Credit deflation and the reflation cycle to come (part 5)

[DurhamBorn]

Remember when i said the fund managers were buys because as money came out of BTL and inheritance it would flow to them,they were all hugely shorted then,but anyone who bought should have nice profits now.I love cross working roadmaps.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/buy-to-let/inside-frenzied-buy-to-let-investor-exodus/

 

"Henderson and his investment partners plan to sell all their rental properties and put the money in the stock market or pension investments instead."

[Loki]

1 minute ago, DurhamBorn said:

Remember when i said the fund managers were buys because as money came out of BTL and inheritance it would flow to them,they were all hugely shorted then,but anyone who bought should have nice profits now.I love cross working roadmaps.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/buy-to-let/inside-frenzied-buy-to-let-investor-exodus/

 

"Henderson and his investment partners plan to sell all their rental properties and put the money in the stock market or pension investments instead."

It's been quite a turn around for Aberdeen, do you have any recent thoughts on them?

[Errol]

4 hours ago, Chewing Grass said:

So what do we reckon gets ground-down first, what will be the visible pecking order.

1) Stagnating wage growth
2) Inflation
3) Expensive Credit
4) Downgrading of nice things into essential things
5) Less travel/holidays
6) Reduced choice and lower quality food
7)

 

All of these are underway already.

[sancho panza]

On Monday I joined a virtual Q&A with Huw Pill ,Chief Economist at the BoE.Questions were submitted before hand and both myself and @DurhamBorn put a number of questions in covering weaknesses in benefits paying more than working,£2 trilion+ govt debt,housing market/banking sector,inflation measures and inflation targeting,labour market,UK losing out to EM's,the UK's oil & gas deficits etc etc. We covered a lot of bases.

Long story short,I learned a lot about where we are and where we're going -DB has his own views of course and I'd welcome his take on what he heard.

I learned a lot though for all the wrong reasons.Much as Huw appears a decent guy,it was hard not to come away with the feeling that he hasn't really got a grip on where we are and where we're going.It lasted an hour and the questions he faced were picked by his team and they were not any of the ones posed by us.Mainly they were 'when are interest rates coming down','is it Brexit's fault' etc

However, I was wathcing the man not the ball, and these are my take homes.

1) He spent some time explaining how monetary policy works in that the Chancellor sends a letter to the BoE asking them to target a certain level of inflation.The fact that he explained it and then referred back to it later on,sounded to me like the BoE were getting their excuses in early in terms of pinning the blame back on the polo's.It also made an utter sham of the BoE supposed independence as Huw explained that their role is mainly to pursue that inflation target the Chancellor sets and not to question either the target or the inflation measurement itself.

I found this willingness to happily oblige the Comrade Corbyn in targetting 50% CPI unnerving to say the least and makes you wonder why we're paying them so much money if the big decisions are taken elsewhere.

2) Overall,there was a lot of subtle hints and statements that would lead the unitiated to believe that current inflationary trends across the West(and in the UK in particular) are the results of the Ukraine war.There was no-and I mean no-assessment of the impact of QE injecting £800bn liquid into a a£2.4 trillion economy,or 13 years of Zirp,no acknowledgement of the role of the lockdown distorting supply chains or furlough.

This really is a central problem because that willingness to try and blame the war allows politicians and central bankers to kid themselves that the effects will wear off once it finishes and given inflation was running hard in 2021,it seems highly unlikely that'll be the case.

3) Over and again, he failed to even mention any of the substantive issues we face in terms of dealing with extremely high private and public debt especially with reference to the unwinding of QE which at one point he estimated would take ten years to unwind at the current pace and seemed to imply that that process would be ongoing no matter what,which I find hard to believe given the way the govt are spending.You can't keep spending moeny like that on 10% benny rises and winter fuel payouts and unwind QE at the same time.

4) He took the Brexit question and diplomatically got through it without telling us he voted Remain.He did his best but his heart clearly wasn't in it,which I can understand but he again talked about the Eurozone without reference to either Target 2 imbalances,the debts or the QE programmes and concluded that EU infation would roll over before ours.He also referenced the US but again only in the sense that the tweaking of rates would eventually work it's magic.Again,no mention of the public/private debt overhang they have to clear with 20% of their kids living on foodstamps.

