only if it personally hurts them. So probably not. The rich are insulated from most everyday problems.

yes, you keep repeating how it was manufactured. An opinion most Brits don't share with you so really an irrelevancy where it comes to the overall perception of May and the EU. I'm not saying she will succeed in pushing the perception to one where other people than May will be blamed but it seems the strategy of the British political parties at this time to be concerned with who to blame more then to cooperate and reach a sensible agreement.

I think there's 0 chance the UK will revoke the article 50 notice as there's no majority support for it in Parliament. There's no democratic legitimacy for the government to revoke it without that support and as such would be political suicide for the already estranged, English political elite if they did do it. The result of the referendum cannot be ignored like that.

May has a choice, and if she walks this country off a cliff - it will be on purpose. — karl stone

Immaterial if you can blame someone else.

No, it isn't. Also, this thread isn't about communism.

I've been primarily interested in his labour theory of value, as a continuation from the works of Smith and Ricardo which is more economics than history. At least, since 2018 hist economic theory is gaining much more interest at the academic level.

His historical materialism isn't my strong point at all but it was widely studied in the history department of Leiden university as some of the students I was living with studied Marx extensively. From what I picked up, Marx attempted to get to something regulated by "laws" or principles in order to predict and describe specific socio-economic outcomes but still depending on the actual historic context. I think however, he was quite aware of the limitations of his methodology which might explain his reluctance in stating universal truths. I don't think that's an attempt to formulate a scientific theory but perhaps more a categorisation of facts to have an understanding of historical development. Much like how histoire totale is also an exhaustive and exhausting method of describing historical developments. They both have their uses in understanding history and Marx had a specific interest in understanding economic history hence the aspects included in his methodology.

But I digress, I'll just say what I said before:

The qualification, however, is neither here nor there as it tells us nothing of the value (not necessarily utilitarian value either) of social sciences but it often used as a value judgment of social sciences. — Benkei

That's part of the answer. It's the first step in answering it (hence "first," announcing that I'm starting there with you, but thats not the finish.) — Terrapin Station

Is Smith primarily studied as part of economics or philosophy? And Ricardo? Your loaded question wasn't even the beginning of an answer. Also, I can handle more than one liners but I suspect that if you're not familiar with Smith and Ricardo, you haven't read any Marx either which makes your opinion on this issue just that: an opinion. Hence your dodging of the question. I will now go out of my way to pointily ignore your opinion. Thank you for participating. Bye!

First, aren't you familiar with the fact that Marx is studied primarily, if not exclusively, via philosophy departments? — Terrapin Station

No. First, is answering my question first: What did Marx do or not do to put it apart from other economics, history or sociology and instead gets qualified as philosophy?

It's not clear to me on what you base that. What did Marx do or not do to put it apart from other economics, history or sociology and instead gets qualified as philosophy?

While we're at it, Adam Smith? His economic theories, economics or primarily philosophy? David Ricardo, economics or primarily philosophy?

Indeed. Popper took issue with his historical materialism.

How would you describe/qualify what Marx was doing?

There's an issue, in any case, to what extent the social sciences are science or not. If science is anything that uses the scientific method then all social sciences, including Marx' work, are not science.

The qualification, however, is neither here nor there as it tells us nothing of the value (not necessarily utilitarian value either) of social sciences but it often used as a value judgment of social sciences.

Well ethical theories aren't scientific either. Let's not pay attention to ethics either!

If there is an issue with Marx, it's that it's sometimes hard to tell his political engagement from his academic work. I tend to find his analyses more interesting and usable than his predictions, because the latter changed over time. At the same time, the few predictions stemming directly from his analysis (like value extraction) seem to hold true and also necessary conclusions from the system he's describing. To then seeing that happen means the basis of his analysis is probably correct. The billionaires just got 12% richer in 2018. The lower half of the world population saw their wealth shrink by 11%.

https://www.oxfam.org/en/research/public-good-or-private-wealth

And this is happening in the US, UK and other European countries as well, if in less extreme forms on the poverty side.

I don't know what you think communism is. Is China communist according to you?

The argument against Popper is of course to reject his definition of science, come up with your own persuasive definition and take it from there.

