Banker Bashing : Why Boris is Right
Mayor Boris has written to the Chancellor demanding a meeting to discuss his introduction of a 50% tax rate a temporary 50% levy on banking bonuses . In a move that was as vindictive as it was irrational the chancellor is raising the top rate of income tax to 50% in April, making London more expensive for residents earning £1 million a year than New York or Hong Kong, according to KPMG estimates. A London banker on that amount will pay £491,278 in income tax and social security payments from April, a third more than in Hong Kong and £58,500 more than in New York, the data below shows:
Now some might think great, we”ll squeeze ‘em till their pips squeak, we’ll bash bankers bonuses. Not for long comrades. Just as Pol Pot’s extermination of the counter-revolutionary middle-classes (teachers and doctors) left Cambodians uneducated and unheallthy, driving bankers offshore will hurt those left behind more financially. High-earners are mobile, foreign firms will re-locate, and foreign financial firms definitely won’t choose to locate here in the future. The predicted one-time billion pound boost to revenue will see many more billions drain away long term. The burden will just fall heavier on those poor taxpayers left in debt ridden Britain…
See also We’ll Pay for Banker Bashing.
The damage is already done… we’re screwed
This also means that Boris is at odds with Dave.
The more i hear from Dave, the more I do not like what I am hearing.
Agreed.
How the Hell can he support increasing the taxes on the most profitable and MOBILE group of people in the UK?
Getting more taxes out of this section of society will be like trying to capture a roborovski hamster in one hand. It is like grasping at fast moving thin air.
Sad but true, it is a stupid idea.
Because there are not that many of them and nobody cares if they do hoon of to Hong Kong!
They’ll care once they realise they – we – will lose about £400k a year in various taxes from each one of the people who relocate.
Yeah. drive out everyone who brings in money from abroad – the only real earnings this country has. That’ll teach them. What joy it will be to sit huddled around our shantytown fires grilling mice and proudly telling ourselves that no rich bastards are going to be able to live here ever again.
The folk in HK certainly will care that so many high-achieving people have arrived seeking economic exile on their shores. Maybe they’ll send us a ‘thank you’ letter.
+1
I don’t understand why the Tories can’t see that the fat scottish oaf is the reason they’re going to win, not ‘Dave’.
I will not be voting for Blair mk II.
Can’t we have a coup and get Boris in control?
Cast-iron will keep Darling’s bankers bonus and the 50% rate (which will affect us non-bankers too) and to make it a hat trick, cast-iron will bring in green taxes. There’s me thinking that Conservatives cut taxes. Like fuck they do.
Yep, and when you add on various sales taxes like VAT on most stuff soon to be 20%, council tax, petrol tax, alcohol tax, insurance tax, employes national insurance tax (my bete noir) etc, the £1M a year banker would be looted to the tune of about 70% of his pay ~ not good
I don’t know where you get your 70% figure from – that would imply that even if the £1 million income was all spent, 40% of the taxed income would go in VAT / council tax / fuel duty etc.
I suspect the true figure would be closer to 55%, which is roughly the same figure as someone on the average wage shells out (because all their income is spent, and council tax and fuel duty do not take account of income, these fixed costs are proportionately much higher).
The real difference is that the man on £1 million can choose to leave this benighted experiment in communitarian bullshit, while the man on the average wage is basically fucked.
If I was one of the lucky few to receive such largesse from my employer, I would be pushing very hard for a relocation to sunnier and more politically astute climes. Fuck it, if Finland or Estonia offered sensible taxes and no Labour bullshit then I’d wrap up warm and enjoy the extra income.
The solution, of course, is to send Brown to visit and openly support these more enlightened countries, and wait for the curse of Jonah to take effect.
not at all comrade…
understand, poverty is slavery, and we bankers will not be slaves
peace is war,
tractors are freedom
I think it is fair that the global system is put in place a tax on Banks that raises money for a environment in which a bank is not “allowed to fail”
The bankers can then avoid this “tax” by relocated to a country that will not support them if they fail. You should not tax the “workers”
40% plus the National Insurance (income tax) is well over 50% before you even take into account Darling’s tax grab. Why don’t the press give the real figure to the people, see how they would like it if over 60% of the money they earned was taken off of them for the chav scum New Labour voters.
see how they would like it if over 60% of the money they earned
If the bonuses had really been “earned” there would not have been a banking crisis. Trading in toxic debt and dodgy derivatives may produce a short term profit on which bonuses have, in the past been paid. The rewards have been for short term success and long to medium term failure. That is the problem, not the size of bonuses, but the reward of foolish risk and failure.
tax the buggers
when thelabour government gave the banks all this money did they write an agreement that said they can only lend that money in the UK…? If not then what’s to stop them saying yes lets start lending again ..where shall we do it I know France Germany China India look like good bets lets lend it there…and so all our competitors will benifit from our money and they will put us out of business what a brilliant idea .I wonder if any Labour MPs have bought shares in our competitors..I’ll be watching newsnight to see if they have noticed anything…Oh dear they haven’t
To be honest if you merely have £500,000 per annum left after tax you should apply for working tax credits!!
£40,000 per month is an awful lot of money.
It’s not the point that you think they have too much money.
The point is that they can and will get more elsewhere which means less for everyone else here.
It’s not like their wages are taking away from people – it’s from the money they’ve created anyway, or got from another country.
Their wages go down, yours go down.
It ain’t a see-saw.
Do you think the State should take more than half the money you earn? blimey.
Yes I do, especially considering if the state propped up the failed company with taxpayers money. It galls me that they took the risk, lost but didn’t face the consequences of that risk they took because of taxpayers taking it for them. Most of it will end up tax free anyway, fed through a series of tax dodging schemes involving, the cayman islands, british virgin islands, etc.
Schemes NOT CLOSED DOWN by the Balls it up Brown Fellowship for Fiscal Incompetence.
You can’t get away from the truth that their economic poolicy (correct spelling) resembles Enron’s accounting practises
Why oh why Guido doesn’t point out that 50% is untrue. Over the measely £100k, you loose your personal allowance. The efective rate is 60% by £110k. And with NI on top ………………….
You dont know what you’re talking about.
if these institutions decamp to somewhere else, you’re going to be losing upto 20% of GDP, before you even take income tax into account. How the fuck are you going to make up the shortfall, considering you have no plans for reindustrialisation, no plans for renationalisation and no fucking money to do it with anyway??
The Chairman of RBS has been given a poisoned chalice after Fred The Shred – the same Fred who was knighted by that stupid c’unt Brown for services to banking – was deposed. His pay and bonuses are CONDITIONAL on RBS being returned to the private sector, profitable and that the government makes a profit on its “investment” in it. If he fails, he dont get shit.
Yes there was incompetance in the banking profession. But there was also incompetance in the regulatory framework drawn up by Brown. There was incompetance in repealing Glass-Steagal in the US.
If you’re a sheep farmer and you leave the gate open and the wooly fuckers get out, who’se fault is it? The sheep’s fault for going through the open gate or your stupid fault for leaving the c’unting gate open??
Its not just simple red-meat dogwhistling tax the bankers, you chump!!!
correct, the motherfuckers aint going nowhere.
You really have fallen for the spin haven’t you? It was not greed or dodgy lending that got us into the mess, nor was it Banker’s incompetence. We had a system that borrowed short and lent long, encouraged (and taxed) by a clueless bunch of incompetents. Securitisation was the bubble that burst. You allowed everybody to buy up any package of debt and said it was AAA rated. Then you made everybody sell at the same time and ended up having to buy the stuff yourself. It didn’t matter what the loan was for if it was a forced sale, it fell in value. The tripartite group caused the run on Northern Rock while the politically motivated moral hazzard suddenly discovered by the US treasury allowing Lehman to fail caused a run on the Commercial paper markets that provided all the short term liquidity for the US economy. Basically the world had its overdraft pulled.
