Comments by "Curious Crow" (@CuriousCrow-mp4cx) on "Richard J Murphy" channel.

  1. Starmer's weakness is that he doesn't appreciate that sloganeering is not effective policy making. The ignorant will be misled, and the informed will be sceptical. If he really wants to impress develop a measured and grounded overarching narrative that identifies accurately the changes needed, and explains why. If he carries on in his current vein, he'll end up alienating everyone, as everyone is tired of empty soundbites. Everyone wants stability and measured policy making. I hope he oblige us, or he'll be building up the sense that he hasn't a firm enough grip on the realities to realise that he counfuusing the map with the territory. I mean, Aswath Damodaran, a professor of Finance at NYU Stern, noted in his blog and YT channel about the current events in anti-trust policy in the US, that law schools globally are pretty useless in teaching their students about business. So when they become regulators, they don't always understand what businesses do that can or should be regulated. And Starmer is a criminal lawyer, so regulation is naturally out of his wheelhouse. I suspect his advisers are inexperienced too. Or he wouldn't be doing what he's doing. All politicians in government learn on the job, but they need to have the right people around them who will not lead them astray. I'm not convinced his team of advisers are match-ready.
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  2. Sorry, but we're not the laziest or unproductive workers in Europe. We're the least invested in workers in Europe. From the cuts in education where we are turning out the wrong types of workers for the jobs needed, from corporations expecting never to train their employees, and Government expecting the magic private sector to take care of manpower planning in the economy, and you get the omnishambles of UK plc, where we are ever more dependent on importing talent ratther than growing it. You get the buzzwords like "lifelong learning" but no funding to provide it. And we do not pay apprentices a living wage, even though they are learning in the job. They don't even get enough to pay their bus fare to go into their apprenticeship. We have unpaid internships, which are exploitative, and there is no guarantee, any longer of security for workers. Indeed if those at the top are only doing the bare minimum, why do you thing anyone else will do more than that? When I hear people say British workers are lazy, I just say "it's monkey see, monkey do." It's time certain corporate leaders led by example, and stopped bitching about how lazy everyone else is but they are. They are many who are lazy, short-sighted, and irresponsible with the power society gives them. I know, I worked for many of them. To the extent, I wish I hadn't. The jobs I loved gave me control over how I did my job, and helped me to do it well. And I turned out results to the best of my ability. That is not the norm. We have to be honest with ourselves as a country, and admit that our problems reflect our priorities, and if we don't like dealing with those problems, we need to look hard at our priorities. Blaming and scapegoating does nothing useful. If you cannot motivate your workers, then that is your problem. Not there's. Even if what you said was true about British workers being lazy - which it isn't; British workers work longer hours than anyone else in Europe - they weren't born that way. They were made that way because their leaders are that way. Look at what Prime Ministers we are creating, and that should give you pause, because if they are the best this country has to offer as leadership, you shouldn't be surprised that others just might be either following their examples, or being apathetic.
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  3. Not true. The Pound is backed by the power to create demand. Period. Don't be fooled by private tokens claiming to be money. They're not. Crypto is wannabe money, because the banks can't force everyone to use it. Without the power of forcing people to use it, it's noting but private Monopoly money, and you might as well exchange that or DnD trading cards. It is for that reason crypto is backed by unaudited financial "asset pools" like Tether of fiat currency for liquidity. And plutocrats and corporations busy are throwing money at trying to persuade us crypto is money, and weakening state power by themselves. It's a tool of distraction, because their ultimate goal is to replace the state, and to seize state power for themselves. Crypto is worth as much as the promises of the Pigs in Orwell's Animal Farm.
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  4. Richard, you are too modest. You have resisted publicising your report here on You Tube. May I suggest that you pin a link to it in the comments, as most people seem not to read the description, but wade into the comments more readily.
