru]

The ideologues are taking a long view IMO. This is a once in a generation opportunity to reshape the UK to a US model in terms of workers' rights (fire at will etc.), social protection (move from benefits to SNAP / food banks, move to healthcare models with less emphasis on need and more on ability to pay). Although this disaster capitalism approach would impact negatively on existing models of production in the short to medium term, it would change the post-war settlement, to give less of a share of wealth to working people (which if you look at the US includes the middle class) and more to the capitalist class. They should remember Lord Hailsham's statement:

"If you do not give the people reform they are going to give you social revolution."

If threatened with social revolution (from the left), the ruling class has the 1930s strongman playbook in their back pocket, so there's a need to keep an element of the populace on board with a continuing narrative about the dangers of immigration, gay rights etc., so that they can be mobilised in extremis behind a far right political grouping to preserve the new economic order.

I may have misread this, but it's the best way I can see of making sense of this from the point of view of the pro-Brexit wing of the ruling class. Two other interpretations would be that it's a hedge fund conspiracy, and I don't really buy into conspiracies, or that there's a collective madness at the top, which also seems unlikely to me.

That is indeed my reading of the situation.
And it may come to pass, there are plenty "useful idiots" who will vote for their own undoing.

[meridian]

Nissan halts investment plans

Now this is really difficult: when the pound goes down, things that are paid for in pounds go....



... that's right : D O W N

All these companies are multinational. They don't give a tulip about UK PLC. If they want to pay for 10000 Qashqais delivered to Holland they want to know how many euros they need to fish out the kitty.

Only 20% of Nissan UK stays in the UK. Component costs will rise due to the pound falling but remember the Tories are not going to put any tariffs on imports, so UK costs will go up but that's just a side show.

Labour in the UK plants is paid for in GBP. It doesn’t matter whether the pound goes up or down, wage costs are not tied to FX rates, so clearly the wage costs of labour in a U.K. factory, paid for in pounds, won’t change. So in that respect I still don’t know what you’re on about.

Companies might be multinational, but they also need to adhere to international accounting rules. Any costs incurred within the overarching company between legal entities need to be cross charged at transfer pricing rates, taking into account FX movements. I don’t know the Nissan financial model but it’s likely that they have an inter company logical (virtual) plant / LE based in NL that receives all sales or stock transfers anyway. But this is by the by - if the cost of doing business in the U.K. exceeds profits them they will look at relocating or downsizing.

Tories not going to put tariffs on imports? Good luck with believing that one, that opens up the U.K. to no tariffs from any other country under MFN rules. Under “no tariffs” costs won’t go up, manufacturing will disappear altogether.

[original PM]

Putin's goals are
1. destabilize EU by supporting brexit and creating refugee streams by bombing civilians in Syria, give money to extreme left and right in EU countries and create loads of fake news stories using their news outlet such as RT and Sputnik
2. Destabilize western relationships, Trump is extremely helpful
3. get sanctions lifted on illegally invading Ukraine (Italy and Hungary are already willing to do this)
4. Invade rest of Ukraine, restore Russian influence and create vassal states

Yup and with a lot of the eastern european countries being the ones to not want refugees then if Putin supports them we could indeed return to the USSR.

[BlasterBates]

This whole "refugee crisis" is just a paranoia whipped up to sell newspapers. Jordan's population is 20% refugees, Pakistan also has a huge number of refugees and no-one complains.

Most people "up in arms" about refugees haven't actually seen a refugee, they just "read the Daily Mail".

This is what happens when you get rid of religion, you replace it with "Witch Doctors" who make stuff up to get everyone to dance around in a rage. Eastern European countries have no more than a handful of refugees.