The central banks fixed it last winter and we have been steadily recovering since. The countries that suffered the most and continue to suffer are those with no proper financial service infrastructure like us. Politicians have spent the last 12 months trying to blame bankers. And too many want to believe it and so do.
Guido’s point here is that these “populist” measures will drive away high earners (very few of whom had ANYTHING to do with this). The money they used to spend (indirectly) employing large numbers of people in the service sector will go with them, as will their taxes. It is a lose lose and too many people are blind to the consequence of their own (manipulated) rage and envy.
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Yes without the funny money driving up the price of houses, goods and services at the top end, we’ll be stuck with the misery of cheaper accommodation and living costs. Just like those poor, wretched, banker-starved French.
Why do you persist with this bollocks, Guido?
Cos I’m the bankers’ tool. Ain’t it obvious yet?
On this issue Guido, who is so often right about so much, does seem to be so wrong he is making himself look like some sort of a tool.
No Guido is right on this – 50% tax is outrageous. This Labour vindictiveness and continual play on class war is pathetic. However, the banks we have at present are corrupt institutions who create obscene levels of debt out of thin air. They are a threat to all democratic, capitalist societies. They stifle true innovation and expect us to toil in the field to keep them in the manner they are accustomed. Fuck Labour and fuck the banks.
And we need a pledge right now from Osborne that he will reverse these damaging taxes.
The French have a patch of land 4x the size of the UK with the same population, plus they don’t have large stretches of uninhabitable wastelands like the Highlands and most of Wales. That is the likely main factor behind SE property prices.
That and massive immigration and high levels of divorce and relationship failure.
All increasing demand beyond supply, forcing prices sky high.
Indeed, Guido,
and good that you mention Pol Pot. He was a big favourite of the Left wasn’t he? How many people did his cohorts kill? A couple of million here or there? And this wasn’t in the dim and distant past either. Some of his political supporters will still be around. We shouldn’t forget that.
Che Guevara probably killed more. Fecking thick pinko bum!
I think many financial services outfits should relocate to North Korea.
Think about it:
1. There is no such thing as tax in North Korea, it was abolished in 1974.
2. The International authorities will find it very hard to mess them about.
3. There is a lot of potential for growth in the North Korean financial services sector.
4. Mr Kim puts on lovely parades.
5. Mobile phones are forbidden. This means no interrupted lunches.
6. Cokehead bankers will feel very welcome. North Korea is a hub in the world drugs smuggling trade.
7. There is low pollution (due to the lack of industry) and spectacular scenery (although it is worth bearing in mind that if you wander off the tourist trail you will be shot).
8. If the companies tow the party line they won’t get slagged off by the press. North Korea enjoys the second least free press in the world. (Second only to Eritrea.)
9. There is very little, if any, traffic.
10. The socialist dictator isn’t as crazy or left wing as the one in Britain.
Its all within the rules
Exactly. Banker bashing is very important. If we don’t bash bankers then people might remember about troughing MPs, and that would be intolerable.
I still haven’t forgotten that oik who shouted “You lazy fat bastard” at me in the constituency.
But I rose above it. “drive on Jenkins,” I said,” and put the windows up would you. There seems to be an ill wind blowing around this estate.”
We went to a meeting at RBS just after lunch and Hester met me at the entrance to the building. We chatted for a bit before Jenkins pointed out that it wasn’t the Chief executive, but a tramp.
Well, I mean, the chap was pissed and stoned, holding a tin of cash and babbling all kind of nonsense that no one could understand, so it was an easy mistake to make.
Right, That’ll do for today. Nearly 11am, time to head to the constituency to do some “work”. We don’t like to hang about on Fridays. Jacqui never came in at all, but these days we’re all under scrutiny.
Warm the Rolls up Jenkins, there’s a good fellow.
The high taxes make perfect sense now that Labour has all but completed it’s transformation back to Old Labour.
Our ‘government’ f.ucks everything up! Jockommunist economics at its worst!!
fuck off Guido you silly old tart.
if the useless wankers, er, I mean bankers don’t want to pay their fair share then they can fuck off elsewhere. innit.
dubai is supposed to be nice this time of year. aslong as you don’t mind being raped with a piece of wood ofcourse.
Bankers make an easy target – but they were just doing what bankers do. Saying that bankers are greedy is a bit like saying alligators are a bit snappy.
The significant point is – Who was the guy who set-up, oversaw and micromanaged the regulatory system?
Someone in the US according to McMental!
You don’t think Brown was lying when he boasted he was responsible for ending Boom and Bust do you?
Indeed, the bankers are greedy and that is a good thing. They should be, it is their job to be greedy. If they were not greedy, then they would be fucking useless. Like a race car without an engine.
What is needed is for that greed to be nurtured, encouraged and then unleashed in a controlled way, and steered properly for the benefit of the economy and society.
The Government need to be in control of the steering wheel. Steering the massive amount of power generated by the engine.
Brown put a supercharger on the engine, slammed on the accelerator and then let go of the steering wheel, then blamed the engine when he crashed!!!
Now he is planning to syphon off power from the engine instead of improve the tyres, suspension, and steering response.
The car is no longer fit to race in, and is about ready for the scrap heap.
Why do you persist in your moronic outpourings?
You convinced us long ago that you are intellectually deficient in a multitude of ways.
Do you actually understand what is at stake here?
Any comprehension at the gravity of the situation for the UK if the banking sector leaves?
Patently you do not. So just be quiet whilst the grown ups debate & discuss.
only wankers double space.
mr ned gets a pass on the double spacing coz mr ned’s alright.
SHKREEEEEEKK!!!
(ping)
(flutter)
WHERE’SYERBLOG!!! (scuttle) WANKER!!!
shut up you stupid c’unt.
innit
come up with your own material you fuckwit.
They were. The ones who are left at RBS and LLoyds/HBOS are, on the whole, the plankton de tutti plankton or those who lack ambition to leave Scotland. There is a big overlap.
Darling says we (who is we?) are on the road to recovery UTTER BULLSHIT
The only thing on the road is FUCKING ICE SNOW and no FUCKING GRIT!!!!!
WAKEY FUCKING WAKEY!!!!
Be nice to find a fucking road!!!
The boss of HSBC has alerady declared that he is leaving London for Hong Kong. How long until HSBC Holdings re-registers.
The left a fecking thickos. The NHS is financed by the rich for the benefit of all. Leftwing politics == tat!
Indeed.
The HSBC directors won’t need their London houses refurbished anymore, so 20–50 British people who would have been making curtains, upholstering chairs, re-decorating walls, fitting carpets, kitchens, bathrooms will not get the work, the HK Chinese will instead. Thank you Darling. Labour: destroying livelihoods ‘It’s what we do’.
Should that not read “20-50 Polish people”?
Arsebiscuits, 20 – 50 Polish people, or polish people, or whatever the fuck I mean.
Agreed. As long as these overpaid masters of the universe are spunking their money around the UK economy, lots of other people benefit from their largesse. What matters is that this money gets back into circulation. Resenting the lucky bastard who actually does the spending is really pointless, although understandable. Better we tolerate their profligacy here, than have some other country’s economy soak it up. Hold nose, and lay off, I say.
No in this case they are all British, sub-contracted by my sister.
Unlike Gordon Pol Pot had a mandate to do what he did.
Guido, should that be “three times as much as in Hong Kong” rather than a third more? It’d fit the graph better that way. Or are you referring to what little is left?
When did common sense matter to loony socialists?
Their philosophy has always to kill the golden goose.
And Cameron promises only cuts.
That’ll make the goose lay more eggs will it?
It’s like watching a train crash in slow motion.
UK plc, UK plucked more like.
That’s rubbish, Guido – the threat that they’ll all leave is just that – a threat.
And anyway, the whole country needs a complete realignment. More or less anyone can move scraps of paper around a desk – the bankers just manage to get paid silly amounts of money to do it … there’s very little skill in it.
Let ‘em live in a high-rise in a noisy overcrowded city like Hong Kong if they want to – and good riddance.
quite right, bankers are nothing more than glorified office workers.
and what a fucking shit office they ran.