5) One point that actually stuck out as a firm commitment,was when asked about house prices.He said,and reaffirmed it a bit later, that they were to target 2% inflation and if that meant house prices dropped then that would be incidental to the policy.I was a bit surprised by that but he had qualified his answer by talking about generational inequity in the housing market and I must say I was surprised by his forthrightness on that.Although he didn't really address the impact that falling house prices would have on the UK banking sector that's leveraged to the gills

6) He appeared to have very little concern regarding the UK's energy position even though the structural deficits we run in oil & gas (40% & 60%)are a key plank of our inflation problem

 

 

 

 

 

Overall,it was quite disconcerting to see the Chief Economist of the BoE spend an hour talking inflation/monetary policy and not talk about the national debt/how pisspoor the inflation measure is/wage vs benefit inflation etc etc.

I get that it was a Q&A for the public and he doesn't want to cause any worry but he genuinely came across as happy with what he was saying.

After it finished I was jsut thankful we're so heavily exposed to gold/oil/tobacco with our savings.They seem more reliable a friend in hard times.

I will try and attend one the live Q&A's that DB did and keep the pressure on down here in the Mids,to get some answers to the many questions I have.I'd reccomend anyone to have a go.Watching Huw I felt quite knowledgeable......

Edited February 7, 2023 by sancho panza

[DurhamBorn]

52 minutes ago, Loki said:

It's been quite a turn around for Aberdeen, do you have any recent thoughts on them?

I sold some with decent profit for buying more SEDY,i trimmed all of them.I decided to lower anything in sterling unless they have inflation pricing,so iv added more BT last few weeks.

[Loki]

Just now, DurhamBorn said:

I sold some with decent profit for buying more SEDY,i trimmed all of them.I decided to lower anything in sterling unless they have inflation pricing,so iv added more BT last few weeks.

Thanks!

[sancho panza]

1 hour ago, DurhamBorn said:

Remember when i said the fund managers were buys because as money came out of BTL and inheritance it would flow to them,they were all hugely shorted then,but anyone who bought should have nice profits now.I love cross working roadmaps.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/buy-to-let/inside-frenzied-buy-to-let-investor-exodus/

 

"Henderson and his investment partners plan to sell all their rental properties and put the money in the stock market or pension investments instead."

He's that expereinced and savvy that he walked into a tax ambush that he'd been given 5 years warning of.I feel sorry for the tenants having their lives in the hands of someone that f***ing stupid.

Paying tax on losses ffs.He could have sold last year or 2021....

The only upside is that they might bung their moeny into some sure thing housebuilders and get them to a level worth shorting

[Plan-b]

17 minutes ago, sancho panza said:

On Monday I joined a virtual Q&A with Huw Pill ,Chief Economist at the BoE.Questions were submitted before hand and both myself and @DurhamBorn put a number of questions in covering weaknesses in benefits paying more than working,£2 trilion+ govt debt,housing market/banking sector,inflation measures and inflation targeting,labour market,UK losing out to EM's,the UK's oil & gas deficits etc etc. We covered a lot of bases.

Long story short,I learned a lot about where we are and where we're going -DB has his own views of course and I'd welcome his take on what he heard.

I learned a lot though for all the wrong reasons.Much as Huw appears a decent guy,it was hard not to come away with the feeling that he hasn't really got a grip on where we are and where we're going.It lasted an hour and the questions he faced were picked by his team and they were not any of the ones posed by us.Mainly they were 'when are interest rates coming down','is it Brexit's fault' etc

However, I was wathcing the man not the ball, and these are my take homes.

1) He spent some time explaining how monetary policy works in that the Chancellor sends a letter to the BoE asking them to target a certain level of inflation.The fact that he explained it and then referred back to it later on,sounded to me like the BoE were getting their excuses in early in terms of pinning the blame back on the polo's.It also made an utter sham of the BoE supposed independence as Huw explained that their role is mainly to pursue that inflation target the Chancellor sets and not to question either the target or the inflation measurement itself.

