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Author Topic: Recession  (Read 19627 times)

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adamzero

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Re: Recession
« Reply #20 on: January 26, 2009, 03:14:22 AM »

Very interesting, Bill.   I'm in the US and am familiar with ground leases (don't know how they differ from the lease-holding system in the UK).  I thought they still had ground lease laws in Hawaii (to keep property in native Hawaiian's hands).  The US practice does seem kinda strange, but I know that the property owner does maintain some liabilities that don't get foisted onto the lessee.  Also a good friend of mine was able to maintain mineral/oil rights to property he sold in Texas.  

I guess the history of feudalism and the social hierarchy in the UK makes the system far less dynamic.  

I've never understood condos.  Why would you not want to buy the land your "home" sits on?  

One thing to ponder in the coming Depression--with cash-strapped nation-states get to the point of "nationalizing" property with ground leases (the so-called "death tax" in the US has us half the way there).  Instead of the King holding the land, we'll all owe the Federal Reserve.  
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Bill Harry

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Re: Recession
« Reply #21 on: January 26, 2009, 10:02:56 AM »

There are all kings of unfair practices in English leasehold law (I don't say British because, of course, Scotland - and our own Prime Minister's constituents -has been freed of it).For instance, I have been paying 'buildings insurance' on this property since 1970. But I am not allowed to pay an insurance company direct. The freeholder tells me what I have to pay each year and I have to pay him. I don't even know what I'm insured for. He charges more me more than it would cost me to get the insurance direct (I contacted several insurance companies over the years and each time they offered me buildings insurance at a fraction of what I have to pay the freeholder), plus I get no benefits, such as no claim bonuses - having never claimed in 38 years and so on. The leasehold law won't allow me the freedom of getting my own qotes, getting buildings insurance from an insurance company - who would also give me all the insurance documentation in my name. If something happened to the property it would be the freeholder who gets the insurance money, even though I am the only one paying it. Would you cnsider that just?
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Kevin

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Re: Recession
« Reply #22 on: January 26, 2009, 10:45:19 AM »

I'm with you Bill and agree with Dave. I abhor the left. All style and no substance.
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adamzero

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Re: Recession
« Reply #23 on: January 26, 2009, 07:45:05 PM »

Bill, sounds like you guys need to finish that revolution you started in the 1640s.  But at least I guess that means you guys aren't inundated with Geico and Progressive commercials.
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Bill Harry

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Re: Recession
« Reply #24 on: January 27, 2009, 10:27:58 AM »

I remember around 1962 there was the Ian Hendry film 'Live Now - Pay Later' which indicated the trend to buy what you wanted on credit and pay back, with interest, over a period of time. Prior to that people lived within their means. It's going to have to go back to that. It won't cripple capitalism, just the people on ridiculous six figure yearly incomes. The Governments must also do the same and live within their means, only borrowing what they can afford. Unfortunately, Britain is borrowing far too much unecessarily and decades of children and grandchildren will have to pay for it. Going back to people living within their means will be good for our planet as it will help to slow down the 'waste' culture. Manufacturers should start building things that last rather than washing machines, dishwashers, cookers etc with built in obsolecence. I remember this waq predicted in the early Sixties with Vance Packard's book 'The Waste Makers.'

At the moment too much food is wasted in the Western world, there is too much packaging, too much wastage of paper and card which is destroying the rain forests. People would get healthier and live much longer lives if they didn't stuff themselves with more food than necessary. It was discovered that the healthiest time ever in Britain, when people were far healthier than at any time before or since, was just after the Second World War when there was rationing in Britain.
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Ged

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Re: Recession
« Reply #25 on: January 27, 2009, 11:28:08 AM »

Hello Bill. Coming from Liverpool (though I don't know if you lived here in the 1980s) you must know that Thatcher's policies closed down countless manufacturing and high employers such as Tate and Lyles, Crawfords - United biscuits, Meccano, British-American tobacco etc and of course the coal mines that some are now advocating re-opening to fuel our own nuclear power stations instead of relying on the Russians controlling fuel prices and wars in the desert to ensure oil is plentiful for the West. At the time Thatcher came to power in 1979 North Sea oil was just coming fully on tap. This was the greatest legacy the country had ever had. Instead of using it to prop up and modernise industries, create new industries, promote education and training, etc, to catapult the country forwards, they used it for unemployment benefits because their half-baked economic theories failed. North Sea oil revenues were squandered. We will also remember she introduced disability living allowance to massage the unemployment figures which were rocketing, now we can't get these people off DLA. You might remember that the award winning 'Boys from the blackstuff' was made during this depressing time and only the Falklands war saved Thatcher for another term then things picked up until the poll tax issue saw her off.

