1 hour ago, Brunolem said:

Since you insist on bringing History to the table, let's have a look at some facts, not related to the specifics of housing, and without going back to the times of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table.

 

What is the EU...providing a closer look?

 

The EU is a collection of failed empires, British, French, Austro-Hungarian and so on, desperately clinging together in search of a new grandeur.

 

Like neutrons stars remaining after the explosion of supernovae, they have lost their shine, yet refuse to give up.

 

Whatever benefit the EU may have brought, the fact is that each of these nations is nowhere near where it used to be for centuries.

 

The EU is an association of losers, with a great past and a less than promising future.

 

Its populations are dramatically shrinking, which is a sure sign of malaise and lack of confidence in the future, and many of its members are being slowly swallowed by "imported cultures", which carry much more long term consequences than imported goods.

 

What is precisely weakening the EU is this objective of grandeur craved by aspiring Napoleons such as Macron or Juncker...an objective which cost billions every year for nothing in return (Brussels gigantic bureaucracy, the parliament moving back and forth between two different cities, the translations between a multitude of languages which no member nation want to dispense with, and so on).

 

 

 

The fact that you have no idea what history is makes you a non-standard in my book.

"Whatever benefit the EU may have brought, the fact is that each of these nations is nowhere near where it used to be for centuries."

What???? You comments are just subjective gibberish

Edited November 18, 20187 yr by kwilco

A couple of pages on this topic have provided a lifetime's supply of complete BS. The EU is essentially a trading block. When it works as a unit it has power at least equal to any trading unit in the world. A while back the US was attempting to screw us with trade tariffs and ignoring our pathetic complaints. We went to the EU and they put a big tariff on Florida orange juice (Jeb Bush was seeking re-election). The US dropped their damaging import duty on the UK within a week. We have voted - like total idiots - to become a small fish in a big sea full of sharks.

Globalism is not a faceless demon of someone's fevered fantasy, it is worldwide trading organized to be at least acceptable to all its' willing participants. You are free to go back to living in the Dark Ages, or JR-M's Victorian world where you could be one of his serfs.

Read "The New Enlightenment" by Steven Pinker, it is packed with hardcore scientific evidence of how much better off we all are now. We are richer, more healthy, better educated, under less threat of violence (US goes against the world trend), and we live longer lives and remain in much better condition in our later years, work accidents are way down, women are treated more equally..........the list goes on and on. One shining example is that in 1820 90% of people in the world lived in extreme poverty, now it is 10%.

The core idea underpinning Brexit is that our condition is awful and we have to blame the EU and Immigrants (Dark skinned ones in particular) for that - it is the politics of resentment and envy. Anyone whose brain is small enough to believe what a charlatan like Farage says, deserves everything- that it now sadly, looks likely-that they are going to get.

Edited November 18, 20187 yr by Nigel Garvie
grammar

28 minutes ago, kwilco said:

The fact that you have no idea what history is makes you a non-standard in my book.

"Whatever benefit the EU may have brought, the fact is that each of these nations is nowhere near where it used to be for centuries."

What???? You comments are just subjective gibberish

Once again you resort to bold short statements without bringing anything to the debate...that's not how one wins an argument...in my book!

 

Is it subjective to say that today's Spain has dramatically shrunk (not only in size) since the days when its empire extended all the way to South America on one side, and to the Philippines on the other side?

 

And what about the British Empire? a subjective collapse?

32 minutes ago, Nigel Garvie said:

A couple of pages on this topic have provided a lifetime's supply of complete BS. The EU is essentially a trading block. When it works as a unit it has power at least equal to any trading unit in the world. A while back the US was attempting to screw us with trade tariffs and ignoring our pathetic complaints. We went to the EU and they put a big tariff on Florida orange juice (Jeb Bush was seeking re-election). The US dropped their damaging import duty on the UK within a week. We have voted - like total idiots - to become a small fish in a big sea full of sharks.

Globalism is not a faceless demon of someone's fevered fantasy, it is worldwide trading organized to be at least acceptable to all its' willing participants. You are free to go back to living in the Dark Ages, or JR-M's Victorian world where you could be one of his serfs.

Read "The New Enlightenment" by Steven Pinker, it is packed with hardcore scientific evidence of how much better off we all are now. We are richer, more healthy, better educated, under less threat of violence (US goes against the world trend), and we live longer lives and remain in much better condition in our later years, work accidents are way down, women are treated more equally..........the list goes on and on. One shining example is that in 1820 90% of people in the world lived in extreme poverty, now it is 10%.

The core idea underpinning Brexit is that our condition is awful and we have to blame the EU and Immigrants (Dark skinned ones in particular) for that - it is the politics of resentment and envy. Anyone whose brain is small enough to believe what a charlatan like Farage says, deserves everything- that it now sadly, looks likely-that they are going to get.

Brilliant thoughts. Thank you!

 

28 minutes ago, Nigel Garvie said:

 

Globalism is not a faceless demon of someone's fevered fantasy, it is worldwide trading organized to be at least acceptable to all its' willing participants. You are free to go back to living in the Dark Ages, or JR-M's Victorian world where you could be one of his serfs.

 

Globalism is much more than organized worldwide trading.

That is just the cover picture used to present the pleasant face of globalism.

 

And serfs it is creating!

Why are companies moving their production to crumbling buildings in Bangladesh?

Because of the superior qualifications of the local population?

 

A typical reaction of those who support globalization is to pretend that there is no other way: it is either that or the Middle Age!

 

And of course, we modern humans have found the light while our ancestors all the way until the 1980s were rotting in darkness!

 

That conveniently lets aside the fact that all the major discoveries that we rely upon today were made long before the advent of globalization.