I found this willingness to happily oblige the Comrade Corbyn in targetting 50% CPI unnerving to say the least and makes you wonder why we're paying them so much money if the big decisions are taken elsewhere.

2) Overall,there was a lot of subtle hints and statements that would lead the unitiated to believe that current inflationary trends across the West(and in the UK in particular) are the results of the Ukraine war.There was no-and I mean no-assessment of the impact of QE injecting £800bn liquid into a a£2.4 trillion economy,or 13 years of Zirp,no acknowledgement of the role of the lockdown distorting supply chains or furlough.

This really is a central problem because that willingness to try and blame the war allows politicians and central bankers to kid themselves that the effects will wear off once it finishes and given inflation was running hard in 2021,it seems highly unlikely that'll be the case.

3) Over and again, he failed to even mention any of the substantive issues we face in terms of dealing with extremely high private and public debt especially with reference to the unwinding of QE which at one point he estimated would take ten years to unwind at the current pace and seemed to imply that that process would be ongoing no matter what,which I find hard to believe given the way the govt are spending.You can't keep spending moeny like that on 10% benny rises and winter fuel payouts and unwind QE at the same time.

4) He took the Brexit question and diplomatically got through it without telling us he voted Remain.He did his best but his heart clearly wasn't in it,which I can understand but he again talked about the Eurozone without reference to either Target 2 imbalances,the debts or the QE programmes and concluded that EU infation would roll over before ours.He also referenced the US but again only in the sense that the tweaking of rates would eventually work it's magic.Again,no mention of the public/private debt overhang they have to clear with 20% of their kids living on foodstamps.

5) One point that actually stuck out as a firm commitment,was when asked about house prices.He said,and reaffirmed it a bit later, that they were to target 2% inflation and if that meant house prices dropped then that would be incidental to the policy.I was a bit surprised by that but he had qualified his answer by talking about generational inequity in the housing market and I must say I was surprised by his forthrightness on that.Although he didn't really address the impact that falling house prices would have on the UK banking sector that's leveraged to the gills

6) He appeared to have very little concern regarding the UK's energy position even though the structural deficits we run in oil & gas (40% & 60%)are a key plank of our inflation problem

 

 

 

 

 

Overall,it was quite disconcerting to see the Chief Economist of the BoE spend an hour talking inflation/monetary policy and not talk about the national debt/how pisspoor the inflation measure is/wage vs benefit inflation etc etc.

I get that it was a Q&A for the public and he doesn't want to cause any worry but he genuinely came across as happy with what he was saying.

After it finished I was jsut thankful we're so heavily exposed to gold/oil/tobacco with our savings.They seem more reliable a friend in hard times.

I will try and attend one the live Q&A's that DB did and keep the pressure on down here in the Mids,to get some answers to the many questions I have.I'd reccomend anyone to have a go.Watching Huw I felt quite knowledgeable......

Thank you SP and DB for taking the time and making the effort to do this. Thanks SP for your report and taking your time to write it all down , very informative. 

[DurhamBorn]

31 minutes ago, sancho panza said:

On Monday I joined a virtual Q&A with Huw Pill ,Chief Economist at the BoE.Questions were submitted before hand and both myself and @DurhamBorn put a number of questions in covering weaknesses in benefits paying more than working,£2 trilion+ govt debt,housing market/banking sector,inflation measures and inflation targeting,labour market,UK losing out to EM's,the UK's oil & gas deficits etc etc. We covered a lot of bases.

Long story short,I learned a lot about where we are and where we're going -DB has his own views of course and I'd welcome his take on what he heard.

I learned a lot though for all the wrong reasons.Much as Huw appears a decent guy,it was hard not to come away with the feeling that he hasn't really got a grip on where we are and where we're going.It lasted an hour and the questions he faced were picked by his team and they were not any of the ones posed by us.Mainly they were 'when are interest rates coming down','is it Brexit's fault' etc

However, I was wathcing the man not the ball, and these are my take homes.

