Cameron's vision for Britain ...

[Jog On]

I'm absolutely certain that lots of public sector workers are lazy good for nothing tulips. I can be sure of this because I have extensive experience in the private sector, which is also full of lazy good for nothing tulips, and I don't expect those in the public sector to be any better.

The only thing that puzzles me is why people think the private sector will magically make it better when there is little or no evidence to support that conclusion.

Civil servants take it to a whole new level - it has to be seen to be truly appreciated...

[Mich the Tester]

Civil servants take it to a whole new level - it has to be seen to be truly appreciated...

+1 here in NL. Astonishing.

[Platypus]

but then the thread turned to make out that libraries are really becoming redundant

IIRC that was your POV, I don't recall the thread "turning", just that you pitched in.

[doodab]

You seem to be working on the premise that governments are efficient redistributors of wealth. They are poorly delivered and simply spending more money on them is no solution to improving them.

There is no premise at all, simply the observation that there is a correlation between spending and outcome.

In healthcare for example, there are studies that show that more doctors per head and increased spend per patient improve things like stroke, cancer and heart disease survival rates. Britain measures badly on all of these measures of healthcare quality, but it also has one of the least well funded systems.

The reason for this seems to be that our system is funded out of central taxation, and the budget is set by the treasury. Other systems (whether delivered private or public sector or a mixture, it doesn't seem to matter too much) that are funded by specific healthcare / social insurances perform better not because they are more efficient at allocating resources but because their different funding mechanisms result in more money being spent on healthcare.

Up to a certain point it really is a case of you get what you pay for.

[doodab]

Why not train them for 'XXX Factor' and kill two birds with one stone?

Kill two birds with a stone? Isn't that a snuff movie?

[doodab]

If 400,000+ people have an income* of >£100k in the UK, why would we be surprised (or think it improper) if approx. 10% of them work in the public sector (not just local government, mind), when 25% of UK workers are employed in the public sector.

http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/pse/pu...se-2013q1.html

Income in the United Kingdom - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Because people aren't very good at maths.

[original PM]

IIRC that was your POV, I don't recall the thread "turning", just that you pitched in.

ooooh!

[Old Greg]

Because people aren't very good at maths.

It's a question of critical thinking, not of maths.

[DodgyAgent]

There is no premise at all, simply the observation that there is a correlation between spending and outcome.

In healthcare for example, there are studies that show that more doctors per head and increased spend per patient improve things like stroke, cancer and heart disease survival rates. Britain measures badly on all of these measures of healthcare quality, but it also has one of the least well funded systems.

The reason for this seems to be that our system is funded out of central taxation, and the budget is set by the treasury. Other systems (whether delivered private or public sector or a mixture, it doesn't seem to matter too much) that are funded by specific healthcare / social insurances perform better not because they are more efficient at allocating resources but because their different funding mechanisms result in more money being spent on healthcare.

Up to a certain point it really is a case of you get what you pay for.

So you believe that public sector services are run just as efficiently as private sector services?

[original PM]

So you believe that public sector services are run just as efficiently as private sector services?

I think we all know they are not however you cannot say that private healthcare is going to better at curing deseases because private healthcare is about making profit and there is more money in sick people taking lots of drugs than healthy people.