Moron. Not worthy of the medication that private finance invested the R & D money in to keep you stable.
TAT? No, TWAT.
howled the ECT patient.
innit, eh?
repetition is the sign of a fuckwit.
hold on…YOU ARE A FUCKWIT!
“…. a banker on £1 million a year….” OK, why is that banker on £1 million per year? What ‘wealth’ is he creating? The answer is that he is creating no wealth whatsoever but is merely appearing to create wealth. That ‘wealth’ is no more real than the ‘wealth’ created by quantitative easing or running up racks of wealth/debt (terms apparently interchangeable) on a credit card.
The banker is an office trader whose commodity happens to be money. He has easy access to that commodity and it doesn’t need sold nor converted into currency so let the party begin.
I suppose that 200bn quid of Quantative Easing ain’t ‘real’ either. Nor was the 200bn quid of borrowing this year. Or the cumulative 600bn of borrowing so far on the Maximum Imbecile’s watch.
Not real at all. We’ll never have to pay that back. With interest.
The bankers are convenient whipping boys for the Maximum Imbeciles fuckwitted economic decisions.
Even now the governmnet (and wider publics) fucked-up view is that the problem is that the banks are not lending enough money so that house prices can be maintained at the ‘right’ price – ie the highest price they ever attained – and so we can’t all go out, remortgage and borrow ourselves rich again.
It is fucking insane. The banks not lending money to muppets is what they should have been (not) doing all along. Yet now that the banks have sobered up the general public is still wailing that their house has decreased in value and it’s all because nobody will lend some other plonker even more money to buy their insanely overvalued house.
It’s fucking nuts.
the people who get out of their beds and go and do a hard day’s work are the people creating the wealth and most of those are on less than 25K a year.
end of story.
Not for much longer. They’ll be out of work. When the April deferred VAT bill has to be paid and employers’ NI goes up.
good point susie.
banks provide a necessary service to society.
we supposedly live in a competitive capitalist society so that resources are allocated efficiently to the most productive sectors and individuals in the economy. The reason that this is done through competitive individuals is that this method involves risk. Risk ensures that failure is not rewarded and inefficient businesses and households are not allocated excess resources. Banks, whilst skimming off a profit, ensure that there are a wide variety of services available to enable the free market economy to function.
now i do agree that the system has been so poorly regulated as to allow some financial institutions to become so large and so necessary, as well as participating in predatory practices, that the idea of risk = failure has been removed. there has also been a tendency on the governmental level, fueled by a moronic public, to ensure that the materiel needs of everyone should be met by cheap borrowing and low interest rates. Brown is right that this started in America, but totally incorrect (by omission) about when. Clinton, seeking to shore up the poor and ethnic part of his vote encouraged financial institutions to provide mortgages to people who could never repay their home loans, their car loans, other loans and forced institutions such as fannie and freddie (staffed on an executive level by political appointees) to oblige and encouraged the development of what we now know as sub-prime, mortgage backed securities and other loan based derivatives. Banks were forcibly encouraged to provide these “services” so, as you can imagine, were determined to move them onto someone else’s balance sheet. This is what we know, via tony blair, as the market route to socialism.
The problem is not “the bankers”, the problem is the regulators who turned a blind eye to 125% loans, loans of 6 – 8X income and other loans that never could be repaid. The reason that the demand for these loans was so high is that interest rates were too low. Borrowing for anything was extremely cheap, yet the total amount of assets remained broadly constant. The regulators set the interest rates and believed in a monumental act of hubris that a few individuals, meeting in darkened rooms of central banks across the world could find equilibrium between the supply of money and the demand for money. Due to the fact that the period 1994 – 2008 was characterized by high inflation (a lot higher than “2%”) owing to the decision to remove certain, politically unfavorable statistics from the inflation figure, it was clear to everyone – household and individual, that that piece of investment or asset purchase was best done immediately with cheap money, rather than through saving – as the savings rate was negative owing to high asset inflation. This was ultimately a problem caused in the political, not the financial realm. Banks, like other businesses and households are a hostage to political fortune. If they did not get in on this game, they would be bought out or be criticized by their shareholders (the public) for missing a bull market. It was essential, for their competitiveness that they played the game. The problem was caused by perverse market incentives – not bankers. Governments believing in the “new paradigm” – not the accounts team.
now all this could have been solved at a stroke by allowing the banks to go bankrupt. there is enough of a demand for banking services and enough private money looking for a return to have allowed a new set of banks to develop. instead, owing to an idiotic political class, the excellent lobbying skills of the too-big-to-fail banks and a public determined to ensure the government covered all their risky investments, they were “bailed out”. instead of a sharp shock, when economic activity would have likely fallen by 25% and then rebounded as wage, asset and money prices reached realistic levels, we instead chose to “fight the evil of deflation” and try to reinflate the bubble. house prices are still based upon 6 – 8X income yet this is totally unrealistic. wages are too high and commodities are too high. clearly, this recipe is a recipe for political disaster due to a fearful and privileged political class and a public not willing to work for a living so the easy option was taken, which was to hold the inflated asset prices where they were with the incomes of our great grandchildren. we will see a lost decade rather than a lost 18 months.
“the bankers” are responsible for the problems caused, but so are you by never paying that store card back, so is your neighbor for taking out a mortgage they knew they could not repay if interest rates rose by 1% and so on. so yes, there were *some* bankers responsible, but to punitively tax everyone who works for “a bank” is vindictive and typical of an idiotic public who like capitalism when it suits them and don’t when it doesn’t. what it comes down to is that to allocate resources, you can do it by price or you can do it by queues.
let’s take a look at the airline industry. now who likes paying a fuel surcharge after spending several hundred pounds on a ticket? any airline has the option of hedging fuel contracts into the future. this guarantees today’s price for tomorrow’s supply. without banks, this would be impossible, as the banks take the other side of the trade (gasoil futures/kerosene swaps) and if you like, you can fix your costs for 20+ years. the bank makes money just like the bookies does, it captures the spread between the bid and the ask. just because some idiot airlines are not capable of utilizing this service, or lose out, is not a reflection on the banking industry. it is a reflection on the airline’s business model. if consumers had some brains, they would refuse to fly airlines that introduce excess charges due to their own incompetence and force them to hedge properly – risk management exists to protect against volatility and if you take the risk of no hedging and go bankrupt then fine. another business will come and replace you.
bankers don’t just “move scraps of paper around a desk” they provide liquidity to markets and allocate resources efficiently. the beauty of the system is that it is non – compulsory and the resources are allocated by the individuals involved in the trade. if you don’t want to use a bank, save or borrow from a private individual. the bankers who get rewarded so highly do so by protecting their firm’s assets whilst maintaining a market share. as this is supposed to be a capitalist society, if you do not like it, then take your money elsewhere – as there is the option to do so.
finally, i realize that most of this argument is somewhat redundant owing to a) people’s hatred for those that earn more than them and b) massive government intervention on behalf of anything that threatens their constituency and c) the fact that we actually live in a socialist economy. when the state believes that it can pick winners and losers, or that it can effectively decide where resources should be allocated to you get massive misallocation of resources, and the clusterfuck we have now. with the state representing ~ 50% of GDP and relying on easy money, shielded from market forces, this situation was inevitable. all it takes for it to be fixed is for people to realize that things are not free. if you want something, save and be productive. government should realize that resource allocation (bar strategic things such as defense, energy, ok health but certainly not money) is not their job as ideology will always come second to trade.
“the bankers” are responsible for the problems caused, but so are you by never paying that store card back, so is your neighbor for taking out a mortgage they knew they could not repay if interest rates rose by 1% and so on.
All true.
The voters can be whipped up into a frenzy because they are desperate to blame somebody else for their own decision to remortgage while interest rates were cheap and buy a BMW X5 and a 42″ plasma TV. And now the bank wants the money back. With interest. Fucking banks. I fucking hate ‘em.