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  5. But your answer is not answering the question. And as for costs rising. I've lived long enough to see a 2p bus journey now cost £2.50. And benefits have not kept up with that rate of increase. But working people who are paid a true living wage can afford to pay that fare. And isn't that the real issue? Britain is a low paid economy relative to its peers, and that occurred over the last 5 decades of mostly Conservative "small state" policy and privatisation. Whereas real GDP has gone up like a ski slope, the Labour share of Real GDP has plateaued, and it has been left to the Welfare State to make up the difference. That is not the case with our peers. And that is on us. We have allowed a huge transfer of wealth to the mostly already asset wealthy, and have not invested in our workforce skills and health, to the extent that our productivity is far below that of our peers. The short-sighted "small statists" policies have left us with an over large financial service sector dominating the whole economy, and not providing well-paid jobs. We need to invest and return to a mixed economy, instead of one vampirised by wealth extractors. That means the asset wealthy should not be favoured more than those relying on a wage for a living, and that the welfare state should be geared to keeping people healthy enough to work to to the best of their ability, and to be able to afford their basic needs without the need for their wages to be subsidised. Yes we have the most vulnerable in society, and they should be looked after, because everyone potentially will suffer sickness or ill-health, or old age. How we treat them is the minimum level of civilisation we have. Cut that down any further in favour of the asset wealthy, and we will have more diseases of poverty and more people not working because of illness. Our problems reflect our priorities. If we don't like managing our problems, we neeto look at our priorities that put them in our lives. We better priorities than making a few people even richer.
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  6. He's a Chartered Accountant and an Econimist - I'd love to see them try to dispute his analysis.
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  7. It says a lot that his speech isn't on the front page of the newspapers, or even listed on my Google feed.
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  8. Not really. That was only the case after the pandemic and the beginning of the war in Ukraine. Now it's a different story, because household spending is falling, and unemployment is moving upwards. Retail has been hit hard, and the big names are cost cutting. Moreover new orders, as we move into the busiest time of the year - Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas is declining. Also, loan defaults are still climbing. So the economy is not slowing for a lack of goods, but the absence of people who can afford to buy them. Money printing can't solve that directly, but the malinvestment and speculation that is siphoning money out of the productive, job-creating economy can be addressed by removing the incentives to malinvest and hoard money.
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  9. You don't know how PAYE works. Or business.
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  10. The Cabinet is not the party in the Commons or the Membership. Cabinet reshuffles have been a thing since there was a cabinet. So, let's just stick to the facts, Mam!
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  11. Sorry, but where have you been for the las13 years? Royal Mail was privatised in 2011,under the Coalition Government of the Cons and the Lib Dems. Vince Cable, has a lot to answer for.
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  12. And Johnson removed 8 thousands more just before Covid struck.
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  13. Too simplistic appoach here. And if british banks in the present aren't willing to invest in british industry, why is that? Pensions aren't capital, they are savings for the future for people who will lack capacity to earn more in their retirement. Pensions should be off limits. Entrepreneurs should find their own capital from capital markets, and leave pensions alone.
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  14. Cheapest drug addictive btw
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  15. It is because people don't understand the reality. Finance has been around far longer than economics, yet the public understanding of both is limited, and that is to their detriment. Why? They are like cattle being prepped for slaughter, since most Western economies bought into the theory that financialising everything was a good idea.
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  16. All it seem we are creating are hot house flowers rather than leaders with real intellectual rigour. All ornament, but of little practical use. Once they are removed from the climate-controlled greenhouse and put into the real world, their attractions quickly wilt in the harsh climate of reality. Honestly, you, Gary Stevenson of Gary's Economics, or Political Economist Mark Blyth are the calibre of politician this country really needs. Not only do both of you have a grasp of The Dismal Science enough to display of understanding it's real world limitations, but you have displayed practical application of its ideas enough to formulate reasonable and reasoned positions that at least are addressing Economics and Finance's biggest failing in the real world: the distribution of resources. It's a lacuna in both disciplines that reflects a real world disconnect between their theory and application. Or more simply, the real world consequences of failure to meet the needs of everyone in the economy. In that, much of the economics and finance as taught is limited to a carefully curated view of reality that is detached from it. We are turning out economists that could get a job in the city but who fail to grasp how the economy is basically failing, and still get a decent job. In other words, stuffed shirts. The last thing we need are more paper tigers - efficient exam taking machines and ladder climbers who don't really care about the ideas they dutifilly exposed themselves to get a qualification. We need people who actually think beyond their own career. Or things are only going to get more lavatorial.