As to Marx. I'd like to point out that there isn't such a thing as "Marxism". Marx himself didn't expect a "revolution" by the end of his life and if he did, he expected it to happen in more agrarian societies. Marxism in its broadest sense is economic theory, which isn't science to begin with.

Marx has never offered a definition of "capitalism", instead talks about the capitalist mode of production.

I think the most important thing to take away from Marx is that the capitalist mode of production means a) private owner ship of the means of production b) wage labour c) increased mechanisation of the means of production and d) value extraction from the labourer to the capitalist. If I see the socio-economic development of, for instance, the Netherlands I think this is largely true.

What I see is despite increased GDP and profits that these benefits are not shared with everyone, especially low-schooled labour, which is also increasingly under pressure due to mechanisation. It was only 40 years ago that a lot of labourers used to be able to support a family on their own, nowadays both mom and dad need a job. And even then it's hard to get by when sickness or (partial) disability kicks in. Many families are one crisis away from poverty. I don't think that's acceptable for a civilised society.

In that sense I fear for those people and the development of robotics, that will probably be able to replace a lot of labourers such as painters, brick layers, cleaners etc. etc. The reality is not everyone has the necessary talents or don't get the opportunities to do something else than the simplest of tasks.

The value we put in capital in relation to labour is schewed in my view. Having money as opposed to having skill is worth more and this doesn't seem correct to me. Yes, the capitalist risks his money but the labourer risks his livelihood and his family. If the company he works for goes belly up, he doesn't just lose money (that most capitalists can afford to lose); he loses his kids' college tuition or his membership to the local football club.

I think we need to move to some sort of dynamic equity system in which labourers not only receive wages but also build up equity over time based on the value they add to a company. As the value grows, the initial capital investment shrinks from a relative point of view and therefore gets a diminished portion of the profits over time. The longer a labourer works at a company the higher his share becomes (but it's diminished relative again to other labourers putting in hours). Then when the robots are bought, they own a share of the profits the robots will produce.

Selmayr seems to want none of it.

If these Brexiteers think it's like "not having a border" it should be fine to implement it between Northern Ireland and the rest of the UK when the backstop comes into effect.

Next step in the Brexit-saga: the Malthouse compromise.

The main thing for Ireland is that they'll have a border but it won't feel like one because they'll have a technical implementation to do the border control that people can move up and down between Northern-Ireland and Ireland without any delay.

Correct me if I'm wrong but doesn't that mean there is a border? So what happens if the technical implementation fails or doesn't deliver? Who's going to pay for it? What if it's too expensive? etc. etc.

I wonder how the EU will react to it.

The basic difficult here is to understand that the EU, however it wants to be a federation, is still what you would call a confederation. In fact if someone argues that the EU has a lack of democracy because the EU Parliament doesn't have much say, I beg to differ. Strengthening the EU Parliament would just lead to taking power away from the parliaments of the member countries. I myself am far more happy with EU being an assortment of independent states rather than something else. — ssu

There's definitely a benefit to this sort of decentralisation. For one, if you want to lobby for something, you need to lobby in different countries, making the EU less suspectible to inappropriate lobbying efforts as we see in the USA (obviously, it still happens). I also prefer there not to be a single EU army for similar reasons that I don't think a powerful, centrally governed military-industrial complex is useful.

A good article by Gary Young: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/feb/01/poorer-brexiters-worse-off-working-class-leavers

Again a lot of misrepresentation. Germany is not in a technical recession but close to it, which contradicts tour earlier statement. Italy had a technical recession where you claimed an actual recession. Etc. Etc.

The EU does a bad job of explaining how it functions so your mistake is understandable. Meanwhile, what most people will be amazed to know is that the EU is fundamentally more democratic than the UK.

Here's a nice overview even if I don't agree with every point : https://eu-rope.ideasoneurope.eu/2018/10/21/which-is-more-democratic-uk-or-eu/

Meanwhile, Germany is in technical recession, Italy is in recession, and France is in flames. — Inis

More lies. Germany is expected to do best of the three you mentioned with 1.7%. France is expected to outperform Italy (1.6%), the UK will now no longer outperform Italy (1.2%) (still assuming soft Brexit), Italy is still growing (1.3%). So technically you don't know what you're talking about.