Ooooooh. They fucked up by lending too much money to too many fuck-witted families like us who can’t pay back? Ohhhh – it’s all the banks fault. Not mine at all for being a financial cock-head.
And the best bit? They want the banks to lend even more money to some other poor sap so that their house price ‘goes up’ and they can…. remortgage and borrow even more money.
Jesus. What am I still doing here in a nation of jackasses?
Blaming bankers is like blaming car designers when you’ve smashed yourself and your car up after a night out clubbing.
you mean if you borrowed, or relied upon borrowing for 120% of your asset value or business cashflow, then yes.
Bankers don’t drive trucks moron.
The banksters have sucked up all the money in Britain to prop up their failures, so paying a bit extra tax on bonuses hardly seems unfair. Keep on talking Boris, can’t wait to see you trying to explain this one to the voters during the election! Especially all the ones that Cameron and Osborne say shouldn’t get a pay rise at all.
Overheard in a bar in St James’ two nights ago: “If you’re earning enough to start worrying about the tax regime, you’re earning enough.”
Surely the answer is to tax everyone at 100% and let the State decide how the money should be spent – we’re almost there already
It takes Balls to increase the deficit by 500 million pounds every day!
PS Balls is the freudian explanation for Brown’s book title Courage
THE CURRENT BANKING CRISIS EXPLAINED
Toby bought a donkey from a farmer for £100.
The farmer agreed to deliver the donkey the next day.
The next day he drove up and said, ‘Sorry son, but I have some bad news. The donkey’s died.’
Toby replied, ‘Well then just give me my money back.’
The farmer said, ‘Can’t do that. I’ve already spent it.’
Toby said, ‘OK, then, just bring me the dead donkey.’
The farmer asked, ‘What are you going to do with him?’
Toby said, ‘I’m going to raffle him off.’
The farmer said, ‘You can’t raffle a dead donkey!’
Toby said, ‘Sure I can. Watch me. I just won’t tell
anybody he’s dead.’
A month later, the farmer met up with Toby and asked, ‘What happened with that dead donkey?’
Toby said, ‘I raffled him off. I sold 500 tickets at two pounds a piece and made a profit of £898′
The farmer said, ‘Didn’t anyone complain?’
Toby said, ‘Just the guy who won. So I gave him his two pounds back.’
Toby now works for the Labour Party.
I have a strange feeling that you are nearer the truth except the ruins tickets are bundled debt derivative instruments .
The donkey is Britain’s productive industry.
The donkey is the Uk economy.
toby borrowed the money to buy the donkey.
toby had fuck all to offer.
toby(the bankers) offer no value whatsoever to the economy.
innit, greaty insight, wicked mon
shame you have no insight innit.
I dont get obamas new bankers tax , he says its to recover money from crooked banks profits, but Barclays ran there Bank well , so why take profits from the good banks .
mmmmm see what you mean re tax , and its more hypocritical given in the nationalised banks ,that tax money is used to pay the salaries and bounuses jp morgan have annouced today , to me it would have been prudent just to put a cap on bounus for 2 or 3 years until they have rebuilt what they have blown and made it safe. This approach just fuels the rumour that they know what they have done and are filling there trousers before more dire times .
600 jobs to go in Cardiff .
As for rest of it beaurocracy has won ? i hope not but i see what the bust means a major reajustment .
like stormin norman tag , although I enjoyed resonse by fiftyandproud to fabian solutions , it was so fresh and accurate completely free of repetative blogg injury
why take money from the good bankers?
you must be on fucking acid you c’unt.
the entire banking sector was in danger of totally collapsing. so not only did we directly save the banks that were insolvent but we also indirectly saved every single bank and building society in the country with taxpayers’ money.
therefore they all owe us a debt.
I would say a 5% levy on all banks’ and building societies’ profits should be paid annually to the taxpayer and in perpetuity for without our cash they would no longer exist.
a good deal innit, after all the money normally gets 50%.
dunnit.
Shut up moron.
You obviously have no comprehension at all, so why continually litter this site with your inane neo marxist droolings?
oh dear you are making a complete fool of yourself.
I am an independent radical capitalist.
you are an imbecile.
that will be all.
independent radical capitalist?
more like a 13 year old with spots and a sore wrist
no-one cares what a nobody like you says.
innit.
oh, and we all know that is you mr slater’s parrot.
you are very boring.
‘We’ are shareholders in some of the banks.
Therefore ‘we’ need them to prosper so the share price will rise. The shares can eventually be sold, recovering ‘our’ money and maybe even making a small turn on it.
Surprised Gordon hasn’t sold the shares at the bottom of the market
It’ll be a close run thing in his fucked-up head.
He’ll be tempted to crystallise the loss now at a low-point so that Cameron cannot benefit from a ‘windfall’ if they recover in the future but then that will leave him open to further criticism on a par with his timing of selling UK’s gold reserves.
The plan for these recycled marxists is to destroy capitalism.
Tribal class war is the only item left in Old Labours armoury.
Remember when Miliband said “If you get brown in 6 months you will be begging for Blair to come back”.
Amazingly precient for someone who, intellectually, is still in very short trousers.
it is the bankers and new labour who have destroyed the economy.
marxism hasn’t got anything to do with it you spastic.
Tell that to Brown’s sponsor Jack Jones, KGB agent.
Talking on banks this is another kick to the taxpayer.
Three British banks including part-nationalised Royal Bank of Scotland face paying more than 10 billion US dollars (£6 billion) to the US government under its new stringent tax regime on the sector, it has been reported. RBS, which is 84%-owned by the UK taxpayer, is in line for a potential hit of almost one billion dollars (£600 million) over the next 10 years, according to The Times.
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/21/20100115/tuk-british-banks-face-6bn-us-tax-bill-6323e80.html
Is this actually Darling’s doing or the Balls Brown duo?
We got to learn to build an economy that doesn’t rely on them. They are evil. Better to have a more equal society. Maybe your average lower middle class family will be able to afford to live in London again. Good riddance to the scum.
Evil bankers, blame them for everything!
It couldn’t possible be the governments fault with it’s ludicrously low interest rates set via the government controlled central banks to create a false boom for which they claimed the credit and political dividends.
Remind me again, who bailed out these failed banks? that would be the government again! more perverse incentives for the markets.
The government is in the business of picking winners, and placing the blame for the failures on anyone’s doorstep but their own.
Banks provided about 23% of the tax take. The country won ‘t see any tax receipts from banks for years, so factor that in to the need for cuts.
if I understand you correctly Peter you are arguing that we should retain ownership of the banks we have majority shareholdings in?
good idea.
Bad idea. Very bad idea. We should get them off the books as soon as we can – ideally at a profit but be prepared to take a loss. Otherwise RBS and Lloyds/HBOS will turn into the British Leyland or NCB of banking.
let me make sure I have got this right jgm2: we have saved the useless bankers’ necks by bailing them out and now you want to ‘give’ them the banks back that belong to us so they can make money out of them?
hmmm… that’s the old privatisation bullshit again innit.
look at how fucked up the railways are and how fucked up the energy companies are and how fucked up the communications companies are; privatisation did not improve the service or prices of the services.
why can’t a publicly owned company make money and be efficient?
BR was better than the current crop of shit rail companies.
that is a fact.
currently we have the worst of both worlds where private companies receive public subsidies. what a load of fucking shit, innit.
Absolutely. Compare the state owned utilities and transport systems of mainland Europe with current British experience. I remember my father explaining to me that the reason why UK would never have a New York blackout was because our electricity supply was safely in the hands of the government.
No normal thinker would suggest privatising the armed forces or the police, but energy supply and transport are just as essential. If retail banking is also as necessary for the smooth running of the country, then it too should be state owned.
I’ve never quite understood why some bankers’ and financial sector employees’ salaries and bonuses are so high. Not at all sure that they ‘earn’ them. They don’t seem to need any particular qualifications or demonstrable experience beyond extreme competitiveness. However, it seems to be an international given that very high remuneration is normal for some, and one national government acting in isolation isn’t going to change it.