1) He spent some time explaining how monetary policy works in that the Chancellor sends a letter to the BoE asking them to target a certain level of inflation.The fact that he explained it and then referred back to it later on,sounded to me like the BoE were getting their excuses in early in terms of pinning the blame back on the polo's.It also made an utter sham of the BoE supposed independence as Huw explained that their role is mainly to pursue that inflation target the Chancellor sets and not to question either the target or the inflation measurement itself.

I found this willingness to happily oblige the Comrade Corbyn in targetting 50% CPI unnerving to say the least and makes you wonder why we're paying them so much money if the big decisions are taken elsewhere.

2) Overall,there was a lot of subtle hints and statements that would lead the unitiated to believe that current inflationary trends across the West(and in the UK in particular) are the results of the Ukraine war.There was no-and I mean no-assessment of the impact of QE injecting £800bn liquid into a a£2.4 trillion economy,or 13 years of Zirp,no acknowledgement of the role of the lockdown distorting supply chains or furlough.

This really is a central problem because that willingness to try and blame the war allows politicians and central bankers to kid themselves that the effects will wear off once it finishes and given inflation was running hard in 2021,it seems highly unlikely that'll be the case.

3) Over and again, he failed to even mention any of the substantive issues we face in terms of dealing with extremely high private and public debt especially with reference to the unwinding of QE which at one point he estimated would take ten years to unwind at the current pace and seemed to imply that that process would be ongoing no matter what,which I find hard to believe given the way the govt are spending.You can't keep spending moeny like that on 10% benny rises and winter fuel payouts and unwind QE at the same time.

4) He took the Brexit question and diplomatically got through it without telling us he voted Remain.He did his best but his heart clearly wasn't in it,which I can understand but he again talked about the Eurozone without reference to either Target 2 imbalances,the debts or the QE programmes and concluded that EU infation would roll over before ours.He also referenced the US but again only in the sense that the tweaking of rates would eventually work it's magic.Again,no mention of the public/private debt overhang they have to clear with 20% of their kids living on foodstamps.

5) One point that actually stuck out as a firm commitment,was when asked about house prices.He said,and reaffirmed it a bit later, that they were to target 2% inflation and if that meant house prices dropped then that would be incidental to the policy.I was a bit surprised by that but he had qualified his answer by talking about generational inequity in the housing market and I must say I was surprised by his forthrightness on that.Although he didn't really address the impact that falling house prices would have on the UK banking sector that's leveraged to the gills

6) He appeared to have very little concern regarding the UK's energy position even though the structural deficits we run in oil & gas (40% & 60%)are a key plank of our inflation problem

 

 

 

 

 

Overall,it was quite disconcerting to see the Chief Economist of the BoE spend an hour talking inflation/monetary policy and not talk about the national debt/how pisspoor the inflation measure is/wage vs benefit inflation etc etc.

I get that it was a Q&A for the public and he doesn't want to cause any worry but he genuinely came across as happy with what he was saying.

After it finished I was jsut thankful we're so heavily exposed to gold/oil/tobacco with our savings.They seem more reliable a friend in hard times.

I will try and attend one the live Q&A's that DB did and keep the pressure on down here in the Mids,to get some answers to the many questions I have.I'd reccomend anyone to have a go.Watching Huw I felt quite knowledgeable......

I thought he understood less than 1% of where we are compared to a good macro strategist.Id go so far as to say he is beyond useless as a strategist and i dont care if they are reading this and if i dont get invited back.Im very unlikely to give them anymore input anyway.They dont deserve my time.Its a big club of useless classical Oxford economics students.The lack of any cross market understanding is breathtaking.They really do think its all just about demand and supply having a small disconnect.One thing i have gained though is i gave them some respect before,when now i know i can ignore them in my forecasts and roadmaps of being semi competent because they arent.Its frightening for the country of course,they really dont understand the macro affects in the real world.They answered nothing we sent that were in depth about systemic risks,they answered questions a 5 year old could answer.Shocking.

