Lib Dems prove once again they are not fit to govern

[Mich the Tester]

Free market capitalism is enables people to work for the benefit of others (services) in the interests of themselves. I build you a house and you mend my computer. Competition ensures that we work hard and do not become complacent or reliant on other people.
as you say this model does not or should not work for everything - policing for one and basic healthcare for another but where it can be used it should be.
it should also be our priority as a society to make suer everyone is equipped and prepared to survive in this society - that is what our government should be doing with the taxes it raises. Of course governments get nowhere near this - aided and abetted by lefties tax is viewed a punishment or to feed people with a sense of entitlement or to buy power and influence in order to enrich themselves (Tony Blair is a prime example).
The failure is not the system, it is how the system is managed that is failing.

There are countries, in Europe, where governments seem to do this with a greater degree of success than the UK, even (or perhaps precisely) when they have coalitions that include traditionally left of centre parties. Think of CDU-SPD in Germany, or earlier Dutch coalitions like VVD-PVDA-D66. What I notice here in the Euroland is that when one side of the political spectrum manages to form a coalition without the other side, things go badly wrong. If the left form a coalition, they write lots of new regulations, everything goes well for a few years and everyone's happy, but then those regulations start hitting business and the money runs out. When the right form a coalition, they start handing things to 'the market' (which is in many cases actually a tiny group of vested interests), like basic healthcare, which then become more expensive, more bureaucratic and infested with management consultants, they avoid regulating anything and thereby allow corrupt monopolies to form, and then the money runs out again.

Here in northern Euroswamp in the post war period we used to have a sort of balanced system of coalitions whereby the lefties got to run the nice cuddly stuff like healthcare, the arts, edjumacayshun, the sciences, turd world aid and so on, with a rather strict right winged bookkeeper in charge of the money and a tough, uncompromising old codger running the justice department. OK, it's a charicature, but it illustrates how different ideologies keep each other's extremes in check; I think that's also essential, because if one ideology gets alll the power, it'll turn out to be as disastrous as any other. It might just take a bit longer for one ideology to lead to disaster than others.

Britain has (or had) this too, without necessarily having lots of parties or coalitions; within the Conservative party (and it may suprise you to learn that I am a member of Conservatives Abroad), there's a wide range of opinions on all sorts of issues; ideology's fine until you actually have to work out policies that can work for people and keep a government functioning.

[DodgyAgent]

There are countries, in Europe, where governments seem to do this with a greater degree of success than the UK, even (or perhaps precisely) when they have coalitions that include traditionally left of centre parties. Think of CDU-SPD in Germany, or earlier Dutch coalitions like VVD-PVDA-D66. What I notice here in the Euroland is that when one side of the political spectrum manages to form a coalition without the other side, things go badly wrong. If the left form a coalition, they write lots of new regulations, everything goes well for a few years and everyone's happy, but then those regulations start hitting business and the money runs out. When the right form a coalition, they start handing things to 'the market' (which is in many cases actually a tiny group of vested interests), like basic healthcare, which then become more expensive, more bureaucratic and infested with management consultants, they avoid regulating anything and thereby allow corrupt monopolies to form, and then the money runs out again.

Here in northern Euroswamp in the post war period we used to have a sort of balanced system of coalitions whereby the lefties got to run the nice cuddly stuff like healthcare, the arts, edjumacayshun, the sciences, turd world aid and so on, with a rather strict right winged bookkeeper in charge of the money and a tough, uncompromising old codger running the justice department. OK, it's a charicature, but it illustrates how different ideologies keep each other's extremes in check; I think that's also essential, because if one ideology gets alll the power, it'll turn out to be as disastrous as any other. It might just take a bit longer for one ideology to lead to disaster than others.

Britain has (or had) this too, without necessarily having lots of parties or coalitions; within the Conservative party (and it may suprise you to learn that I am a member of Conservatives Abroad), there's a wide range of opinions on all sorts of issues; ideology's fine until you actually have to work out policies that can work for people and keep a government functioning.

This is true. In France in particular there is a civic pride that motivates workers to give a reasonable service. They do however still service on their own terms rather than on the terms of their customers (the public they serve) So education and healthcare are pretty good. However where every country falls down is in servicing those at the very bottom of the pile. In all these countries (I am not sure about the Nordic ones) but there exists about 10% of the population with no work and living in relative poverty. Clearly the public services are failing in Germany as much as they are failing here. by failing I mean that they are failing to prepare particularly the poor and young to compete and join in with the rest of society.

This is not the fault of the rich or a lack of money it is the fault of the government in failing for example to give children a decent education.

[Robinho]

But other factors are of great importance too, like education levels, demographics, geography, geology, level of sexual equality, literacy rates, health, transport, etcetera etcetera.

Yes you have to use your bonce to try and account for those things you see. Or you can compare the same country over different time periods. For example, pre-thatcher uk, with thatcher's uk.

[Mich the Tester]

Yes you have to use your bonce to try and account for those things you see. Or you can compare the same country over different time periods. For example, pre-thatcher uk, with thatcher's uk.

Did you study economics?

[Robinho]

Nope, i didn't study IT either but i get paid a lot to do it.

[Mich the Tester]

Nope, i didn't study IT either but i get paid a lot to do it.

Why do you think anyone cares about how much you get paid to do IT?

[Robinho]

Why do you think anyone cares about how much you get paid to do IT?

I don't.

[Mich the Tester]

I don't.

So why do you tell us you get paid a lot to do IT? Is it because you think money is the only way of valuing something or someone?

[Robinho]

So why do you tell us you get paid a lot to do IT? Is it because you think money is the only way of valuing something or someone?

Why did you ask me if i had studied economics?

[Mich the Tester]

Why did you ask me if i had studied economics?

Well what I see is that you stick to your ideology while being very selective with the use of empirical evidence. You seem to ignore things that don't fit your ideology. That's a trait I've seen in many economists.