EDIT: Those were the 2020 figures. Here's 2019:

Germany: 1.8%
France: 1.6%
Italy: 1.2%
UK: 1.2%

He's a pathological misinformer and cherry picker. Like his numbers for the trade deficit, which was for goods only because, of course, the UK has no services industry!

The data was eventually extracted from HMRC and the Treasury by Iain Duncan Smith, ex Work and Pensions Secretary, and is for 2013/14. — Inis

The same data I used with totally different figures. Do you have a reading disability that I need to take into account when communicating with you?

The same misinformation again. Let's get back to what I pointed out before and you haven't dealt with at all, just repeating the same nonsense again.

This simply isn't true. IMF projects UK will be equally fastest European G7 growing economy. — Inis

How many EU countries are there? How many are in the G7? Spoiler, 28 and 3. That IMF paper also shows the UK will underperform compared to the EU average. In other news, the EC forecasts UK GDP growth at 1.2% tying it with Italy for last place. Both forecasts assume a soft Brexit by the way.

And that's despite a depreciated currency...

Meanwhile, spreads and volatility in UK equities have increased as well, reflecting the risks market participants perceive. Rating agencies have downgraded UK debt as well.

From an economic point of view Brexit sucks for every party involved.

That's why 3.7 million EU Citizens live in UK, that and the £4billion in benefits they take.

That's why net migration from EU is still 100,000 p.a. despite Brexit. — Inis

Based on what information because the "data on migrants and benefits is incomplete, fragmented and not routinely available"? When people voted on Brexit no information was available on the costs of benefits paid by the UK government to EU citizens. The estimates I found in the House of Commons Library were from March 2017 on data in 2013/2014 at results in 1.7 billion GBP over 2 years for non-UK EU citizens. An important point as well: non-UK nationals were far less likely to receive benefits than UK nationals. Since the system is such that the working populace carries the costs of those receiving benefits, the non-UK citizens not only paid for all non-UK people receiving benefits but also a part of UK citizens receiving benefits. E.g., they make social security cheaper for everyone in the UK.

UK citizens working in the EU have the same rights to benefits as well that the UK wouldn't have to pay if they were unemployed in the UK (1.3 million UK citizens live in the EU) but I imagine that they similarly have a lower unemployment rate and less need for benefits as the local populace and as group are a net contributor.

1. Socratic dialogue?
2. Catchy!
3. Inane chatter being the happy medium, I suppose? — karl stone

1. It's the listening part where you learn.
3. Possibly a translation thing but I always interpreted "speaking up" as taking a (verbal) stance against injustice and unfairness

EU: Ok, bye then!

I actually think the EU has been very considerate of UK interests so far in particular where it concerns the financial services industry. EU entities can continue to meet their clearing obligations by clearing at LCH. If it had been me, I would've said that's fine with regard to your historic portfolio but for any new financial instruments it needs to be cleared at a clearing house in the EU.

Here's an idea to an alternative arrangement; don't leave if you can't handle the consequences you dumb fucks.

Leave what exactly? I'm getting a Balfour déjà-vu. The UK agreed to the following:

The United Kingdom remains committed to protecting North-South cooperation and to its guarantee of avoiding a hard border. Any future arrangements must be compatible with these overarching requirements. The United Kingdom's intention is to achieve these objectives through the overall EU-UK relationship. Should this not be possible, the United Kingdom will propose specific solutions to address the unique circumstances of the island of Ireland. In the absence of agreed solutions, the United Kingdom will maintain full alignment with those rules of the Internal Market and the Customs Union which, now or in the future, support North-South cooperation, the all island economy and the protection of the 1998 Agreement.

Same thing that the Scottish wanted from the UK: nice independence, but all things good for business to stay as it was in the union. It's called cherry picking. — ssu

Sorry, I wasn't very clear. I meant more specifically with regard to the "alternative arrangements" to the backstop, what do they want?