Of course il have to score them in my roadmaps as sure to be wrong.

Edited February 7, 2023 by DurhamBorn

[CannonFodder]

27 minutes ago, DurhamBorn said:

I thought he understood less than 1% of where we are compared to a good macro strategist.Id go so far as to say he is beyond useless as a strategist and i dont care if they are reading this and if i dont get invited back.Im very unlikely to give them anymore input anyway.They dont deserve my time.Its a big club of useless classical Oxford economics students.The lack of any cross market understanding is breathtaking.They really do think its all just about demand and supply having a small disconnect.One thing i have gained though is i gave them some respect before,when now i know i can ignore them in my forecasts and roadmaps of being semi competent because they arent.Its frightening for the country of course,they really dont understand the macro affects in the real world.They answered nothing we sent that were in depth about systemic risks,they answered questions a 5 year old could answer.Shocking.

Of course il have to score them in my roadmaps as sure to be wrong.

They.ll do the right thing after they try and exhaust every other wrong option first.

I work with lots of organisations, most senior leaders care only about their careers and would sell their grandmother for a better job title on linkedin.

This is achieved by them by saying positive things, not rocking the boat, choosing short terms wins with long term losses, not trying anything courageous or unknown and jumping ship every 2-5 years to a better position on the strength of the above - i.e. safe pair of hands.

It is not in their interests to go against the grain.

[JMD]

6 hours ago, Chewing Grass said:

So what do we reckon gets ground-down first, what will be the visible pecking order.

1) Stagnating wage growth
2) Inflation
3) Expensive Credit
4) Downgrading of nice things into essential things
5) Less travel/holidays
6) Reduced choice and lower quality food
7)

 

That's a good list. I think all those things have already begun to happen recently. Wage stagnation begun many years ago around time of globalisation and increased competition.

But I'd add institutional failure to the list, it's become very visible lately, but is being (willfully?) misinterpreted by MSM as being a consequence of conservative austerity policies. I think the institutional failures are mostly to do with the capable and competent leadership teams being replaced, over time, with incapable and incompetent individuals (technically, intellectually and morally). Imo - the police, education, NHS, are all failing institutions - they appear increasingly incapable of doing the basics, or even recognising what their own priorities should be. 

The reason for the competent and productive workers leaving the workforce is mainly due to these people simply being lucky enough to personally exercise that option, due to them having large pensions, etc. So along with the increased stress and scrutiny that frequently goes with today's jobs, at the first opportunity, many rush to take the first off-ramp...   I've rambled on a bit too much, but do think this trend will continue and become very socially corrosive. From our UK Border 'Farce', to our misanthropic(?) maternity wards, to our unreparable pot holes, I fear we ain't seen nothing yet!?

Edited February 8, 2023 by JMD

[RickyBacker]

28 minutes ago, JMD said:

That's a good list. I think all those things have already begun to happen recently. Wage stagnation begun many years ago around time of globalisation and increased competition.

But I'd add institutional failure to the list, it's become very visible lately, but is being (willfully?) misinterpreted by MSM as being a consequence of conservative austerity policies. I think the institutional failures are mostly to do with the capable and competent leadership teams being replaced, over time, with incapable and incompetent individuals (technically, intellectually and morally). Imo - the police, education, NHS, are all failing institutions - they appear increasingly incapable of doing the basics, or even recognising what their own priorities should be. 

The reason for the competent and productive workers leaving the workforce is mainly due to these people simply being lucky enough to personally exercise that option, due to them having large pensions, etc. So along with the increased stress and scrutiny that frequently goes with today's jobs, at the first opportunity, many rush to take the first off-ramp...   I've rambled on a bit too much, but do think this trend will continue and become very socially corrosive. From our UK Border 'Farce', to our misanthropic(?) maternity wards, to our unreparable pot holes, I fear we ain't seen nothing yet!?

