Credit deflation and the reflation cycle to come (part 2)

[JimmyTheBruce]

Is it fair to assume that there will be a tipping point for the consumer when inflation of prices means they simply won't purchase?

That being the case, am I being wildly optimistic in thinking that the amounts being paid to senior executives will have to be reduced in order to meet the demands of the people actually doing the work? Same goes for the multitude of agencies and middlemen you see everywhere.

[Animal Spirits]

12 hours ago, DurhamBorn said:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10025373/Britains-blue-collar-workers-earning-MEGA-BUCKS-jobs-crisis-seen-salaries-DOUBLE.html

As we have been saying a lot of the reason is over 50s leaving the workforce (im one) and not being replaced because mostly benefits are too high and so are house prices.

The Guardian meanwhile doesnt seem to think workers should be able to earn more,they should stay on bennies and let other people come over and pluck their turkeys.Maybe the turkey farmer needs to let the Range Rover go and pay more.

Its incredible how the left is now middle class and mostly government workers who only care about their own tiny problems.Workers voted for shortages etc in the short/medium term because the long dis-inflation made it the only way to have a chance in the earnings/housing stakes.Of course The Guardian wont face up to the problem each town hs thousands refusing to work because the bennies are so lucrative.Maybe they are really worried about interest rates goin up on their BTLs

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/sep/24/food-petrol-shortages-brexit-goods-johnson-botched-deal

 

But who will be serving our coffee in Pret, who would be selling us our sandwiches in Pret??? Shazza will have to.

[DurhamBorn]

1 minute ago, JimmyTheBruce said:

Is it fair to assume that there will be a tipping point for the consumer when inflation of prices means they simply won't purchase?

That being the case, am I being wildly optimistic in thinking that the amounts being paid to senior executives will have to be reduced in order to meet the demands of the people actually doing the work? Same goes for the multitude of agencies and middlemen you see everywhere.

Middle men will be removed yes.Execs pay doesnt really matter.The macro is really all about how much the state takes and spends from the private sector.The private sector is going to get a lot back by putting prices up.You take 4% council tax increase eh,have a 15% increase on your corned beef.The workers in the supply chain will all have a 6% pay increase.

Its the reverse of what happened the last 25 years to 40 years.The state sucked up all the benefits of the dis-inflation,and the private worker none.Prices stayed down for everyone,but the state workers and bennies saw their incomes increase so they got most of the gains from the private sector.

The inflection point is crossed now and we will reverse that.The pro single mum is going to have to pay more for her basics,increasing faster than her bennies,and pass it back to the lad flogging on in the warehouse on nightshift for less money than she gets for doing nothing.This is just the start lots more dislocation to come,but this thread has done its job so far helping us leverage the situation.The irony yesterday as i watched the news about fuel shortages and BP sent me a big fat wedge of cash on an entry 7% yield.

 

[King Penda]

45 minutes ago, JimmyTheBruce said:

Is it fair to assume that there will be a tipping point for the consumer when inflation of prices means they simply won't purchase?

That being the case, am I being wildly optimistic in thinking that the amounts being paid to senior executives will have to be reduced in order to meet the demands of the people actually doing the work? Same goes for the multitude of agencies and middlemen you see everywhere.

I’m expecting free training for the unemployed on a large scale

[Phil]

2 minutes ago, King Penda said:

I’m expecting free training for the unemployed on a large scale

That would be good. I ve got to do my 1st aid . 3 day. St John's wanted £300. Got it for £192. Sub contract labour have to pay for all their own tickets. Free would be great for important things like this. Not someone who does multiple training courses, just for bennies. 16 to 18 yr olds. Most go to college as it "helps" the family with no intention of following it through to employment. I can see the old YTS coming back. Just cheap labour again, along with bennies. I'm all for productive  training. Like . Lorry driving. Daughter works in childcare. Tamworth college does one of the very few courses. They are mulling on closing it down due to lack of interest. It really is, do the course end up on minimum wages + bennies. 