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  17. Democracy is a means of distributing influence, if not also power. There is no state anywhere on earth where control of money creation is not delegated to institutions, none that are directly controlled by democratic rules. At best it is indirectly controlled. Not even in Switzerland, a democracy that values regional government and referenda, is the financial system is exposed to direct democracy. It's firmly in the control of central government.
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  18. That's the gaping hole in the constitution. And the case of FDR is a case in point. What people might be missing is that Trump is beginning a project which will increase any suffering the American people have endured because of the failure of Neoliberal Economics to date. They've allowed monsters to breed amongst them and given them too much power. And they are now using it.
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  19. I refer you to the funding of the Napoleonic Wars, which has been financed for over 300 years. Just saying. The need for cash like assets will never go away, because fear and greed will never stop wreaking their havoc. And inflation will erode their servicing cost.
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  20. Trying to solve long-term, structural problems with short-termism is not going to end well. Of course, FDI sounds wonderful, until you understand that it's putting the cart before the horse. If we don't invest in ourselves, why should anyone invest in us? And our workforce is ageing, and our workers need more help to up skill or retrain. We not ready for the range of infrastructure project we need to form the foundation of sustainable economic development for this century. And we have manpower shortages in infrastructural sectors. So Kier Starmer talking to Silicon Valley Brahmins and Banking Merchants is a walk on a road to nowhere, because we still need improvements in manpower and infrastructure to support our expansion into the Digital Economy. We haven't invested in ourselves, so why would anyone else? And if he's just networking for donations, without the infrastructure and manpower being up to the standard needed, he might as well be Oliver Twist for money instead of gruel.
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  21. Is British education, even at Oxford just brainwashing? Where's the critical thinking skills? Haven't we had nearly 5 decades of the Neoliberal experiment failing in doing anything else other than making the asset wealthy even more wealthy, impoverishing everyone else, and creating an economy that is becoming unsustainable, but instead of doing some critical path analysis which would flag the failures over that time, they're doubling down. What a bunch of cultists. Lord help us.
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  22. PS I think Starmer is a wannabe who is out of his depth. And as perception easily trumps facts, he might be on his way to losing the next election. But even more seriously, he might be undermining democracy in Britain by undermining trust in the process. The Winter Fuel stunt, the £22bn hole in the finances gamification in Parliament, and the privatisation by stealth of the BBC is just hopelessly foolish. And before the Reform bunnies jump in, forget it. Farage is cut from the same cloth.
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  23. ​ @Gibbonomics You might say that, but you have to ask why did humans evolve to have empathy, before rational thought? One is not better than the other, because intelligence is context-dependent. Literally, one's experiences shape how your brain grows. And our brains developed the need to relate not only to what we now call family, but to our collective - the tribe too. Until you can explain that, your conclusion is nowhere near the far more complex truth. Nature's agenda always trumps any rationalising we might indulge in. And there's a shed load going on amongst the Russian elites. And one can understand why. But, the bubble they exist in is misleading them. And it's not all their fault. America and Russia share one thing: they are both too big to know themselves or the world in any depth. The world is bigger than they are, and there's much, much, more to learn.
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  24. Never heard of Gold certificates? Doh. Not true. Gold isn't their kryptonite, otherwise Putin would not be trying to launder gold purchases through the banking system. This is not 1914.
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  25. Looking at [hþ comments below, I would like to ask all the American funded bots below to step out of this conversation. Your lack of self-awareness is interesting considering what happened in New York several days ago. Your advice is useless. Clean your own house.
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  26. And you are no expert. Even in your own financial history. Neither do you understand the purpose of sovereign debt in the modern age. By using out if date assumptions, you are missing the point. Not even the roman empire was run without taxation. No empire can run without it. Armies and natural disasters need money to manage them, and taxes on consumption alone, do nothing to limit greed and hoarding of wealth. In fact, you can find that before the introduction of income taxes to finance the Napoleonic Wars, the British Economy was relatively small in GDP terms. But afterwards, it's economic growth exploded. Explain that. Taxes if well designed and well used secure economic growth. They're not a danger. But the private business sector are like toddlers who have forgotten to walk. They got used to getting fed by the assetless and asset-limited, even when they haven't earned it. And now, they will erode the uS economy. Watch and weep.