I can make do with the following three points I'm confident enough to impart as wisdom you can live by:

1. Nobody ever got smarter by talking
2. Oefening baart kunst it's similar to "practice makes perfect" but with the important distinction that "kunst" doesn't mean perfect but "art" or "craftmanship"
3. Speaking up is golden, silence is oppression

What do the British MPs and the government want exactly?

You mean the Article 50 notice, which is causing confusion for Inis.

What's more, a majority of northern Irish politicians and businesses are in favour of the back stop. When do these matters become devolved matters that the local politicians get a say?

It's true but a website definition and not the statutory definition. It now seems to match the statutory definition used in the Violence Against Women Act. That Act expired during the government shutdown but appears to have been extended again until 15 February. Whether there's a policy change related to the change in definition isn't clear. Reason to pay attention for now.

Yes, I reiterated what had to be deducted from the gross amount resulting in a net payment of 9 billion. Agree with that final figure or not?

OK So the membership fee is closer to £14billion. — Inis

Minus the rebate, minus the expenditures of the EU in the UK, you get around 9 billion GDP. In return for which you have access to the largest free trade block in the world. Effectively each UK citizen pays 135 GBP, or 155 EUR, per year. The Dutch pay 230 per capita but make more than up for it in the benefits it generates (somewhere between 1500 to 2000 per year per capita). And here the CBI explains to you why it was a benefit to the UK as well: http://www.cbi.org.uk/insight-and-analysis/our-global-future/factsheets/factsheet-2-benefits-of-eu-membership-outweigh-costs/

But of course people actually running a business don't know what they're talking about. :rofl:

In any case, the UK paid and is paying far less than the other most-developed European countries. So the complaint about the membership fee is just pathetic. If youthink being part of a free trading block can be a free lunch then you don't understand the complexities of having to maintain a functioning and integrated market. Just have a look at the total public expenditures in the UK as a whole.

EU still takes £4billion in fish from UK waters. — Inis

And the UK fishes in Irish, Norwegian, Dutch and other waters and is and was in any case a negotiated deal the UK agreed to.

The deficit in traded goods is still £95billion. — Inis

Ah, it's cherry picking again and a blatant attempt at misrepresentation. The trade balance is the total of goods and services. The most recent numbers from November 2017 to November 2018 is 28.6 billion GBP compared to 4.1 billion GDP as of end 2017. A strong rise compared to before which is driven by falling foreign direct investment in the UK due to the uncertainty of Brexit. Something you can blame your politicians for.

EU citizens still take £4billion in benefits. — Inis

Based on what information because the "data on migrants and benefits is incomplete, fragmented and not routinely available"? When people voted on Brexit no information was available on the costs of benefits paid by the UK government to EU citizens. The estimates I found in the House of Commons Library were from March 2017 on data in 2013/2014 at results in 1.7 billion GBP over 2 years for non-UK EU citizens. An important point as well: non-UK nationals were far less likely to receive benefits than UK nationals. Since the system is such that the working populace carries the costs of those receiving benefits, the non-UK citizens not only pay for all non-UK people receiving benefits but also a part of UK citizens receiving benefits. E.g., they make social security cheaper for everyone in the UK.

UK citizens working in the EU have the same rights to benefits as well that the UK wouldn't have to pay if they were unemployed in the UK (1.3 million UK citizens live in the EU) but I imagine that they similarly have a lower unemployment rate and less need for benefits as the local populace and as group are a net contributor.

Yes. I want you to stop misrepresenting the facts all the time by cherry picking data and spreading misleading or false information. It's not nearly as much as you state it is and it is also meaningless without understanding the gains. It's kind of like saying 'an iPhone costs 300 EUR to make so we shouldn't do it because it's to expensive!'. On the UK contribution:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/governmentpublicsectorandtaxes/publicsectorfinance/articles/theukcontributiontotheeubudget/2017-10-31

Meanwhile, based on figures from 2005 to 2015 the Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, Belgium, Luxemburg, Denmark, France and Austria all contributed more to the EU as percentage of their GDP. This still excludes the Fontainebleau Abatement, which probably puts the UK net contribution even belowthan Italy's.

https://www.cbs.nl/en-gb/news/2016/50/netherlands-largest-net-contributor-eu-this-century

The economic benefits of being part of the EU are nevertheless clear (it costs us 230 EUR a year per person and results in a 1,500 EUR benefit). And of course a Nexit is discussed in the Netherlands but that's a matter of EU bureacracy, sovereignty and local autonomy and a perceived democratic deficit. The EU, by the way, is in its structure less democratic than the Dutch structure but more democratic than the UK structure. So "taking back control" in the UK is quite misleading as it is mostly about taking back control for a specific elite in the UK. But whatever, don't let actual facts get in your way.