[Phil]

Just now, Phil said:

That would be good. I ve got to do my 1st aid . 3 day. St John's wanted £300. Got it for £192. Sub contract labour have to pay for all their own tickets. Free would be great for important things like this. Not someone who does multiple training courses, just for bennies. 16 to 18 yr olds. Most go to college as it "helps" the family with no intention of following it through to employment. I can see the old YTS coming back. Just cheap labour again, along with bennies. I'm all for productive  training. Like . Lorry driving. Daughter works in childcare. Tamworth college does one of the very few courses. They are mulling on closing it down due to lack of interest. It really is, do the course end up on minimum wages + bennies. 

So if no-one is getting the mandatory training in childcare, who looks after tarquine while mummy and daddy do the 16 hrs? Its eating itself.

[JimmyTheBruce]

24 minutes ago, King Penda said:

I’m expecting free training for the unemployed on a large scale

 

13 minutes ago, Phil said:

That would be good. I ve got to do my 1st aid . 3 day. St John's wanted £300. Got it for £192. Sub contract labour have to pay for all their own tickets. Free would be great for important things like this. Not someone who does multiple training courses, just for bennies. 16 to 18 yr olds. Most go to college as it "helps" the family with no intention of following it through to employment. I can see the old YTS coming back. Just cheap labour again, along with bennies. I'm all for productive  training. Like . Lorry driving. Daughter works in childcare. Tamworth college does one of the very few courses. They are mulling on closing it down due to lack of interest. It really is, do the course end up on minimum wages + bennies. 

Whilst I'm all for training, nothing is free, somebody always foots the bill.  Which takes me back to my original question; will the "free" training be "paid " by the state to Hugo's hastily formed training company, set up at the behest of his shool chum who awards the contracts?  Or will companies actually have to make internal efficiencies and investment to recruit, train, and retain the workforce they require?

The relentless cronyism exists in both public and private sector, but at least there's a semblance (albeit still shite) of profit-driven efficiency in the latter.

[JimmyTheBruce]

1 hour ago, DurhamBorn said:

Middle men will be removed yes.Execs pay doesnt really matter.The macro is really all about how much the state takes and spends from the private sector.The private sector is going to get a lot back by putting prices up.You take 4% council tax increase eh,have a 15% increase on your corned beef.The workers in the supply chain will all have a 6% pay increase.

Its the reverse of what happened the last 25 years to 40 years.The state sucked up all the benefits of the dis-inflation,and the private worker none.Prices stayed down for everyone,but the state workers and bennies saw their incomes increase so they got most of the gains from the private sector.

The inflection point is crossed now and we will reverse that.The pro single mum is going to have to pay more for her basics,increasing faster than her bennies,and pass it back to the lad flogging on in the warehouse on nightshift for less money than she gets for doing nothing.This is just the start lots more dislocation to come,but this thread has done its job so far helping us leverage the situation.The irony yesterday as i watched the news about fuel shortages and BP sent me a big fat wedge of cash on an entry 7% yield.

 

I hope you're right DB.

What strikes me is that, despite management at work making clear to every employee that their primary goal going forward is to implement price increases to all customers, nobody seems to realise what that means for them personally.  Yes, it's a manufacturer selling to a distributor, but all of the people being mandated to increase prices will be purchasing that product as an end consumer.

No mention is currently being made by those same managers of wage rises in line with the price increases.....

[MrXxxx]

1 hour ago, working woman said:

Lorry Drivers

My next door neighbours (30ish) both gave up their jobs about 6 months ago to set up a business. They both worked for transport companies, recruiting lorry drivers and have set up an agency recruiting lorry drivers for the supermarkets. They have a lot of experience in this and are doing really well.

They are paying the drivers £15/hr which for a 40hr week is over 30K.  Sounds good, but a mortgage at x 6 salary is 180K, which gets you a grotty 2 bed flat where I live, not enough for a man to be the "bread winner" and raise a family in a 3 bed-semi.  Semi's start at 300K here. 

Wages need to rise or property needs to come down, maybe both. 

