Reply to: Thatcher - benefits scrounger

[Bagpuss]

You can always rely on a Thatcher thread to bring out the Toryboy bleaters on here regurgitating their parents politics.

If anyone is more responsible for the tulip that we're in now it is that old witch for encouraging a selfish, money obsessed, I'm all right Jack society and business climate. True, New Labour sucked up to it as a way of grasping power but she started the whole thing off.

How dare you, do you not realise it's All Saints Day tomorrow?

[SueEllen]

As a retort to my post it doesn't really make any sense.

He's just upset because he's the same age.

Odd as there are some young people well versed in history and random subject.

[Alf W]

You can always rely on a Thatcher thread to bring out the Toryboy bleaters on here regurgitating their parents politics.

If anyone is more responsible for the tulip that we're in now it is that old witch for encouraging a selfish, money obsessed, I'm all right Jack society and business climate. True, New Labour sucked up to it as a way of grasping power but she started the whole thing off.

[Bagpuss]

You'd better let all the historians in on this revelation.

As a retort to my post it doesn't really make any sense.

[d000hg]

That would mean you weren't born when Thatcher was elected. Leave the argument to the grown ups.

You'd better let all the historians in on this revelation.

[Bagpuss]

That would mean nobody could argue about anything that happened before they were born, which is obviously daft.

If you read what he wrote you can see it's half cobbled together rubbish. He has obviously not read up on the political and economic history. It's little more than half baked dogma rather than fact.

[Doggy Styles]

That would mean you weren't born when Thatcher was elected. Leave the argument to the grown ups.

That would mean nobody could argue about anything that happened before they were born, which is obviously daft.

[Bagpuss]

Hear hear!

It amuses me how on many forums, columns, etc, people blame the conservatives and thatcher for ills, such as power outages caused by striking.

Those people are retarded. Striking and power outages were happening in 1970, well before the conservatives took the helm. Yes, it is a shame everything got privatised, but there wasnt really any other viable option as labour had failed over multiple times in government to rectify the issue and instead let it escalate.

As dodgyagent said, she kickstarted the private sector and enabled banks to make us richer than ever before. Without her, none of us would have the prosperity (work) we all enjoy or at least enjoy the money we get from it. She worked harder than any other PM and stood up to terrorists hell bent on destroying businesses and maming citizens.



The same problem is happening nowadays. In the press and in public forums, there are numerous people convinced the current conservatives caused the economic collapse and refuse to acknowledge labour's reign of terror under the mentally ill, foreign piece of filth aptly named Brown.

I am in my late twenties now.

That would mean you weren't born when Thatcher was elected. Leave the argument to the grown ups.

[TheFaQQer]

Thanks for your brilliant insight.

Any time

[TimberWolf]

You said


I pointed out that 140 is not, in fact, less than 103. 140 is a bigger number than 103. It is not smaller. There is a difference between the two numbers - 140 is the LARGER number than 103, which is SMALLER.

Is that clear enough to explain why you are wrong to say that "the UK pays more into the EU than France"? The reason it's wrong to say that is, simply, because it is not right

You then changed tack slightly, and said



which is a different argument altogether. Perhaps what your original post should have said was "How come the UK (although we pay in less than France) ends up taking out less money than France, so we have a worse net benefit than a country with a larger GDP than ours?"

You also suggest that . None of the figures in the table support that statement:

Money in: Germany (UK fourth)
Worst net benefit: Germany (UK second)
Ratio of money out/in: Netherlands (UK second)
Net benefit per capita: Netherlands (UK sixth)

Thanks for your brilliant insight.

[DodgyAgent]

You said


I pointed out that 140 is not, in fact, less than 103. 140 is a bigger number than 103. It is not smaller. There is a difference between the two numbers - 140 is the LARGER number than 103, which is SMALLER.

Is that clear enough to explain why you are wrong to say that "the pays more into the EU than France"? The reason it's wrong to say that is, simply, because it is not right

You then changed tack slightly, and said



which is a different argument altogether. Perhaps what your original post should have said was "How come the UK (although we pay in less than France) ends up taking out less money than France, so we have a worse net benefit than a country with a larger GDP than ours?"

You also suggest that . None of the figures in the table support that statement:

Money in: Germany (UK fourth)
Worst net benefit: Germany (UK second)
Ratio of money out/in: Netherlands (UK second)
Net benefit per capita: Netherlands (UK sixth)

And I'm a dutchman

[TheFaQQer]

In what way wrong?

You said

How come the UK pays more into the EU than France, when France's GDP is higher than the UK's?

I pointed out that 140 is not, in fact, less than 103. 140 is a bigger number than 103. It is not smaller. There is a difference between the two numbers - 140 is the LARGER number than 103, which is SMALLER.

Is that clear enough to explain why you are wrong to say that "the UK pays more into the EU than France"? The reason it's wrong to say that is, simply, because it is not right

You then changed tack slightly, and said

Argue if you will that net contribution is not a great metric, but I hardly think payments excepting returns is a good one.

which is a different argument altogether. Perhaps what your original post should have said was "How come the UK (although we pay in less than France) ends up taking out less money than France, so we have a worse net benefit than a country with a larger GDP than ours?"

You also suggest that

Always seems like the UK gets shafted the most.

. None of the figures in the table support that statement:

Money in: Germany (UK fourth)
Worst net benefit: Germany (UK second)
Ratio of money out/in: Netherlands (UK second)
Net benefit per capita: Netherlands (UK sixth)

[Doggy Styles]

I sorted by 'net benefit (billions)'

Top 4 losers:
Germany −86
United Kingdom −57
France −51
Italy −46

On these figures I agree that the UK is a higher NET contributor than everyone bar Germany.

But as the EU accounts weren't kept properly and weren't signed off for 15 years, gawd knows where all that money went.

[TimberWolf]

I'm not arguing that it's not a good metric, but your statement that we pay in more than France is completely wrong.

In what way wrong? I already explained how it is right, given the metric used.

In reply you suggest that non-net contributions was the true metric. You're boring me now.

[TheFaQQer]

The negative sign means a net loss. Germany's, having a larger negative number in that table, does not mean their net payment is less than the UK's, it means it's greater. Argue if you will that net contribution is not a great metric, but I hardly think payments excepting returns is a good one.

I'm not arguing that it's not a good metric, but your statement that we pay in more than France is completely wrong.

A better metric, I think, would be net benefit per capita, but that doesn't fit the argument that it "seems like the UK gets shafted the most" quite as neatly.