 

Today we "discover" Viagra and Botox, or Facebook and video games, while the stupid serfs were only able to come up with vaccines, electricity, the laws of physics, walking on the Moon, and a few other minor things...

 

And while our predecessors were not as smart as we obviously are, they did not destroy and poison our planet, water, soil and air included, in a matter of less than a century!

 

Because our frenzy for trading has consequences...very long term consequences...

 

A longer and better life?

That is true for the lucky ones from the silent and baby boom generations, who escaped most of the poisoning.

But this is going to change...cancer cases are exploding and this is just the beginning: people don't eat, drink and breath poison without consequences.

Animal species are going extinct at more than a hundred times the natural rate...humans won't be spared!

 

11 hours ago, kwilco said:

The HISTORY of housing in UK is directly linked to supply and demand and governments' policies or attempts to meet that demand.

Ownership after the war was about 25% it is now 64% .

The rise has not been smooth, there have been about 3 or 4 bubbles since WW2 in particular in the seventies, which totally contradicts your rise-tinted recollections.

.  The last was this century.

Currently Brexit is causing a slow down in freeze of prices and it is looking like it will put it into negative equity for many owners

Britain has one of the highest house ownership rates in the world.

At present the Tory government has through austerity and Brexit massively increased the rich poor divide.

House ownership in UK has a huge cultural weighting and this often manicure market trends....... none of this however is due to globalism or "slave Labour".

 

If you are going to comment on the history of housing you really need to brush up on your facts figures evidence and trends before spouting comments based on purely blinkered personal perspective.

I take it you are living in Thailand, therefore I’ll excuse your ignorance on the subject of U.K housing. 

For the last 10yrs the U.k housing market has been heavily influenced by the buy to rent industry, which has resulted in many young families being unable to get on the housing ladder, instead they are having to pay private rent, at a much higher cost. Without any chance of actually owning the property. And these landlords are not, as I thought previously, the Iikes of ex-pats residing in Thailand, who rent out their home to finance their stay. No, many of these private landlords have portfolios of anything between 70- 13,000 properties.

 It’s a national scandal,which for some unknown reason is hardly mentioned in the U.K’ media.

7 hours ago, Nigel Garvie said:

A couple of pages on this topic have provided a lifetime's supply of complete BS. The EU is essentially a trading block. When it works as a unit it has power at least equal to any trading unit in the world. A while back the US was attempting to screw us with trade tariffs and ignoring our pathetic complaints. We went to the EU and they put a big tariff on Florida orange juice (Jeb Bush was seeking re-election). The US dropped their damaging import duty on the UK within a week. We have voted - like total idiots - to become a small fish in a big sea full of sharks.

Globalism is not a faceless demon of someone's fevered fantasy, it is worldwide trading organized to be at least acceptable to all its' willing participants. You are free to go back to living in the Dark Ages, or JR-M's Victorian world where you could be one of his serfs.

Read "The New Enlightenment" by Steven Pinker, it is packed with hardcore scientific evidence of how much better off we all are now. We are richer, more healthy, better educated, under less threat of violence (US goes against the world trend), and we live longer lives and remain in much better condition in our later years, work accidents are way down, women are treated more equally..........the list goes on and on. One shining example is that in 1820 90% of people in the world lived in extreme poverty, now it is 10%.

The core idea underpinning Brexit is that our condition is awful and we have to blame the EU and Immigrants (Dark skinned ones in particular) for that - it is the politics of resentment and envy. Anyone whose brain is small enough to believe what a charlatan like Farage says, deserves everything- that it now sadly, looks likely-that they are going to get.

Your first part is completely correct. If only we had stayed as a trading union, as most of the 1975 electorate voted for, we would not be in the situation we are now. Unfortunately our “betters” decided to deceive the people, and create a monster called the E.U.

The ignorance of leading Brexiteers is quite breathtaking...Raab has no idea about how critical Dover is and this Nadine Dorries is complaining we won't have representation in Europe....What planet has she been living on????.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/nadie-dorries-slams-brexit-deal-leave-remain-jk-rowling-a8639216.html?fbclid=IwAR1fMnpLVZRnbL5s19QYWqBFOjDel6pP4_m_fORntohVRISiFm23YlZMn-Y

There is no doubt that the decision to Brexit was based on lies and ignorance, and on the part of the Leave campaign itself, illegality. Fortunately as the weeks pass, more people are becoming aware of the disastrous implications.

Sent from my SM-G930F using Thailand Forum - Thaivisa mobile app

4 hours ago, nontabury said:

I take it you are living in Thailand, therefore I’ll excuse your ignorance on the subject of U.K housing. 

For the last 10yrs the U.k housing market has been heavily influenced by the buy to rent industry, which has resulted in many young families being unable to get on the housing ladder, instead they are having to pay private rent, at a much higher cost. Without any chance of actually owning the property. And these landlords are not, as I thought previously, the Iikes of ex-pats residing in Thailand, who rent out their home to finance their stay. No, many of these private landlords have portfolios of anything between 70- 13,000 properties.

 It’s a national scandal,which for some unknown reason is hardly mentioned in the U.K’ media.

It is the same in the US, where the new landlords are the big banks and giant hedge funds who get unlimited access to free money created by the central bank.

 

In France, the new landlords are Qataris and their friendly neighbors in search of investing their money somewhere.

 

In Canada, it is the Chinese, and so on.

 

These massive influx of hot money in the real estate market have pushed the prices through the roof (the housing bubble in the US is now bigger than it was before the 2008 crisis), and made ownership inaccessible to the average family.

 

13 hours ago, Nigel Garvie said:

Globalism is not a faceless demon of someone's fevered fantasy,

Are you sure?