Rather than importing labour from abroad - why not encourage retired Ex HGV drivers back onto the road with incentives such as Tax Free Pay on a part or full 3-6 months contract, hours to suit them, until  enough new drivers are trained up. 

Why would people want to move to the UK, in the middle of a pandemic, where you have to jump through hoops to get on a plane and go home to visit family. 

It will be interesting to see what happens.

I think you make some really logical arguments...fancy replacing Biffo?

[Phil]

4 minutes ago, JimmyTheBruce said:

 

Whilst I'm all for training, nothing is free, somebody always foots the bill.  Which takes me back to my original question; will the "free" training be "paid " by the state to Hugo's hastily formed training company, set up at the behest of his shool chum who awards the contracts?  Or will companies actually have to make internal efficiencies and investment to recruit, train, and retain the workforce they require?

The relentless cronyism exists in both public and private sector, but at least there's a semblance (albeit still shite) of profit-driven efficiency in the latter.

My point was the waste of productiveness, and yes, there is a cost to everything, and someone always pays, agreed. There will always be the mates rates. I mentioned mandatory training to do a job. Driving for example would be a good one. I would say there is a lot of people who would at say 30 +, love to change their job. If you’ve got the family thing going on it can be difficult to pay for the training. The bs about drivers earning shed loads is bs. Even at £20 ph, the life must be grim. That’s how I see it. Importing from Europe may be needed temporarily, but long term access to productive “free” training is a good thing long term ( 10 yrs say).

[MrXxxx]

13 minutes ago, JimmyTheBruce said:

Or will companies actually have to make internal efficiencies and investment to recruit, train, and retain the workforce they require?

This....in the last 20-30 years large companies have increased their profits by making the training of their specialist operators someone elses responsibility. Here I think of the apprenticeship schemes, where companies such as de Haviland/BAe had their own dedicated teaching blocks/schools at various manufacturing sites for 300+. It really gets my gall nowadays when they complain that they cannot get sufficiently qualified technicians but were happy to scrap their training to increase profits.

[working woman]

@King Penda "I ’m expecting free training for the unemployed on a large scale"

Yes, I have been thinking about this too with regards to if/when manufacturing comes back to the UK and what it would actually mean.  It would be a huge undertaking, which would need a lot of planning and investment.

Take clothing as an example, I worked for a manufacturer for M&S in the 90's before it went abroad. Clothing needs machinery, components and trained staff.  All my skilled and knowledgeable colleagues are likely retired now or passed away. We would likely have to import that knowledge now. 

It will be interesting to see what happens.

China has the knowledge and I suspect have their eye on a huge potential pool of cheap labour in Africa. They are already involved in building infrastructure there such as railways.  

Maybe for the UK, clothing manufacture stays abroad and we focus on developing more high tech industries.

 

[King Penda]

46 minutes ago, Phil said:

So if no-one is getting the mandatory training in childcare, who looks after tarquine while mummy and daddy do the 16 hrs? Its eating itself.

Daddy can do 32 hours apparently 

[Harley]

4 hours ago, Gin said:

The government is planning a temporary scheme to make it easier for foreign lorry drivers to work in the UK.

Final details are expected this weekend, but any changes to immigration rules would be temporary, and there would be a cap on the number of workers allowed to enter the country.

Newspaper reports suggest up to 5,000 temporary visas could be issued.

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news

This is why, as was posted earlier, I too doubt things will get fixed until the "Administration" has tried everything else and fecked up everything first.  It's what they do.  Here they cave in to the industry which created this situation (with their help) and issue platitudes about "temporary" to cover until the s-show moves on to something else.  Like with the NI increases for the NHS, where's the plan to get us out of this mess and secure the alledged "investment" or more accurately cost?  There are loads of things, given the information posted above, that could be done to help the situation in the intermediate term but nothing is said to counterbalance this (yet again) regressive move.  The "Administrators" are either well out of their depth (of course they are given their backgrounds) and/or captured by vested interests like in so many other areas.  Alas, this needs to break to fix, and the words, even if/when spoken, are just that. These types of issues will just drag on to inflict the maximum pain on the better innocents before any possible fix.  Doing this is all these "Administrators" have proven capable of.  At their best, they will just scorch the earth so something proper can be built by others.  But not in my lifetime.  I proceed doing my own thing as much as I can while trying as hard as possible to ignore yet insulate me and my family from the actions of these parasites.