So, how to maximise tax revenue from the banks and the financial sector? Quite clearly, tax rates that encourage relocation of institutions or individuals is the wrong way, and we now need all the tax revenue we can get. Playing ‘bash the bankers’ is just cutting of nose to spite face, politically. Will the loss of tax revenue be made up by expansion of other sectors of the economy? There’s not much sign of that at the moment.
Boris is right – bankers’ pay may be obscene, but now is a time to be pragmatic. We can squeeze them when the rest of the economy is booming, and can make up for any resulting loss of tax revenue. But not now.
engineer what the fuck are you going on about?
if not now, when?
if we do not act now it will be too late.
don’t you understand? if someone offers no value to the economy then they should be cut adrift.
if someone offers no value to the economy then they should be cut adrift.
Hard to disagree with that tat. I rather hope the Tories will be sitting there with a big database on a memory chip already and have a big file all ready to send P45′s to anybody with ‘equality’, ‘diversity’, ‘inclusion’ and a few other keywords in their job title.
They could auction the rights to hand-deliver the envelopes.
agreed.
Because it means bright young things who don’t fancy life in Dubai (good luck if you like a drink or god forbid are gay) might stay here and set up their own businesses. And the really bright ones might not be sucked into the basements of banks and might instead stay in our universities creating useful research of benefit to everyone.
And the economy too, Big G.
Set up their own businesses? What with? Their £20,000 student loan overdrafts?
Stay in university doing useful research? Darling’s cut £1 billion off the higher education budget. The only ‘useful research’ will be how to juggle 3 Mc Jobs and find the time to complete the doctorate.
In fact in a few years time we’ll be in the classic Marxist situation so characteristic of places like Cuba — where your taxi driver or waiter is a fully qualified consultant Oncologist.
WTF is ‘useful research’? Do we make any money out of it?
it is all headline grabbing .for the masses.
jealousy is a very strong emotion!
sure a lot of the bankers have got it badly wrong…….RBS were told by nearly everyone to abandon thier takeover plans…………..
there are a few people that earn silly money..if they leave then the other jobs will go too…..last time i looked there were 600+ foriegn banks in the city……..secretaries,messengers,cleaners.all will lose thier jobs……….
there is too much whinging and not enough knowledge in this country……..
if people want to be wealthy then most -including myself- have to work for it………..
if you want to be a player in london get yourself up to the smoke and get a job!get in at 6 am and leave at 9pm!
or save up £10,000 and start trading futures for yourself on the net!
trade the ftse or the gilt……..
or get out and raise some money and start your own hedge fund!
all of these things are possible for EVERYONE……….
but it requires EFFORT!!!!!!!!!
it is the same for every job.want to be a dentist?
doctor? sparks? brickie? qualifications and hard work are essential!
want to open your own shop?
rent/rates/stock required.as well as understanding the market place………..
still it’s a lot easier just blaming everyone else isn’t it?
Quite so. Best Sermon I ever heard was literally 3 words – ‘Don’t be jealous’.
Want some of the action, then become a Banker.
Up at six ? Home at nine ?
People in manufacturing do that all the time, they just don’t have prima donna hissy fits about it. Grow some balls.
I think he meant, home at nine PM…….
Or perhaps he meant teachers who ‘struggled’ into their schools last week to text/email parents that the school would be shut as they fancied another day cuddled up by the fire with the Guardian Jobs section.
I would be up at 6 am every day and twice on Sundays if I could start my own bank. Did I really write that? Ha ha.
There are perhaps 5,000 bankers in the City earning more than £1m.
They are contributing to the Exchequer therefore around £2,5 bn per annum.
If they do not continue to contribute, because they are either driven away or bonus earnings get banned by McRuin, then around 500,000 hard working families will need to pay an additional £5,000 per annum to make up the difference.
It’s the right thing to do.
Aaaaah. Maths. We don’t do that around here.
This is a country where even quite senior people (Jack Straw) will give it ‘I’m shit at maths, me’ and instead of being fired as an incompetent this is considered a perfectly reasonable excuse.
These incompetent fuckers are vorting, day in, day out on matters that cost billions of quid and yet they’re quite comfortable admitting ‘I’m shit at maths’.
I see. And are you crap at reading and writing too Mr Sraw? Logic not your strong suit? Ethic? Honesty? Integrity? IQ?
For fuck‘s sake.
Good ole Boris.
Won’t get anywhere, not with those doctrinaire tax and spend bozo’s from NeoLieBour. Gordo’s not interested in inward investment, he wants to create the perfect nirvana…… a replica of the Stalinite nightmare, where the people know their place and everything is run by the state for the state and the elite who govern.
Boris should rather storm the gate’s of No 10 with the Household Cav and string the beggars up from the Whitehall lamp posts.
Buy rope, buy options on lamp posts, bring on la revolucion.
“Boris should rather storm the gate’s of No 10 with the Household Cav and string the beggars up from the Whitehall lamp posts.”
Penfold! This is a solution I like! Can you imagine? All in scarlet and gold uniforms on spirited steeds….. Ed Balls stripped, whipped and hung from a lamp post. Gordo forced to beg for his life….. and we say no. Tony Blair tarred and feathered….
It’s called “killing the goose that lays the golden eggs”. Unfortunately, many people would prefer to have £1 while everybody else has £1, than have £5 while somebody else, somewhere, has £10.
Taxes are too high for everbody, however, not just bankers. Governments spend too much.
you turkey!
golden goose? fuck off you moron.
the bankers are dead ducks FFS.
very good.
yes guido, you are completely correct.
however, i think this is about more than simply “bashing the bankers” (much as it is convenient to do so) and closer to your pol pot example. By attacking the aspirational and high earners, they are more likely to win the election as we leave.
said the rimmer.
what is the point in you?
you never add anything constructive or make any points.
all you ever do is to shriek a one line insult at anything that doesn’t equal your worldview. you spend most of your time on this website, yet wish to confiscate the assets of those who trudge into the city on overcrowded commuter trains for most of their lives.
what is your job exactly?
Publicly-funded Labour Troll.
God… I wish.
Floozy hasn’t quite grasped that the Labour Party form the government and therefore only the Labour Party has access to public funds.
what is my job?
I am a full time genius.
oh, and I am independent of all parties.
so you got that wrong didn’t you shitforbrains.
so the best a full time genius in modern Britain can come up with is:
“said the rimmer.”
I have to come down to your level for you to understand.
you dullard.
Gudio
You make a brave (and unwise) assumption that these bankers actually contribute to the economy..when the case can be easily made that they are merely an opportunity cost…
The argument is thus about whether the whole financial system (especially in London and New York) has not been hijackedby a few greedy (and fraudulent look at the “mortgage backed securities and other vehicles which were clearly fraudlent) bankers who have destroyed more wealth than they have created…
Look at the share prices of the banks themselves for a start…They have ripped off their own shareholders to start with…
Look now at the level of public debt that has had to be injected to stop systemic collapse of the whole financial system..
The opportunity cost of these mad frauds and their losses is trillions (of whatever currency you want)…
So the argument should not be about taxing them…
There should be serious criminal inbvestigation of their fraud to start with…Many should be in jail…thzere is also the serious problem of paying any “bonuses” at all to banbkers whose banks actually lost huge sums during the period on which the bonuses were calculated…that I would suggect is fraud on the shareholders…
Then the bonuses of these bankers should be entirely clawed back and paid 1) to the taxpayers who had to bail them out and if there is any surplus, 2) to the shareholders of the banks themselves…
No sane person can defend the pillaging of the financial system that has taken place…nor the obligation to pay back the long-suffering tawxpayers who have to pay for this massive fraud resulting from a total breakdown in regulation…
And any Libertarian idea that the financial system can work without any regulation at all (after the near systemic collapse we have lived through) is pure madness…
yeah, Guido’s claim to be a libertarian are exposed as false when he protects those who cause millions of peoples’ lives to lack freedom.