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  27. Yeah, right... In which universe? Not this one. Greed is part of the human condition, and must be guarded against. Pretending otherwise is idelogogical folly.
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  28. They still exist everywhere, even in large cities. To say they don't is a triumph of propaganda over reality. But reality is what it is. H.G. Wells is probably chuckling in his grave at the illogical thinking encouraged.
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  29. Rachel Reeves needs to develop a more flexible way to negotiate the politics. I think her advisors aren't upto scratch. There are ways to address her dilemma, just not this one.
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  30. Bot talk.
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  31. Your about 10 years out of date. Defined Benefit pensions are dead except for MP's. Everyone else is now exposed to the casino that is the Stock Market, and paying insurance companies really high fees for the privilege of having a workplace pension.
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  32. Er... You're not British are you?
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  33. It's not ignorance. It's a choice. When the insurance companies across the planet are beginning to very quietly move away from paying out on climate change related damage, whether by nickel and dimeing claims, or by abandoning affected areas altogether, it's no longer possible to deny that climate change is a thing. And climate change will be the hurdle that entrepreneurial politicians like Kemi Badenoch will fail to get over. Our political system is so dysfunctional that as a political immune system supposedly designed to protect our body politic, our society and our collective welfare, it's clearly in need of better nutrition. GIGO applies, and that is sad. But perhaps necessary, as reality is a harsh mistress, and it will be in the next few decades where her lessons will be most acute. So, it will be down to the next generation of the electorate and politics to clean up the mess we're leaving behind. If they can.
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  34. Papers please, comrade.
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  35. No; he isn't being disengenuous. He is being literal. Have you you actually studied the evolution of money? Money came into existence before Finance and Economics. And for good reason. Indeed, Accounting came before Finance and Economics. Money emerged as civilisation did. Why? It is a tool first for representing our beliefs. It is a technology for representing our bekiefs. When we did not need money, it never existed, but when we needed tokens of value, it emerged. And as our civilisation as a species grew, it developed means of valuing, counting, and tokenising value. And we have Accounting, Finance, and Economics respectively. So, as a Chartered Account and an Economist, Professor Murphy can combine the two disciplines to critique the dominance of Finance over Economics. In this we should be careful not to conflate the two disciplines, and their perspectives. You see Finance has different goals to economics, and we often are encouraged to conflate the two. But they are not the same. Hence our confusion about money, and the heterogeneity of beliefs about it.
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  36. Then what you are really saying is that Brexit which devalued the pound, moved the UK credit rating down, and stagnated the UK economy, also increased the interest rate the UK pays to those who hold its sovereign debt, even when Liz Truss' mini budget created a "moron premium", yes? But one should not confuse the map with the territory. Premium Bonds are liabilities for the UK government, but don't pay interest. Instead of interest, holders are entered into a monthly draw where they can win prizes... For that privilege, they can get back their stake. It's a government lottery that gives the Treasury a interest free loan. That saving pays for the prizes and the government saves money. Premium bonds cannot be traded or exchanged. Sovereign Debt instruments sold to investors are a different creature altogether. They can be traded or exchanged, and they except for the shortest durations pay interest to maturity as the coupon. So UK Premium Bonds and UK Gilts are chalk and cheese.
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  37. Wrong. That the job of a financier. Rather the Economist is interested in the effective utilisation of resources to meet society's needs. The financier just wants more effective creation of money. Money is only one commodity. That financiers are obsessed with money, as their success is measured by their own wealth. Financiers are not concerned whether that damages the economy or not. Economists should, but not always be concerned that economic activity does not damage the economy. A subtle but important difference.
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  38. Double Entry Bookeeping. The form of money created is an electronic ledger entry, i.e. credit. To put it into perspective, the Bank of International Settlement states that less that 5% of all transactions are made in cash or central bank credit, the rest is commercial bank credit.
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  39. Yes, if the law has an overarching right to it, which in Russia and every state, is the case.