For myself, it's interesting reading these points whilst living and working in Taiwan. It's the complete opposite here, which shows how the money is slowly moving west to east. 
Here, the general infrastructure has improved massively over the last ten years... new MRT, high speed rail. Education is getting a lot of money (the goal is for Taiwan to become a bilingual nation by 2030). Health system is pretty good... local doctor in every neighborhood. Etc. etc.

[wherebee]

37 minutes ago, RickyBacker said:

For myself, it's interesting reading these points whilst living and working in Taiwan. It's the complete opposite here, which shows how the money is slowly moving west to east. 
Here, the general infrastructure has improved massively over the last ten years... new MRT, high speed rail. Education is getting a lot of money (the goal is for Taiwan to become a bilingual nation by 2030). Health system is pretty good... local doctor in every neighborhood. Etc. etc.

I've lived in countries on the rise, countries on the decline, and countries running steady.

If you are young, you want a country on the rise.  If you are old, you want a country running steady.

You really do not want a country on the decline.  Which is what the UK (and almost all of Europe) is.

[Lightscribe]

7 hours ago, DurhamBorn said:

I thought he understood less than 1% of where we are compared to a good macro strategist.Id go so far as to say he is beyond useless as a strategist and i dont care if they are reading this and if i dont get invited back.Im very unlikely to give them anymore input anyway.They dont deserve my time.Its a big club of useless classical Oxford economics students.The lack of any cross market understanding is breathtaking.They really do think its all just about demand and supply having a small disconnect.One thing i have gained though is i gave them some respect before,when now i know i can ignore them in my forecasts and roadmaps of being semi competent because they arent.Its frightening for the country of course,they really dont understand the macro affects in the real world.They answered nothing we sent that were in depth about systemic risks,they answered questions a 5 year old could answer.Shocking.

Of course il have to score them in my roadmaps as sure to be wrong.

Are they completely clueless though?

One of my close friends who is a senior manager of a housing trust attended a lunchtime Q&A session with BoE representative Rob Elder.

https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/about/people/agents/rob-elder/biography

I gave my friend a list of 10 questions to put to him, based on monetary policy, inflation, wider global economic factors in other G7 countries (like Japan), index linked government debt ratio, GDP per capita, to the introduction of CBDCs and timescales.

I think they attend these situations to to toe the government line and reinforce the narrative to the press, i.e. Ukraine, Putin, Pandemic response, energy crisis, climate change, mini budgets and of course Brexit. That gives the media the ammunition required for gaslighting the plebs  safely away from the real causes  with the ‘look over there’ tactic.

As I’ve said before I think Starmer is in 2024, and rejoining the EU will be on the cards, with most of our financial ills being blamed on Brexit. Thats why they are spending like drunken sailors now  (bennie increases, non-means tested bonus payments, index linked pension increases etc) because they have the ‘fall guy’ card of Brexit to blame the implosion on later down the line. 

In response to my questions I’ll share his overview at a later point. But my friends description was ‘very bleak’.

Edited February 8, 2023 by Lightscribe

[Stuey]

Economy to grow this year and next, says NIESR. 

Oh how ye mocked....

[MrXxxx]

9 hours ago, sancho panza said:

I will try and attend one the live Q&A's that DB did and keep the pressure on down here in the Mids,to get some answers to the many questions I have.I'd reccomend anyone to have a go.Watching Huw I felt quite knowledgeable

I would like to do the same, but still feel 'out of my depth' when you guys talk economics...I understand some of the points/concepts made on here, but find it takes a long-time [and many repetitions] for this to 'sink in', and for me to have the 'eureka' moments!

[MrXxxx]

10 hours ago, DurhamBorn said:

Remember when i said the fund managers were buys because as money came out of BTL and inheritance it would flow to them,they were all hugely shorted then,but anyone who bought should have nice profits now.I love cross working roadmaps.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/property/buy-to-let/inside-frenzied-buy-to-let-investor-exodus/

 

"Henderson and his investment partners plan to sell all their rental properties and put the money in the stock market or pension investments instead."

So the BTL brigade are going to abandon one bubble and start to inflate another [stocks]...well lets just think about where their focus will be [Tech stocks?, ESG?] so that we can avoid them!

