4 ms·

You’ve mixed tiny trivialities with the one factor that’s killing the UK economy—Brexit. The rest aren’t even rounding errors.

rayiner 4y ago
The UK’s GDP per capita peaked in 2007 and has stagnated since then: https://www.google.com/search?q=uk+gdp+per+capita&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en-us&client=safari https://www.google.com/search?q=uk+gdp+per+capita&ie=UTF-8&o.... 2008 was the global financial collapse, of course, but in the UK it seemed to have exposed some fundamental economic problems because the country never recovered. Whatever is “killing the UK economy” happened long before Brexit. It’s actually like the Sixth Sense—the UK isn’t dying, it was dead the whole time. Heck, if you look at the chart of GDP per capita you can’t even tell where the Brexit vote happened or when Brexit formally happened. Something similar happened Italy around the same time, as well as Greece.
- cloutchaser 4y ago
  People seem to ignore the EU is in just as bad a state as the UK, especially now that Russian energy is over Germany as we know it is basically over. Brexit might have had an impact but it’s one of 10 things badly wrong with europe as a whole.
  - martimarkov 4y ago
    But the thing is that the EU is not. Every major power in the EU is predicted to grow their economy and the UK is the only one that is not. Even if you look at it as a purely engineering problem you'd see that adding more red tape on trade would be most detrimental to the smallest player. In the relationship with the EU, the UK is the smaller player.
    - xyzzyz 4y ago
      Predictions are not worth much. Everyone predicted UK’s economy will collapse after Brexit. While it certainly has not flourished, it is not any worse than before. Now, what about the other “major powers” which are “predicted” to grow their economy? France’s GDP per capita has peaked in 2008, and never recovered since then. Italy? Same. Spain? Same. Belgium? Only recovered to 2008’s figure in 2021, same as Netherlands, Denmark, Finland. Sweden also only now recently recovered to its peak in 2011. In fact, the only major EU economies that did not simply recover to their 2008-2011 peaks, but rather grown beyond them, are Germany, Poland and Czechia. The truth of the matter is that EU economies are deeply stagnant, this is by no means a UK specific problem. There is no reason to predict growth in EU but not in UK.
    - jvmfjvfjvf 4y ago
      Germany contracted the last 2 quarters. Your explanation?
      - mejutoco 4y ago
        It seems that is not true. https://countryeconomy.com/gdp/germany https://countryeconomy.com/gdp/germany Germany growth: 2022Q4: -0.2% 2022Q3: 0.5%
    - fidgewidge 4y ago
      "Even if you look at it as a purely engineering problem you'd see that adding more red tape on trade would be most detrimental to the smallest player" This is economically illiterate, calling it an engineering problem doesn't change that. Trade happens when both sides can benefit. If trade stops happening, both sides lose. Artificial trade barriers do not mean one side "wins", they are always and everywhere a way to penalize some local citizens in order to prioritize others, usually owners of businesses that are favoured by the state in some way. At any rate it's an academic question. UK exports to the EU recovered to the prior level, it is selling the same quantity as before. Imports are lower, so UK buys less from the EU. Balance of trade therefore actually improved. This is not widely reported because the media is full of people who want everyone to believe Brexit has been an economic disaster. The reality is it'll never be possible to know because any impact is so small as to be invisible against the chaos caused by lockdowns.
      - martimarkov 4y ago