By the way, I agree with everything you say about new labour whom are just like the old tories, it's just that deep down (with their greedy hiding of personal expenses for instance), none of them can be trusted, they're all in it for what they can get out of it.

As for your personal problems regarding your buildings insurance etc, whilst terrible, this was surely known and signed for at the time - were you badly advised? Just like living on a caravan site, you might own the box your living in but the site can put the eminities and utilities fees up at will. For bad land laws see the rest of Europe too - there's enough programmes on Sky about them such as the land grab in Spain where the government can just come along and say we're building a highway through your frint garden and not only that, you're paying for it too. Or in Cyprus where holiday homes were sold to Brits only for returning Greeks and Turks coming back after beingafter the war are now laying claim to the land - possibly rightly after they turfed out off it.

Most of our laws are pretty cosher, maybe not the fact that Prince Charles is the Duchy of Cornwall so all land left intestate (ie. no will) goes to him - that needs sorting out. As for your thread on the criminals and immigration which is another matter - from what i've read, you're spot on, you only have to watch crimewatch.  
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Bill Harry

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Re: Recession
« Reply #26 on: January 27, 2009, 12:07:12 PM »

Yes, anyone who signs a lease is aware of the problems as it's a feudal system, but it's either having to accept them or not being able to buy the house you want to live in. Leasehold has increased under Labour, a Government who promised to get rid of all the unfair clauses in the system when they first came into power - the opposite has happened.

I also think there are other things the Tories did that crippled the country - nationalising essential things such as utilities. Water, Gas and electricity should remain in the control of the country, not be sold to foreign countries. The Germans bought Thames Water, let all the pipes rot until there was more water being wasted in leaks than being used, sold vital reservoirs to developers, then sold the company to an Australian with no experience in the water industry, making billions of pounds in profit in the process. The Tories messed up the railways. Now we pay these private companies more in subsidies than we did when the railways belonged to the nation. The same with the bus system. The directors of Stagecoach become multi-millionaires with every move councils make. We also pay these private companies more to run the buses than when the councils ran them.

Let's face it, the country is in a mess and both Tories and Labour have been responsible over the years. There are genuine MPs, particularly in Liverpool like Peter Kilfoyle and Louise Ellman who fight for people's rights, but there are too many MPs who have never done anything but come out of university and enter politics - I also feel that too many of them have been lawyers and barristers who live in a caccooned world away from real life.
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Swine

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Re: Recession
« Reply #27 on: January 27, 2009, 12:33:00 PM »

i was offered german gas the other day. how about that?
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Bill Harry

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Re: Recession
« Reply #28 on: January 27, 2009, 01:58:08 PM »

What we should do is to begin manufacturing again but in a different way. Make things last. This would save the worlds resources of metals, trees etc. If manufacturers made a cooker that would last, a dishwasher that would last etc, then that would help the poor, pensioners, people on low incomes. It would save earth's precious minerals. If manufacturers made things to last, they could get orders internationally. At the moment, when our dishwasher doesn't work, we have to pay a man one hundred pounds just to turn up at the door before he does any work. He tells us that these dishwashers only really last for four years.

At the moment manufacturers use built in obsolescence. Here is what wickipedia says about that:

Planned obsolescence (also built-in obsolescence[1] in the United Kingdom) is the process of a product becoming obsolete and/or non-functional after a certain period or amount of use in a way that is planned or designed by the manufacturer.[1] Planned obsolescence has potential benefits for a producer because the product fails and the consumer is under pressure to purchase again, whether from the same manufacturer (a replacement part or a newer model), or from a competitor which might also rely on planned obsolescence.[1] The purpose of planned obsolescence is to hide the real cost per use from the consumer, and charge a higher price than they would otherwise be willing to pay (or would be unwilling to spend all at once).

For an industry, planned obsolescence stimulates demand by encouraging purchasers to buy again sooner if they still want a functioning product. Built-in obsolescence is in many different products, from vehicles to light bulbs, from buildings to software. There is, however, the potential backlash of consumers who learn that the manufacturer invested money to make the product obsolete faster; such consumers might turn to a producer, if any, which offers a more durable alternative.

Planned obsolescence was first developed in the 1920s and 1930s when mass production had opened every minute aspect of the production process to exacting analysis.

Estimates of planned obsolescence can influence a company's decisions about product engineering. Therefore the company can use the least expensive components that satisfy product lifetime projections. Such decisions are part of a broader discipline known as value engineering.