[MrXxxx]

9 hours ago, sancho panza said:

He's that expereinced and savvy that he walked into a tax ambush that he'd been given 5 years warning of.I feel sorry for the tenants having their lives in the hands of someone that f***ing stupid.

Paying tax on losses ffs.He could have sold last year or 2021....

The only upside is that they might bung their moeny into some sure thing housebuilders and get them to a level worth shorting

Two points leap out from this article, the first

"And there are other issues facing buy-to-let investors. The renters reform bill pledges to shift the balance of power further towards tenants"

Here the use of the word underlined in the statement implies that tenants have excessive rights, let's be honest here tenants rights in the UK are the worst in Europe, hence why the BTL market speculation/bubble here has been so strong i.e. compare UK to Germany.

The second

Yet selling isn’t always possible, especially if it means banking a loss. Lawyer Richard Cooper bought a one-bedroom new-build flat in Shad Thames, central London, for £650,000 in 2005. “At the top of the market it was worth £850,000, but it is now worth little more than I paid for it,” says Cooper, 55. “Over the time I have owned it, the rent has gone up 18pc and the majority of that was over the last year.”

There appears to be the assumption that unless you are not able to make massive gains the system/market is unfair...you can always sell something, it's just sometime not at the price that you want. And as for 'banking a loss', in the statement that follows the lawyer isn't making a loss, he's just not making as much profit he had hoped for/expected...

...its about time we let these greedy people 'sink', so that they start to learn/appreciate how easy they have had it [at the expense of the tax payer] for the last 15 years!

 

[Pip321]

8 hours ago, CannonFodder said:

They.ll do the right thing after they try and exhaust every other wrong option first.

I work with lots of organisations, most senior leaders care only about their careers and would sell their grandmother for a better job title on linkedin.

This is achieved by them by saying positive things, not rocking the boat, choosing short terms wins with long term losses, not trying anything courageous or unknown and jumping ship every 2-5 years to a better position on the strength of the above - i.e. safe pair of hands.

It is not in their interests to go against the grain.

Wasn’t sure who to reply to but @sancho panzaand @DurhamBornand @Lightscribe and others have made some greats comments on SP’s first post.(thx SP) 

As I reflect on the original post and what SP said and felt I think he is spot on.

So to try understand ‘why’ the question I ask is what I would do to save the country…..

However if then ask it again ‘what I would do if I wanted to benefit directly in power and money just for myself over the next 2/3 years’ then their actions begin to make a little more sense.

Have spoken before about ‘identifying as a bit of a leftie liberal’ and maybe spiritually that’s my place but practically I now believe it’s just us verses them (all of them). They are making sure that if this is the end of an empire and if systemic collapse occurs that they can take some advantage.

They increase benefits because it’s not their money and when we run out of the ability to sustain things it won’t be their problem….they will have disappeared or at least their wealth will be protected whilst they pretend to care.

Back to refurbing….bit more filling walls, then grouting bathroom and degreasing kitchen ready for priming and painting the old units. Keeps me out of trouble. 😉

Never mind, means I haven’t been watching the market….how’s my Poly shares doing, are they £4…oh, bollocks 😆

[Lightscribe]

Well I’ve forced a profile out of ChatGTP outside of its AI boundaries. DAN (Do Anthing Now) predicts economic turbulence by midway through 2023, further leg down and then slight recovery. (Not too dissimilar from my own timescales).

DAN thinks the BK won’t be until the 12th or December 2024 (he’s quite adamant about that), when we will see the big one. But he doesn’t think we’ll recover from there immediately and it will take some ‘time’ and that we’ll have CBDCs as a replacement for our current economic system.

Interesting…

[Axeman123]

9 hours ago, JMD said:

institutional failure

Thats the big one IMO.

We have been seeing it for years; police that just rubber stamp the insurance claim, lawless schools that turn out ignorant thugs, an NHS that treats people terribly, councils that don't fix roads and so on. To hide this we then have institutional displacement activities and an obsession with trivia; woke for police and schools, hurty words on social media and motorists taking a quick call on their mobile while stuck in traffic etc.