        1. Imports from EU are higher than pre-Brexit and higher than exports. So it's the deficit is also higher than before. 2. The EU does not have the UK as their biggest (40%+) market. Therefore the smaller player is the UK. If all trade stops - yes both sides lose. One collapses economically overnight. 3. The EU can either absorb the cost on its internal market (and sell goods internally for a smaller margin) or export to other players as there are existing trade agreements (again with a smaller margin). The UK does not have access to the same deals. 4. The EU market has a much higher GDP. Losing 1 trading partner even of the of Britain would not take down the Union.
        fidgewidge 4y ago
        All you're saying is that the EU has a higher willingness for self-inflicting economic pain on its citizens, which is true, but not an argument for being inside it.
- ZeroGravitas 4y ago
  The UK response to the global financial collapse in 2008 was to blame the Labour party that was in power, and "immigrants", which led directly to austerity and then Brexit, as memorably captured by Frankie Boyle, who compared it to watching Columbo with his Granny with dementia. "It Was The Fu*king Banks" - YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtWA3jQN1Pg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtWA3jQN1Pg
  - rayiner 4y ago
    New Labour was in power for the decade preceding the financial crisis and two years after. They quite justifiably bore the blame for what happened, just like the Bush administration did in the US. Brexit and the backlash against globalism is a result of the economic malaise brought about by those policies, not the cause of that malaise.
    - theironhammer 4y ago
      And the Tories have done nothing to turn the ship around after being power more than a decade. Under Tory management the decline continues. The malaise in UK goes much deeper than tweedle dumb and tweedle dee political parties.
- rhino369 4y ago
  The UK's back was broken in the Battle of France. It's all downhill from there.
coldpie 4y ago
A friend of mine straight up left Britain for Canada in his 20s after Brexit. He wanted to get out before it all came down. Now that's one less young worker in an aging country. It's hard to overstate how much damage that vote did to the UK.
- automatic6131 4y ago
  >It's hard to overstate how much damage that vote did to the UK. And yet, people frequently succeed
  - avh02 4y ago
    "I moved (edit: willingly) to the UK because of brexit" is not a statement that's often heard either.
  - martimarkov 4y ago
    When most ppl around you succeed more than you is it really a success?
- phonescreen_man 4y ago
  Same, expat here under 40 living in the US, left when the referendum came in as an exit vote.. grabbed my bag and hit the ocean road! Took my skills with me.
  - ben_w 4y ago
    Same except I went to Berlin, and I delayed leaving until late 2018 as my mother got Alzheimer's and I wanted to help while that still meant something.
  - coldpie 4y ago
    There's probably something insightful to say around the topic of constantly shitting on the most important people in your economy (young workers) in order to curry favor with the biggest drags on your economy because they are the ones with the spare time to vote (retirees), but I'm not economically smart enough to figure out what it is. "73 percent of people aged between 18 and 24 voted to Remain in the European Union, compared with just 40 percent of people aged over 65" https://www.statista.com/statistics/520954/brexit-votes-by-age/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/520954/brexit-votes-by-a...
dmitriid 4y ago
The trivialities amount to an evidence of systemic problems everywhere. Even though the whole Brexit farce has exposed all of that on its own :)
krona 4y ago
Would you mind providing a factor analysis? Which specific economic indicator(s), when compared to other countries, screams 'brexit wot dun it'? I only ask because the IMF itself doesn't state Brexit as a factor in the prediction.
brianmcc 4y ago
You're right - I'd add a decade of austerity too mind you.