Then the trade deficit.

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/nationalaccounts/balanceofpayments/bulletins/uktrade/january2018

The trade deficit in the UK widened from 3.4 billion GDP to 8.7 billion GBP during a time the pound depreciated in respect of the EUR. The 95 billion is not a familiar figure. Have you decided to take an arbitrary time period and added all the yearly deficits together?

Finally, the EU can hardly be blamed for UK citizens wanting to import non-UK manufactured goods and retain non-UK services. That's a consequence of free trade markets that UK citizens have access to those goods.

It is unknown whether the trade deficit will improve due to Brexit. Any economists claiming one way or the other is just guessing. The depreciated GBP should lead to a reduced purchasing power abroad, so less imports. UK goods would be relatively cheaper for foreign bowers, so more exports. But, there's a barrier to trade now as the EU negotiated trade deals with third countries are lost and the "trade deal" of the EU is lost as well. Where the UK has no real alternative to buy abroad what it cannot provide itself, all other EU countries can avoid the hassle of dealing with UK customs by turning to any other country in the EU for that product or service. That will obviously lead to less exports for the UK to EU countries.

Finally, capital flows are significantly larger than trade flows. Where it used to be that trade deficits would correct themselves in a floating exchange rate environment the exchange rate nowadays is set by capital flows and trade flows have a neglible effect. It's therefore unclear what the GBP currency pairs will trade at in the future, which will be the main driver in the long run as to what happens with the trade deficit. A strong GBP will continue the trade deficit, a weaker one can reduce it or lead to a surplus. I doubt (as in when hell freezes over), however, the UK government is prepared introduce capital controls.

How many EU countries are there? How many are in the G7? Spoiler, 28 and 3. That IMF paper also shows the UK will underperform compared to the EU average. In other news, the EC forecasts UK GDP growth at 1.2% tying it with Italy for last place. Both forecasts assume a soft Brexit by the way.

And that's despite a depreciated currency...

Meanwhile, spreads and volatility in UK equities have increased as well, reflecting the risks market participants perceive. Rating agencies have downgraded UK debt as well.

From an economic point of view Brexit sucks for every party involved. For instance, for the Netherlands, where I live, it can have an effect of up to 1.2% of GDP. That's 10 billion EUR in costs.

You do like cherry picking your statistics don't you? How's GDP growth doing as compared to other countries and the GDP projection?

Furthermore, it's hard to compare a counterfactual with reality but whatever the UK economy is doing now (during a general worldwide economic upswing) we don't know what it would've done if it hadn't voted in favour of Brexit. Expectations is it would've done better, which is why you see GBP currency pairs with major currencies such as EUR and USD trade consistently at lower exchange rates as it expresses the expectation that interest rates in Britain will rise in order to stimulate the economy and avoid deflation. The benefit is of course that exports will be cheaper but despite that the UK lags in GDP growth compared to its now "more expensive" EU members.

Meanwhile, a lot of companies in the UK have effectuated their contigency planning, which doesn't bode well for the economy either. http://www.cbi.org.uk/news/8-out-of-10-businesses-say-brexit-hits-investment-as-speed-of-talks-outpaced-by-reality-firms-face-on-ground/

They are exempted from the Services Directive but have their own directives ensuring a single market for services. Your first list is covered entirely by MiFID, EMIR, CRD IV, BRRD, short selling regulation and Solvency. That's all EU law and has nothing to do with "mutual recognition". But please, continue like you know what you're talking about.

It's one of the four pillars of the EU after all, freedom of movement, capital, goods and services.