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  40. ​ @timcooke2656 Your legalistic argument is lacking the legal basis of Property Rights, which is the Law, and which through the legal doctrine of Equity, can override contractual rights, if Justice would be denied. Equity was almost as interesting as Criminal Law, because although it's costs money to access it, it is a remnant of ancient Legal Jurisprudence that openly and unabashedly, moral. Might is not always Right.
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  41. Sorry but what goes up must come down at some point, and if wishes were fishes, we'd all be fishermen. Bitcoin relies on the existing financial system to exist. Without it, it would be nothing. Why? Because real money is crypto's escape hatch, and everyone hopes it will work when the next crash comes. Or that the money dealers will be tempted to take them as assets... Watch and see... The guardrails are now off, and crypto is exposed to its host, the fiat money system. Enjoy the ride.
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  42. You haven't worked in a large corporation, have you? All you describe happens in them too. Big businesses are run very much in a federal manner. Moving from one unit to another, ones experience might vary because there are various subculture within a large company. And turf wars happen beyond the operational levels, and the issues cascade downwards. And no, they're not always cheaper. Why? They like large niches that they can monopolise. Smaller businesses tend to try harder to give good service, and VFM. I miss one of my suppliers who was a married couple, and they retired just before Brexit, and since then it's been a pain to find good suppliers. Large businesses are alienating.
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  43. ​ @jasonaris5316  Yes, and No. Savings is just hoarding cash instead of investing it productively. Not only is the return on savings normally below inflation, so it's value is being eroded, but too much savings can impede economic growth in the economy. So unless you need cash, it doesn't make sense. So, invest it because the returns on stocks and shares exceed the returns on bank deposits.
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  44. Greed. Capitalism is an experiment to harness human greed, and to provide guardrails. And the truth is, that it's a risky endeavour, because the guardrails are cultural. And when technology gives you the power to mould culture, the greedy will game the system. Now, it depends on those who aren't bonkers to save the system. And you will have a fight on your hands to stop the parasites. One always does, as history will tell you. Greed and complacency are the enemies of peace and prosperity. Hence, here we are, in a world looking more uglier than before.
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  45. Not true. You can't pay what you want, when you want. The amount one has to pay is set by law. And you can be fined.
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  46. This comment says so much more about you than anything else.
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  47. So we have been governed for years, like a driver driving through fog with no idea of where we are going, and the only map we are following is hope and belief? And as the pandemic responded proved utterly, that even when there was reliable information, it was disregarded for the sake of optics? And worse, there is no-one, not one party or politician openiy worried about this in mainstream politics openly concetned about this? If we haven't a grasp of reality, no wonder then, malign actors can cynically exploit us, and reality keeps on kicking us in the rear. Lord helps us.
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  48. None of those practised MMT. Grow up.
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  49. HR are employees. Just a thought.
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  50. ​ @PatrickMcLaughlin-ji4rb Sorry, but you don't understand logic. Logic is the means to process information, and it doesn't not control the accuracy, validity, Iegitimacy of the information processed. Hence, the computer science acronym of GIGO - Garbage In, Garbage Out. Logic doesn't care whether the inputs are objective, measurable truths, or subjective, qualiative truths, like morality. Or lies and falsehoods. Therefore, behind every atrocity in human history there was logic... So, such misapprehension create the inability to grasp with the reality that we're in a Post-truth populist era, because people don't understand logic, and how amenable it is to both good and evil. It is an amoral, mechanical process of processing assumptions. So GIGO applies. That why Steve Bannon strategically argues for "flooding the zone" with 💩as to override logic with untruth, to deny, to distract, to neuter both "rational" logic and 'moral' logic, which are not the same. Rational logic relies on objective, empirically proven truths as inputs, but Moral logic relies on subjective, unprovable truths, that can only be qualiatively and subjectively experienced. The logic of the greedy vs the logic of the moral is a choice, a subjective one, and thus falls into the realm of belief. Not facts. Ideology. These can only be argued for, and the inputs, the premises, the assumptions, can be manipulated. But what else are rich people doing but trying to reshape our reality? Hence, we need to be more sceptical about rich people knowing what's best for people who aren't rich. We need to stop loving and admiring them. We need to see them as ordinary people and not heros or gods. Americans have that blindspot, and it keeps hurting them. We should take that beam out of our own eyes. And see them as they are.
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