Who do we vote for in the May general election and who do we not vote for?

[DodgyAgent]

All the main parties are appalling.

Least the bonkers parties like the Monster Raving Loony party admit they don't make sense - though I wonder what they would do if they actually got an MP......

Saying they are appalling is an easy thing to do, so maybe you could explain why and then suggest what else they could do and how someone else could do it any better.

[pjclarke]

They are not appalling. It is labour that are appalling the last two times they have been in power (over 50 years) they have bankrupted the economy. There should be no question amongst the self employed/contractor community about who to vote for.

This Coalition can be compared with our greatest governments - Telegraph

As for the green party:

Welcome to the completely bonkers world of the Green Party manifesto » Spectator Blogs

Whoever wrote that hate piece on the Green Manifesto is not interested in facts.

The flagship policy is an unconditional, non-withdrawable income of £71 a week for everyone living in Britain “as a right of citizenship”, regardless of wealth or whether they are seeking work. It will cost somewhere between £240-280 billion a year – more than double the current health budget, and ten times the defence budget. Those costs will be off-set by some reduction to the welfare bill, through the replacement of jobseekers’ allowance.

Whoever wrote this drivel needs to educate themself. The idea (aka negative income tax) has a solid academic economic foundation, proposed and supported by Milton Friedman and JK Galbreith, amongst others. It is actually close to revenue and cost neutral compared to the comparable current welfare bill of £276 billion including £8bn on administration and the various means tests, and £2bn in HMRC tax credit administration and write-offs.

And interesting to learn that you support people being given jobs purely because of who their parents are.

[BlasterBates]

The green party's suggestion of 70 week is just a gag..

You already get child benefit and anyone unemployed gets about that amount.

Would just involve an enormous amount of expenditure just to implement and change all the systems and wouldn't make anyone better off.

It sounds radical though and some naive students will probably fall for it because they don't think much further than their next beer in the Students Union.

Far better to target social security to those who need it. Why should should some wealthy banker get the same as someone with a disability.

[eek]

The green party's suggestion of 70 week is just a gag..

You already get child benefit and anyone unemployed gets about that amount.

Would just involve an enormous amount of expenditure just to implement and change all the systems and wouldn't make anyone better off.

It sounds radical though and some naive students will probably fall for it.

The argument for all pensioners getting bus passes and the winter heating allowance is its ridiculously (5-10 fold) cheaper to give it to everyone and increase the tax for those who don't need it rather than means testing who gets it. Worse many people who really need such things won't submit to the means testing so don't receive it until a charity comes along and devotes the time required to convince them what the need to do...

[DodgyAgent]

Whoever wrote that hate piece on the Green Manifesto is not interested in facts.



Whoever wrote this drivel needs to educate themself. The idea (aka negative income tax) has a solid academic economic foundation, proposed and supported by Milton Friedman and JK Galbreith, amongst others. It is actually close to revenue and cost neutral compared to the comparable current welfare bill of £276 billion including £8bn on administration and the various means tests, and £2bn in HMRC tax credit administration and write-offs.

And interesting to learn that you support people being given jobs purely because of who their parents are.

I should have known that this particular self serving hypocrite with his tax friendly high wage status would pop out from under his bridge

[pjclarke]

The argument for all pensioners getting bus passes and the winter heating allowance is its ridiculously (5-10 fold) cheaper to give it to everyone and increase the tax for those who don't need it rather than means testing who gets it. Worse many people who really need such things won't submit to the means testing so don't receive it until a charity comes along and devotes the time required to convince them what the need to do...

And there you have it. The current maze of regulation is asymmetrical between men and women, and can discriminate based on marital and habitation status. Plus, JSA and Child Benefit are progressively withdrawn if/when the citizen's income rises or they do more than a few hours a week training. In some circumstances this can mean losing 95p out of every additional pound earned. With a guaranteed non-means tested income, net income rises much faster as earned income rises. Take up is near 100%, corporations are forced to rethink their business models based on paying exploitation level wages, and benefit fraud is much reduced.

You can say what you like about Bertrand Russell, James Tobin, Paul Samuelson, JK Galbreith, and Nobel Economists Herbert Simon, Friedrich Hayek, James Meade, Milton Friedman (and 1200 others) all of whom have advocated some form of Basic Income, but I don't think economic naivity is one of their faults.

[Unix]

The SNP are going to grab a lot of seats and hold the balance of power. I see a Labour/SNP/Green government.

BTW A one man band is not a business in the sense that the Tories are more pro business. So stop acting like you are running a FTSE 100 company, you are a high paid temp.

[pjclarke]

I should have known that this particular self serving hypocrite with his tax friendly high wage status would pop out from under his bridge

That would be one of those ad hominem arguments I've heard so much about.

[DodgyAgent]

That would be one of those ad hominem arguments I've heard so much about.

Does not necessarily invalidate them does it?

[zemoxyl]

and who do we not vote for?

Well YOU do not vote for any member of the House of Lords.

As Nigel Farage is fond of repeating : Tony Blair won a landslide victory in the House of Commons with 22% of the potential vote, so maybe a vote for one of the parties believing in PR would be a decent start ?