[Harley]

2 hours ago, DurhamBorn said:

Middle men will be removed yes.Execs pay doesnt really matter.The macro is really all about how much the state takes and spends from the private sector.The private sector is going to get a lot back by putting prices up.You take 4% council tax increase eh,have a 15% increase on your corned beef.The workers in the supply chain will all have a 6% pay increase.

Its the reverse of what happened the last 25 years to 40 years.The state sucked up all the benefits of the dis-inflation,and the private worker none.Prices stayed down for everyone,but the state workers and bennies saw their incomes increase so they got most of the gains from the private sector.

The inflection point is crossed now and we will reverse that.The pro single mum is going to have to pay more for her basics,increasing faster than her bennies,and pass it back to the lad flogging on in the warehouse on nightshift for less money than she gets for doing nothing.This is just the start lots more dislocation to come,but this thread has done its job so far helping us leverage the situation.The irony yesterday as i watched the news about fuel shortages and BP sent me a big fat wedge of cash on an entry 7% yield.

 

And Labour will bleat while giving a big FO to their former constituents who actually generated the wealth.  And the Cons will just enact another con.

[Harley]

1 hour ago, King Penda said:

I’m expecting free training for the unemployed on a large scale

More of our money to the rotted education sector who long ago captured the "Administration".  Nice idea maybe, badly executed guaranteed.  So bad in say schools atm they now just want to self assess people rather than test them.

[Harley]

2 hours ago, Animal Spirits said:

But who will be serving our coffee in Pret, who would be selling us our sandwiches in Pret??? Shazza will have to.

Who adds more value, a seasoned lorry driver or a seasoned journalist?  Who gets paid better, a lot better?

I helped a mature HGV driver out this week.  A bit lost and about to make a big mistake.  I went out to help.  A decent bloke (OK I've had some baduns on the road) and I felt good.  And no, I was not reading the Guardian at the time!

Solidarity.

[Bobthebuilder]

28 minutes ago, Harley said:

This is why, as was posted earlier, I too doubt things will get fixed until the "Administration" has tried everything else and fecked up everything first.  It's what they do.  Here they cave in to the industry which created this situation (with their help) and issue platitudes about "temporary" to cover until the s-show moves on to something else.  Like with the NI increases for the NHS, where's the plan to get us out of this mess and secure the alledged "investment" or more accurately cost?  There are loads of things, given the information posted above, that could be done to help the situation in the intermediate term but nothing is said to counterbalance this (yet again) regressive move.  The "Administrators" are either well out of their depth (of course they are given their backgrounds) and/or captured by vested interests like in so many other areas.  Alas, this needs to break to fix, and the words, even if/when spoken, are just that. These types of issues will just drag on to inflict the maximum pain on the better innocents before any possible fix.  Doing this is all these "Administrators" have proven capable of.  At their best, they will just scorch the earth so something proper can be built by others.  But not in my lifetime.  I proceed doing my own thing as much as I can while trying as hard as possible to ignore yet insulate me and my family from the actions of these perverts.

Spot on Harley.

My experience of government / HMRC at the moment reminds of a teenager dragging their heels and throwing their arms about whilst huffing and puffing. (Harry Enfield's Kevin the teenager comes to mind).

They will reap what they sow, hopefully, they deserve everything they will get imo.

I have just managed this morning to finally log on to my online self assessment tax account, after a year of trying. It has been like dealing with an incompetent child that keeps throwing the paper work all over the floor, time and again, while laughing.

[Harley]

On 23/09/2021 at 11:09, Castlevania said:

Associated British Foods still do. Although they’re a conglomerate, so you get stuff like Primark, Twinings and Kingsmill all thrown in.