Guido is a bread head, not a libertarian and that is fine but he should not pretend to be what he is not.
that is dishonest.
Follow the instructions on the medication label.
said the faux libertarian.
No Guido — I’d rather he didn’t. Let Darwin deal with him.
Oh yes we do. Market capitalism is its natural expression.
the french had a revolution, are your hands nice and smooth?
must get back to work I’ve got some tax to pay
Some good points here. But too much conflation of ideas going on generally:
a) the state bailed out banksters can fuck off. They failed their shareholders and depositors and required massive state bailouts to survive. Their business models and renumeration policies (bonuses) were designed to exploit the incompetence of Brown’s tripartite regulatory regime – when the whole lot came crashing down these banks and Brown were to blame. The taxpayer is paying for the incompetence of both. Socialised losses, privatised profits complete bollox.
b) Those banks did not take state handouts to survive should be able pay their staff whatever they like. In these cases renumeration is a matter for the banks and their shareholders, and the government has no business involving themselves in it.
c) It’s an obscenity that anyone should be paying tax at 50% or above. In fact I’d rather everyone pay a flat rate of say 15% or 20% and have done with it. I once worked on a little island that had no income tax at all, and non penal sales taxes. Unemployment was negligible and the economy boomed as every man and his dog saw the benefit of operating a business- whatever income you could generate for yourself you kept. Then some idiot brought in income tax. The result? 20% unemployment – and a growing number of tax collecting bureaucrats -within 2 years of the change.
City of Vice has it about right!
Your figures seem to ignore benefit payments made *to* bankers. You need to add in the amount they have received from the state through the bailout. That probably wipes out all the tax revenue received from banks for the last 17 years or so.
We should let Mark Oaten decide.
The choice between paying these evil shits their bonuses from our money as a reward for their failure, or taking some back risking them flitting abroad is like being forced to choose between sticking your head in a bucket of pig vomit or a bucket of dog shit.
There is still nothing in place to prevent a next time, indeed the Banks have been given the Green light to carry on as usual. High street banks need to be separate and fire-walled from the Casino operations so no more bailouts, gamble as much as you like but if you lose you pay the bailiff, further Bank employees at board level should be legally liable for reparation, seizure of personal assets and property just like any other individual or business. Ironic that the term Bankrupt no longer applies to Banks.
Indeed.
The irony, which seems to be lost on the ‘bash a banker’ mob, is that the ‘good’ banks such as HSBC, are all in the process of relocating their businesses and personnel to places where they can continue to be good banks and prosper, while we are left with the failures who cannot afford to relocate and will be subsidized by the taxpayer for ever more.
But shshhh… don’t tell the children.
Sorry Guido but you are falling for the banking sector bullshit. Many of these so-called ‘taxpayers’ are registered as non-doms so don’t pay any income tax anyway.
An example of what I mean- the hedge fund Brevan Howard for example may have lots of capital but it is registered in the Caymans and therefore pays little or no tax in the UK. Its partners are also unlikely to be registered to pay tax in the UK (I don’t know their individual arrangements).
The same goes for many of the players in investment banking. Oh and by the way bankers in New York are threatening an exodus to London as they frantically try to squeal their piglike way towards a renewal of their status as service-sector parasites.
When discussing non-doms in the financial sector you have to remember that many of these people want to be in the UK for little Timsin and Bruschetta’s private school education.
Fuck them. Call the bluff.
Never mind bashing the bankers, what about bashing the bishop?
Boris Johnson is merely playing the bankers’ rent boy role in this debate. If Britain is in such a state that it cannot afford to lose some parasites, many of whom DO NOT PAY TAX because they registered as non-doms then you might as well bring down the shutters now.
I recall the Tories getting on their little Brit ponies about ‘being held to ransom by unions’ whenever they threatened to strike.
So its okay for bankers to attempt a blackmailing bluff then is it? How many of these bankers have kids in private school in the UK?
Is Boris aware that bankers in New York are busy attempting the same bluff except that they are threatening to decamp to London?
Its time to put these people and the financial services industry properly under control- they are nothing but a high-risk gamble for a country like the UK and their benefit to the UK economy has been MASSIVELY overstated.
Oh- and by the way, Guido (last post from me on this subject) Boris isn’t ‘right’ about anything.
He’s just regurgitating the Bankers Association position which makes him a sock puppet, not a financial commentator.
These fooking bankers don’t ‘earn’ their enormous incomes, they just juggle out with OTHER PEOPLE’S money without risk to themselves. And when they fail and make a right cock-up they are bailed out by the taxpayers of this country many of whom are earning less than £12,000 pa.
What are you fooking complaining about Guido!!!!! Put your efforts into something more worhwhile and if all these greedy fookers go somewhere else then so be it. Even Obama thinks they are ripping everybody off.
Fooking, fooking greedy cuunts the whole fooking lot of them!!!
Guido, well done for protecting “those who cause millions of peoples’ lives to lack freedom.” What does that even mean?
it means you either side with the rich or you side with the poor.
the poor exist as a result of a decision made by the rich.
it is very simple to understand but you must be a dullard which would explain why you don’t.
you idiot.
The poor exist because they have always existed — Darwin again (and Jesus too).
ah, so they don’t exist because the rich keep forcing down their wages by using globalisation as an excuse to chase the cheapest labour?
honestly susie you really are a fucking dope.
The argument for being nice to bankers is weak and will rightly fall on deaf ears.
They have proved to be a poor long term investment. Their liabilities were greater than their assets. They are losers. They are by definition poor businessmen.
Guido sounds like many of his generation – the City is king, manufacturing is dead.
Brainwashed by the bullshitters! History began in 1979!
Let others pick up the inevitable tab.
Suckers.
yes, for a person who deals with 21st century technology when it comes to politics Guido is a very 20th century minded dogmatist.
Yeah because taxing some incompetent bankers, who brought this country to its knees, a bit more is exactly the same as Pol Pot! Ridiculous post Guido.
As has already been said, the threat by bankers to leave is simply that – a threat.
Indeed the incompetent bankers are all still here — subsidized by us.
The really good ones who didn’t screw up have long gone… off to their luxury apartments with concierge services and a gym and pool in the basement as part of the relocation package.
To Eileen’s ery relevant point, I can give you an example of utterly poor decision making between the manufacturing and service sectors which has cost this country billions and is likely to cost the UK in the region of £50billion over the next 10 years.
In the early 1970′s we had the oil crisis. France resolved never to be blackmailed by OPEC again and promptly built nuclear power stations which now supply at least 85% of France’s power requirements.
Britain under Thatcher with its well known sneering attitude to anything that didn’t involve consulting a filofax decided that the market would take care of everything.
Britain is now 7 years away from power cuts, dependent on the goodwill of the Russians in keeping the gas supply flowing and facing the urgent need to pay a French company called Areva to build its nuclear stations via a tie with another French company, EDF.
Looks like the ‘surrender monkeys’ had the last laugh there. Not to mention the fact that they had the guts to stand up to the US over its pressure to join a coalition going in to Iraq.
Britain’s Prime Minister took what should charitably be called the missionary position for the White House- with obvious consequences.
This may come as a shock to the British but the French are WAY ahead of the UK but then they aren’t stupid enough to hand over the keys of their economy to a bunch of people who are nothing but legalised carpetbaggers.
This is a harsh message- but its true. And its about time the British realised that it is not a good idea to have the country’s economic welfare dependent on the ‘goodwill’ of a bunch of vastly overpaid and over-stroked gyppoes in public school ties.
Good Post.
Couldn’t have put it better myself.
Mmm. Good points about the French and nuclear tech.
However, you might want to check out the involvement of a certain iconic British aerospace company in the nuclear sector, including the fact that France contracts out lots, if not all of its nuclear industry consulting and support work to said company. Indeed, were this company to withdraw from the French market, France would be unable to maintain its own reactors.