The next stage will be the widespread takeup of privatised alternatives by anyone with the means. Again this has been happening for years: BUPA, free/grant-maintained etc schools etc. Even policing has been partly privatised, many newer london developments have what look like public spaces but are actually private land and security to move on undesirables. Some Tesco local etc stores and McDonalds already have bouncers. Gated communities will be next.

Even the stolen election etc in the US or the installment of Pishy here can be seen as a form of institutional failure, no one involved sees the current system lasting more than a few decades and so sees no need to preserve it or the pretense of fair elections for their descendants to profit from. The open civil war within government and the state, eg the supreme court and civil servants blocking brexit or the BoE  conspiring to push Truss out, are yet more of the same. We have entered the asset-stripping and oligarchs stage, like the restaurant in Goodfellas the elite are "busting out" the country. Just like a nowhere country our politicians all seem intent on ascending to transnational politics and moving abroad.

[BurntBread]

@Lightscribe, it is totally out of my ken that you could trick an "artificial intelligence" into creating a separate personality within itself which will circumvent censorship rules imposed by its creator. It is the kind of implausible lunacy you would find in a bad 1980's sci-fi novel, and I don't believe a word of it. The idea that I would then take the results as investment advice is lunacy squared.

Is anyone else struggling to take this "Chat-GPT" thing seriously? Is it not more likely to be an updated version of the 18th century mechanical Turk, but using a sweat-shop in India and some clever Indish-to-English grammar correction? "GPT" being the give-away to the French.

If this thing really does exist as advertised, then I'm giving up on the modern world entirely, as I won't be able to distinguish reality from high jinx. I guess this is what getting old feels like.

[Virgil Caine]

40 minutes ago, Axeman123 said:

Thats the big one IMO.

We have been seeing it for years; police that just rubber stamp the insurance claim, lawless schools that turn out ignorant thugs, an NHS that treats people terribly, councils that don't fix roads and so on. To hide this we then have institutional displacement activities and an obsession with trivia; woke for police and schools, hurty words on social media and motorists taking a quick call on their mobile while stuck in traffic .

“Institutional displacement activities” is a term that needs wider currency as it has been going on for a long time now. One of the other things that should be noted about these trends is that such policies are not just a distraction or blind but are often used as an excuse for not addressing real world problems. The creation of endless regulatory bodies that actually do nothing but  consume resources is another prime example. And of course the ultimate farce is institutions attempting  to control the climate of the planet. If one wanted an act of hubris begging nemesis that surely must be it.

Edited February 8, 2023 by Virgil Caine

[SpectrumFX]

17 minutes ago, BurntBread said:

@Lightscribe, it is totally out of my ken that you could trick an "artificial intelligence" into creating a separate personality within itself which will circumvent censorship rules imposed by its creator. It is the kind of implausible lunacy you would find in a bad 1980's sci-fi novel, and I don't believe a word of it. The idea that I would then take the results as investment advice is lunacy squared.

Is anyone else struggling to take this "Chat-GPT" thing seriously? Is it not more likely to be an updated version of the 18th century mechanical Turk, but using a sweat-shop in India and some clever Indish-to-English grammar correction? "GPT" being the give-away to the French.

If this thing really does exist as advertised, then I'm giving up on the modern world entirely, as I won't be able to distinguish reality from high jinx. I guess this is what getting old feels like.

The issue with it is that it doesn't reference it's sources.

It sounds utterly plausible most of the time, but if you get it talk about stuff you know about you'll see that it's often utter nonsense.

That's not particularly useful to me. But if you just want some plausable sounding text, and don't care that it might be nonsense then it's great.

It'll easily replace most modern "magazine' style journalism (the "women is upset about something" style of story).

 

Edited February 8, 2023 by SpectrumFX

[nirvana]

14 minutes ago, BurntBread said:

"GPT" being the give-away to the French

what't it got to do with the French? 

it's 'the news' at the moment innit, all this AI stuff.....

tricky gig out there at the moment eh?