Talking of Primark, they are my perfect disinflationary play on so many levels, from constantly moving production to cheaper countries, moving quickly to "capture" fashion trends, cheap transport, etc.  They've played a great game but IMO the walls started to close in on them a few years ago and the bad has only accelerated.  They are my canary - I have a lot of respect for their ability - but they are my bellwether.  The last shoe to drop, as it were? ABF must be pleased with their diversity!

PS:  I think the (lack of) online debate was a red herring.

[Harley]

12 minutes ago, Bobthebuilder said:

They will reap what they sow, hopefully, they deserve everything they will get imo.

Alas, they will take us down first.

[DoINeedOne]

14 minutes ago, Bobthebuilder said:

Spot on Harley.

My experience of government / HMRC at the moment reminds of a teenager dragging their heels and throwing their arms about whilst huffing and puffing. (Harry Enfield's Kevin the teenager comes to mind).

They will reap what they sow, hopefully, they deserve everything they will get imo.

I have just managed this morning to finally log on to my online self assessment tax account, after a year of trying. It has been like dealing with an incompetent child that keeps throwing the paper work all over the floor, time and again, while laughing.

i spent 3 years arguing about the amount owed for a company that was not even running or had a bank account, they threaten debt collect, fines, interest, and i also received letters from debt collection agencies worded to scare but also not actually saying they will

We could, may etc...

Anyway after 3 years of back and forth sending letters recorded to make sure they got them i randomly received a letter updating what i owed £0, no fucking apology or anything 

Another interesting fact i read the other day the UK tax rules runs into best part of 12,000 pages

Hong Kong around 250 pages 

some of the islands around the UK 1 page lol

[Harley]

3 hours ago, DurhamBorn said:

Middle men will be removed yes.Execs pay doesnt really matter.The macro is really all about how much the state takes and spends from the private sector.The private sector is going to get a lot back by putting prices up.You take 4% council tax increase eh,have a 15% increase on your corned beef.The workers in the supply chain will all have a 6% pay increase.

The economics say yes while the current politics on balance probably say no.  We'll get the political economy, as always (aka a "buggers muddle")!

PS:  Council tax up by 5% to cover their graft?  No problem, more graft through price controls and subsidies to the "needy".  The answer to more graft and regulation seems to be more graft and regulation.  Bread and circuses.

[dnb24]

@DurhamBorn

wage inflation- £30/hour cabbage picking.

I used to get paid £28 per day doing same job- 20years ago

https://metro.co.uk/2021/09/24/cabbage-pickers-offered-62000-salary-by-veg-firm-amid-uk-staff-shortage-15311969/

[Harley]

5 minutes ago, dnb24 said:

@DurhamBorn

wage inflation-

https://metro.co.uk/2021/09/24/cabbage-pickers-offered-62000-salary-by-veg-firm-amid-uk-staff-shortage-15311969/

The Netherlands is a massive veg producer with what I assume is a relatively small workforce.  But then I often hear about all the clever techniques, including automation, they adopt.  "Adopt"!  I mean "invest" (TBC, UK static caravans for overseas labour does not count as an investment but that's an interesting end to end discussion!).

[Noallegiance]

I'm hanging in there!

"InfraStrata PLC - London-based strategic infrastructure projects company - Says it has applied to Companies House to change its name to Harland & Wolff Group Holdings PLC, following its purchase of Harland & Wolff in 2019. Says it is now at its final stage of full reactivation of all its yards, which involves building a multi-year backlog for its facilities across its five key markets: defense, cruise, and ferry, commercial, renewables, and energy. Explains the name change will "better reflect its ambition in expanding its core business and the significant development of its shipbuilding and fabrication activities,"

Chief Executive Officer John Wood says: "We are delighted to make this announcement today, signalling the end of upgrade and reactivation phases. With the new national shipbuilding strategy due to be released in the autumn and the government's 10-point plan for a Green Industrial Revolution, we have confidence that the shipbuilding and fabrication business will deliver substantial value to all our stakeholders as we enter this exciting new stage of building our multiyear backlog of projects."