rayiner 4y ago

The UK’s GDP per capita peaked in 2007 and has stagnated since then: https://www.google.com/search?q=uk+gdp+per+capita&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en-us&client=safari https://www.google.com/search?q=uk+gdp+per+capita&ie=UTF-8&o.... 2008 was the global financial collapse, of course, but in the UK it seemed to have exposed some fundamental economic problems because the country never recovered. Whatever is “killing the UK economy” happened long before Brexit. It’s actually like the Sixth Sense—the UK isn’t dying, it was dead the whole time. Heck, if you look at the chart of GDP per capita you can’t even tell where the Brexit vote happened or when Brexit formally happened. Something similar happened Italy around the same time, as well as Greece.

cloutchaser 4y ago
People seem to ignore the EU is in just as bad a state as the UK, especially now that Russian energy is over Germany as we know it is basically over. Brexit might have had an impact but it’s one of 10 things badly wrong with europe as a whole.
- martimarkov 4y ago
  But the thing is that the EU is not. Every major power in the EU is predicted to grow their economy and the UK is the only one that is not. Even if you look at it as a purely engineering problem you'd see that adding more red tape on trade would be most detrimental to the smallest player. In the relationship with the EU, the UK is the smaller player.
  - xyzzyz 4y ago
    Predictions are not worth much. Everyone predicted UK’s economy will collapse after Brexit. While it certainly has not flourished, it is not any worse than before. Now, what about the other “major powers” which are “predicted” to grow their economy? France’s GDP per capita has peaked in 2008, and never recovered since then. Italy? Same. Spain? Same. Belgium? Only recovered to 2008’s figure in 2021, same as Netherlands, Denmark, Finland. Sweden also only now recently recovered to its peak in 2011. In fact, the only major EU economies that did not simply recover to their 2008-2011 peaks, but rather grown beyond them, are Germany, Poland and Czechia. The truth of the matter is that EU economies are deeply stagnant, this is by no means a UK specific problem. There is no reason to predict growth in EU but not in UK.
  - jvmfjvfjvf 4y ago
    Germany contracted the last 2 quarters. Your explanation?
    - mejutoco 4y ago
      It seems that is not true. https://countryeconomy.com/gdp/germany https://countryeconomy.com/gdp/germany Germany growth: 2022Q4: -0.2% 2022Q3: 0.5%
  - fidgewidge 4y ago
    "Even if you look at it as a purely engineering problem you'd see that adding more red tape on trade would be most detrimental to the smallest player" This is economically illiterate, calling it an engineering problem doesn't change that. Trade happens when both sides can benefit. If trade stops happening, both sides lose. Artificial trade barriers do not mean one side "wins", they are always and everywhere a way to penalize some local citizens in order to prioritize others, usually owners of businesses that are favoured by the state in some way. At any rate it's an academic question. UK exports to the EU recovered to the prior level, it is selling the same quantity as before. Imports are lower, so UK buys less from the EU. Balance of trade therefore actually improved. This is not widely reported because the media is full of people who want everyone to believe Brexit has been an economic disaster. The reality is it'll never be possible to know because any impact is so small as to be invisible against the chaos caused by lockdowns.
    - martimarkov 4y ago
      1. Imports from EU are higher than pre-Brexit and higher than exports. So it's the deficit is also higher than before. 2. The EU does not have the UK as their biggest (40%+) market. Therefore the smaller player is the UK. If all trade stops - yes both sides lose. One collapses economically overnight. 3. The EU can either absorb the cost on its internal market (and sell goods internally for a smaller margin) or export to other players as there are existing trade agreements (again with a smaller margin). The UK does not have access to the same deals. 4. The EU market has a much higher GDP. Losing 1 trading partner even of the of Britain would not take down the Union.
      - fidgewidge 4y ago
        All you're saying is that the EU has a higher willingness for self-inflicting economic pain on its citizens, which is true, but not an argument for being inside it.
ZeroGravitas 4y ago
The UK response to the global financial collapse in 2008 was to blame the Labour party that was in power, and "immigrants", which led directly to austerity and then Brexit, as memorably captured by Frankie Boyle, who compared it to watching Columbo with his Granny with dementia. "It Was The Fu*king Banks" - YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtWA3jQN1Pg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GtWA3jQN1Pg
- rayiner 4y ago
  New Labour was in power for the decade preceding the financial crisis and two years after. They quite justifiably bore the blame for what happened, just like the Bush administration did in the US. Brexit and the backlash against globalism is a result of the economic malaise brought about by those policies, not the cause of that malaise.
  - theironhammer 4y ago
    And the Tories have done nothing to turn the ship around after being power more than a decade. Under Tory management the decline continues. The malaise in UK goes much deeper than tweedle dumb and tweedle dee political parties.
rhino369 4y ago
The UK's back was broken in the Battle of France. It's all downhill from there.

coldpie 4y ago

A friend of mine straight up left Britain for Canada in his 20s after Brexit. He wanted to get out before it all came down. Now that's one less young worker in an aging country. It's hard to overstate how much damage that vote did to the UK.

automatic6131 4y ago
>It's hard to overstate how much damage that vote did to the UK. And yet, people frequently succeed
- avh02 4y ago
  "I moved (edit: willingly) to the UK because of brexit" is not a statement that's often heard either.
- martimarkov 4y ago
  When most ppl around you succeed more than you is it really a success?
phonescreen_man 4y ago
Same, expat here under 40 living in the US, left when the referendum came in as an exit vote.. grabbed my bag and hit the ocean road! Took my skills with me.
- ben_w 4y ago
  Same except I went to Berlin, and I delayed leaving until late 2018 as my mother got Alzheimer's and I wanted to help while that still meant something.
- coldpie 4y ago
  There's probably something insightful to say around the topic of constantly shitting on the most important people in your economy (young workers) in order to curry favor with the biggest drags on your economy because they are the ones with the spare time to vote (retirees), but I'm not economically smart enough to figure out what it is. "73 percent of people aged between 18 and 24 voted to Remain in the European Union, compared with just 40 percent of people aged over 65" https://www.statista.com/statistics/520954/brexit-votes-by-age/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/520954/brexit-votes-by-a...

dmitriid 4y ago

The trivialities amount to an evidence of systemic problems everywhere. Even though the whole Brexit farce has exposed all of that on its own :)

krona 4y ago

Would you mind providing a factor analysis? Which specific economic indicator(s), when compared to other countries, screams 'brexit wot dun it'? I only ask because the IMF itself doesn't state Brexit as a factor in the prediction.

brianmcc 4y ago

You're right - I'd add a decade of austerity too mind you.