The use of planned obsolescence is not always easy to pinpoint, and it is complicated by related problems, such as competing technologies or creeping featurism which expands functionality in newer product versions.
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aspinall_lover

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Re: Recession
« Reply #29 on: January 27, 2009, 04:30:50 PM »

This is going to be an awfully hard year for the working person in this country, and I guess all around the world.  The US are having all kinds of major layoffs with thousands and thousands of people losing their jobs.  And it's fixing to hit close to home to us today.
My husband goes back to work today.  His company is calling in all the employees to a "plant-wide meeting" at two this afternoon.  Not good.  He's already had his hours cut back.  He works 4-10hr days, then cut back to 4-9's, now 4-8's.  What's gonna happen.  Oh, he does stay sometimes 10 hours, but the bosses always put them on "bullcrap" detail.  He's been with the company over 24 years.  God, I'm sitting on pins and needles worrying what to make of all of this.  I'll keep you people posted on what goes down this afternoon............
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BlueMeanie

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Re: Recession
« Reply #30 on: January 27, 2009, 04:42:35 PM »

Merged 'Hard Times' with 'Recession'.
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aspinall_lover

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Re: Recession
« Reply #31 on: January 27, 2009, 05:16:39 PM »

^^^^^Sounds good BlueMeanie.  Thanks!!!!
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Wordno

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Re: Recession
« Reply #32 on: January 27, 2009, 05:43:31 PM »

I think it's the media's fault as to why the economy is worsening. Every single day is the same thing on the news. "The economy is worsening! Are safe?" "This is the worst time in 30 years. Save your money! You need to!". Its absolutely ridiculous how people are eating this crap right up and buying absolutely nothing. The economy is in bad shape but if people continue to not buy anything then the economy will worsen because nobody is making any money.
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Bill Harry

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Re: Recession
« Reply #33 on: January 27, 2009, 07:21:09 PM »

So many people I know have been caught up in this terrible situation and it's heartbreaking. Another aspect is people with small companies who find that the bigger companies they have been supplying go into liquidation. The small company then can't pay its debts and it goes on. There is lots of money owing. What I can't understand here is the amount that the big banks are writing off. They are pursuing little people and repossessing their houses because they can't keep up the mortgage because they have lost their jobs, yet they scrub a two and a half billion pound loan to a Russian billionaire who has a house in London worth thirty two million. The British Government, despite this terrible situation have brought in a law giving more powers to bailiffs - this time they can come into your home with less legal rights and actually break in if you try to prevent them, plus they can take your possessions without having necessary court documentation
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aspinall_lover

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Re: Recession
« Reply #34 on: January 27, 2009, 09:04:43 PM »

Well...............Jeff came in from work this afternoon.  The company had all the "brass" in from headquarters.  The warehouse after being opened for nearly 30 years, is shutting it's doors come April 1.  Jeff's without a job.  Been there for nearly 25 years.  It's not a recession we're in..........it's a "depression"..............
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DoBotherMe

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Re: Recession
« Reply #35 on: January 27, 2009, 09:10:12 PM »

Oh, I'm so sorry. I'll keep you in my thoughts. Dana ; )
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Jane

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Re: Recession
« Reply #36 on: January 27, 2009, 09:27:02 PM »

Aspie, dear, let`s hope for the better. I am also with you in my thoughts.
The crisis hasn`t hit hard here but they say it`ll happen later in the year.
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aspinall_lover

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Re: Recession
« Reply #37 on: January 27, 2009, 10:23:14 PM »

Here's the news announcement..........this is where my husband "worked"..........

http://money.aol.com/news/articles/_a/bbdp/target-corporation-announces-workforce/298353
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DaveRam

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Re: Recession
« Reply #38 on: January 28, 2009, 12:14:58 AM »

Quote from: 1255
Here's the news announcement..........this is where my husband "worked"..........

http://money.aol.com/news/articles/_a/bbdp/target-corporation-announces-workforce/298353


Sorry to hear about your husbands job , i read the article , when they use words like elimination it sounds so cold .

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HeatherBoo

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Re: Recession
« Reply #39 on: January 28, 2009, 02:06:58 AM »

Oh Aspie, I am so sorry to hear this.  I complain and whine because they are cutting us back, I should just be grateful I still have my job.  

Tell your hubby to start looking now, I can't imagaine working one place for so long.  Getting a new job is like starting all over.  But just hold out hope and be strong, I will pray for your family.  
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