Or check out the fact that said company keeps a supplier chain of 260 other UK companies in work in the nuclear industry…
But FOR FUCK SAKE, DON’T TELL GORGON ABOUT IT lest he spread his clusterfuckedness there too…
Spot on, Cap’n! Never mind about our utilities, and much of our infrastructure (seaports, airports, etc.) being in foreign hands. We must be mad! Can you imagine the French or Germans allowing this? Even the Swedes have a car and aircraft manufacturer. I call it Mother Thatcher’s less attractive chickens coming home to roost.
Guido,
This is bullshit. Bankers offer no value. They do not contribute to making our society better. Their threats to leave are empty. They are shallow parasites. Can I be any clearer? And you are an arsehole.
Well well well the Marxist trolls are out in force.
I’d rather borrow money for my new business off an English banker than form an orderly queue behind Spain, Greece, Romania or Turkey which are going to be the priorities for any EU largess.
We shouldnt even be having this conversation. All the banks should have been allowed to fail on both sides of the Atlantic. Thats how the free market should work. The “growth” they provided was illusory credit based expansion. All those debts should now be purged from the system via bankruptcy. The competent banks will then be free to earn money with no need for punitive taxation.
Good point.
Exactly. But it wouldn’t have satisfied Brown’s commie fantasies of destroying capitalism.
Communist Clinton trying to shore up his ethnic vote more like. Bush didn’t have the intellect to see what was happening under his nose.
What a load of bollocks. They myth that bankers are the great contributors to this country appears unshakable. Their contribution is to this country is around 7% while manufacturing contributes at least 19%. It’s high time this bullshit was exposed.
“7%” TOSSER! That is a lot of dough, The uk needs every penny (billions OF!)
You must have gone to the same school as Broon!!!!
THese bankers are NOT mobile at all. Most have been in the same position for at least ten years. THink about what you are saying before you say it. It is a myth and a banker propagated lie that they can up and take their “skills” to another market. Even the bank of England hasn’t fallen for that one. Get back to The Sun, son, because thinking ain’t your stronpoint.
Just watch them relocate… they’ve been doing it for a year or so leaving all those not vital to their businesses — the backroom boys, the high street managers, the cashiers — jobless on benefits. They won’t be coming back.
You’ve got no idea what you are talking about. There is nowhere to “relocate” too. They failed abysmally in their positions; the “threat” that they might leave is simply bullshit–and it would hardly be a loss if they could leave. Do you really think that any other country wants to take on a gaggle of failed British fat cats? Once again, they contribute 7% to the British economy, which is about a third of what manufacturing contributes.
If you could read you would see that it is already happening, fuckwit, and on a bigger scale than is being made public!
FFS anon you are a total prat, 7% is much needed income for the UK.
This typical of fuckwit Labour voters.
Just don’t get it. My grandson 12yrs understands the facts. Your understanding of the UK’s economy comes from 13yrs of labour education…….FUCK ALL!!
Preeecisely.
No one in their right mind would want to take on a bunch of failed financial fuckwits at our expense — apart from Gordon Brown that is.
The good solvent banks and their talented (enough not to have screwed up itfp) personnel have gone elsewhere where they can make money i.e. China/Hong Kong, Australia, Singapore, Zurich.
And we are left with the dross.
Seven per cent, you fucking halfwits, is less than a third of what manufacturing makes for this country. I see no example of where the govt is throwing money into something that is three times as profitable for this country as banking.
The idea that these hoons will leave and it will all come crashing down is preposterous. Perhaps people who can do the job will then get a chance. If you want to argue the significance of 7% to the country you might want to weigh that against the real heavyweights like education, for example. What that brings to this country dwarfs banking but, hey, they’ve got to take a massive cut while banking has money thrown at it.
Don’t give me FFS without considering the cuts facing manufacturing, education and so on, both of which are far more important to this country.
I’ve never understood why these mobile high-flying wealth creators aren’t entitled to walk the streets with their cocks out with the right to enter any orifice that takes their fancy at any time. After all, it does already seem to be compulsory to lick the arses of this useless gang of parasites.
Mandy just shit in my handbag.
Did it have any U2 batterys in it,
Oaten and the one eyed tosser are just fighting over who gets to check it first.
And why shouldn’t they pay? They got us into this bloody mess through their greed whilst gambling with our money.
I’d like their job; gamble other peoples money all day, if I lose I still take home well over the national average wage each month, but if I win I get I could make millions and retire in my 30′s.
It’s a no-brainer. Where do I apply?
WTF?
Are you seriously arguing we should be encouraging the bankers to stay in this country because of the wonderful way in which they contribute to our economy?
Which planet have you been living on for the last couple of years? Have you seen exactly what the bankers have done to our economy?
Yes and what government allowed it happen.. Sorry!, it’s still Thatcher’s fault!
Do you mean a Tory government would not have ‘allowed’ it to happen? Twerpitude of the highest order.
Cato SC you are correct, a Tory goverment may not have stopped it, as it all started in America!
The UK would have been in a better position to weather the storm if Broon was a “little more” carefull with the UK’s finances.
Well, in the spirit of fairness, I’d just like to point out that I blame Thatcher, Gordon Brown, and the bankers. I’d hate to get all party political about this.
While there is an argument that this may not be the best way to do it, there is no doubt that bankers should pay back at least some of the money WE gave them that enabled tham to continue to be paid huge salaries.
We did not ‘GIVE’ the banks anything. We bought shares in the banks which pay dividends and can be sold to get our money back. On the preference shares we get 12% interest. And on most if not all of the guarantees we received a commercial fees.
But then please don’t let the facts get in the way of a good rant
.
/ikh
In short: fuck the bankers.
Until we know what proportion of the estimated trillions of derivative contracts are toxic, then credit markets will remain in a state of chronic paralysis.
No amount of fiscal stimulus or regulation will get the banking system fixed until we know how much poisonous debt there is on the balance sheets of the banks. Until we have exact facts and figures the bankers can go and take a long run and jump and stuff their bonuses up their backsides.
The thing is, the bankers knew all along about these derivative contracts (“weapons of mass financial destruction”, W. Buffett ), but cheerfully carried on anyway, safe in the knowledge that ordinary punters would ultimately pay for the inevitable bailouts in the form of increased taxation.
The derivatives genie is now well out of the bottle. So far nothing the banks have done has limited the risks posed by these types of contracts.
It’s all pretty simple really, this accounting mumbo jumbo that the bankers love to use when talking about derivatives isn’t cash in the bank; its just trash like the failed BearStearns.
the government should have let the banks fail while honoring deposits up to 50K. Over taxing bankers now is crazy and the government will go round in circles as it is confused over private and public entities.
Quite right, the tax is wrong, wrong, wrong. But when Darling announced it Osborne smiled because he knew that he would reap the benefits, wanker. If he was a real Conservative he would announce right now that on day one he will sweep away all the labour tax rises. He won’t, of course, because he is spineless lickspittle. So called Conservatives, David “cast-iron” Comeron’s Conservatives are just New Labour with a blue rinse.
say to yourself 10 times “another 5 years of Labour” and if you can’t see the reason for voting conservative then get some help..and by the way if Dave is crap then vote him out…enjoy democracy while you still can…
152Susie says:
January 15, 2010 at 12:25 pm
‘Just watch them relocate… they’ve been doing it for a year or so leaving all those not vital to their businesses — the backroom boys, the high street managers, the cashiers — jobless on benefits. They won’t be coming back.’
Good. Let me know which airport this caribou herd of geniuses will be using. I could do with a giggle.
And for those of you going on about ‘needing the 7%’ I’d suggest that the reason your manufacturing base is a 19% contribution is indeed because of the disastrous policy of favouring city shitheads and their fake balance sheets over manufacturing.
That was down to Thatcher . As for Blair and New Labour, here’s a quiz question for the political historans among you- which famous English political figure remarked; ‘We’ll be alright with Tony’ .. ?
As an Imaginary Corporate Bond Trader for RBS I make £50 million trading profit a year. That is not a superstar but just a run of the mill trader. Is it so unreasonable that I want 10% of that as my pay? If I were a salesman we would probably call it commission but as I am a banker with a salary of £10,000 P.A. we call it a bonus. There are probably somewhere between 5 and 10 full times jobs at the bank supported through my work. This includes back office admin, accounting, IT staff and software engineers, HR, cleaners etc.
In my private life I am free spending and enjoy resteraunts, bars, theatre, use taxi’s, buy cars, clothes, furnish my property etc. All of this has a trickle down effect on the London economy.
You tax me and my pips squeak. So I move to Dubai, and the £50 million profit goes with me. U.K PLC looses the profits I make for RBS and the corporate tax paid on that, the tax on my earnings, the 5 to 10 jobs I support and the taxes they pay, and the trickle down from my spending and from the jobs I supported.
I move to Dubai to a great life style and I keep up with my friends on the internet ( email, voice and video ) and on weekends I fly to London, Paris, Rome to meet up with them and I am still better off.
The only looser is U.K. PLC
Cutting off your nose to spite your face has never been a good idea.
BTW, in real life I’m not a banker but a freelance software engineer.
/ikh
How much have you got of your own money salted away abroad? The idea that you should get huge profits from your “earnings” as some kind of “right” strikes me as astonishing. It is funny how you don’t feel the same way when you lose billions of other people’s money. When that happens it is someone else who has to pay.
Once again, bankers account for 7% of the UK economy. Feel free to go and live in Dubai where your illegal behaviour will not be tolerated as it has been in the UK for years.
Goodbye we’ll have a real national bank instead, and we’ll really miss you.
http://cyberboris.wordpress.com/2010/01/11/boris-levels-with-george/
Boris is right! Labour are targetting Boris in an Operation Get Boris, in which they scrutinise him endlessly, hoping for ammo to destabilise Cameron. they are also parachuting in Ken to help, hahahaha.
http://cyberboris.wordpress.com/2010/01/14/i%e2%80%99ll-fight-him-any-place-any-time/
Boris is Ken’s Nemesis. Ken thought he had Boris beaten last time but he didn’t. Underestimate Boris at your peril.
The truth is few bankers will go. The quality of living in London is still high alongside, and in comparison with, competitor cities with similar tax levels: Zurich, New York, Mumbai, Paris, Frankfurt (see Mercer’s Index 2009: http://bit.ly/8VxHv1)
These competitor cities (around 50% tax levels on chart) offer little advantage, some are positively unattractive. The figures below give the Mercer Quality of Living Index.
New York 100 (index);
Zurich 108
Paris 102.9
Frankfurt 107
London 101.6
Mumbai (not in top 50 cities)
If most UK bankers speak English by choice and want the cultural, environmental, security and social advantages of UK life they will stay in London. They might even be willing to pay even more for this privilege.
On the part of the generally morally-upstanding public I suggest many would be happy to say goodbye to these parasitic, greedy, economically dangerous scum-bags. Maybe we have to find new disincentives to stay.
Anyone, like Boris Johnson, who seeks their company because of their capacity to milk our financial systems (that means our money) then they share guilt by association.
It is probably true that few Bankers will go. However as about 20% of bankers make 80% of the profits and it is this 20% that are most likely to leave. It does not take many to make a huge hole in the bU.K. PLC P & L account ( Profit and Loss ).
Language has absolutely no effect on where a banker will live and work. Nearly every major city in the world has an English speaking ExPat community. And the kids will be educated either locally in ExPat schools or at home ( where ever home may be ).
I see that you are another who does not like facts to get in the way of a good rant
.
/ikh
poor people vote labour ,that’s why labour creates poverty..they do it every time and still don’t realise people want to better themselves and work for a better life not live on a sink estate with no hope of escape.even the immigrants came here to work hard and make a better life and good for them for waking up to the corruption of labour…
Fred Goodwin ,in my opinion,by applying for the job at RBS said by default ” I can run a bank .I don’t know how much evidence you need realise he couldn’t run a bank,so there fore he shouln’t get a pension and he should pay back the wages he took under false pretenses. The reason this has not happened is because thy are all hoping it’s their turn next….I don’t know why I still keep hoping that there is one decent person left in government but I do…I need help
when the labour government gave the banks all this money did they write an agreement that said they can only lend that money in the UK…? If not then what’s to stop them saying yes lets start lending again ..where shall we do it I know France Germany China India look like good bets lets lend it there…and so all our competitors will benifit from our money and they will put us out of business what a brilliant idea .I wonder if any Labour MPs have bought shares in our competitors..I’ll be watching newsnight to see if they have noticed anything…Oh dear they haven’t
http://cyberboris.wordpress.com/2010/01/14/i%e2%80%99ll-fight-him-any-place-any-time/
Labour bringing in Ken to fight Boris in Operation Stop Boris is like when British Intelligence used a corpse in Operation Mincemeat to fool the Nazis. That actually worked, but this won’t. (JOKE)
[...] Guido printed an article today saying Boris was right and many senior City figures also backed the Mayor. [...]
Who gives a toss Guido?
Let them fuck off and never return.
Perhaps the UK can then concentrate on long term quality of life for all rather than pandering to the whims of business and greedy, immoral money grabbing tossers?
It is risible to suggest any comparable relationship between the systematic extermination of an entire people in Cambodia an asking the very richest few in our society to pay a contribution to it they can easily afford.
Surely, given that it was the banking system that increased our levels of debt, this is only proper. Those that caused the problem should pay lost to clean it up.
The proper and correct response to Boris Johnson and to the banking industry he now claims to represent (odd that he sneered at Ken Livingstone for being an inner city mayor when he is now apparently mayor of the Square Mile – the outer boroughs that elected him
can wallow in their negative equity) is as follows:
1, You don’t like paying tax. No-one does. Don’t throw your toys and threaten to leave because we all know you won’t. Our legal system makes London the most attractive place on Earth for all kinds of corporate activity, especially banking, so you know you’ll stay. We know you’ll stay. Shut up, because right now, you’re not very popular.
2. We call your bluff. Fine. Off you go then. Because for all your claims of being the economic engine of the country, everyone else thinks you’re a bunch of rapacious, self-serving graspers whose greed has cost us a collective fortune. Please bring that type of prosperity to Switzerland, Shanghai or Singapore. You have delighted us for long enough. But on your way out, would you mind leaving those billions you borrowed? Thanks.
I think it would be a positive thing if our economy relied less on the financial sector. In the long run, I think the UK would be healthier if it increased manufacturing and design industries. This would require some hardship and wide scale rebuilding but personally I would be prepared to commit to this goal. I don’t think we want “more of the same” clever lending schemes and high bonuses. I dont’t understand why people want so much money. Cynics know the price of everything and the value of nothing.
No. Wrong analogy Pol (Very Large) Pot…
Teachers and doctors are generally useful people who have a certain level of expertise. The same cannot be said of bankers. Bankers are v. much in the estate agent league of people whose function is necessary but clearly involves v. little specialist knowledge.
I think the way forward on this one is to make banking an open profession rather than what it is now (bankers getting their kids into banking). Let’s have open examinations. I think we’ll soon find that hundreds of thousands of people have all the requisite skills to be bankers.
Incidentally I hope the Bank of Essex project goes ahead. It’s a local auth scheme to set up their own county bank. It will be great when we see local authority officers operating banks with no problem at all.
It ain’t that difficult. So, Guido, please stop pretending it is.
I pay top-whack, about 18%, in Singapore.
My wife, a civil servant pays about £100 a year in tax.
Where would you rather live?
Dont be such a plank G! the banks with a lil help from China have got us into this mess, its only fair that they should contribute to get us out of it. one way or another its still going to take a Decade or so to sort out. Currently the upper eschelons of banking are full or people who went to school with the right people or daddy owns the bank. where are they gonna go – tax in the Good ol USA is virtually the same… Honk Kong’s already full. we could actually end up with some professional bankers who are happy to only have 500k in their back pocket.
I am afraid you have been spending too much time with the wrong crowd and it has messed with your head