Hard Brexit or Hard Brexit

[Scot Dutchy]

Just had another thought... No one should underestimate the financial services sector's ability to self-perpetuate it's own bullshit jobs model. No doubt you will lose a lot of financial services business with the split, but a good chunk will remain to service the UK itself, and it will create a whole host of new bullshit jobs in pretty quick time I'd suspect. Of course, bullshit jobs ultimately aren't any good for an economy, and only serve to prop up the system in the short term. But if we are talking long term, the UK (and all neoliberal capitalist countries) is fucked regardless of if it leaves or stays in the EU. Without a change in the way we all do business, a massive collapse is inevitable.

With whom are they going to start theses services? Go on call out the countries. The Euro clearing accounts for 60% of the City of London activity. That will be moved to the EU. In manufacturing the UK depends on 70% supplies from EU subcontractors. Even the great Nissan plant in Sunderland depends on supplies from the EU. Of course the trade will continue but the tariffs will be horrendous. The EU leaders have always maintained one simple guideline the UK will not be better off outside the EU. Or is the UK government going for the Trump method: "Making UK great again".

To compensate for the loss of EU trade a growth of 50% trade with other countries will be required and the UK does not have any FTA's so how is that going to be achieved? The problem as well and one that I am sure the Brexiteers have forgotten; it is not just making FTA but the rest that is involved and a very important one is standards. The UK enjoys the EU standards that applies throughout the EU and in all the FTA's the EU has made because of its economic clout has imposed on other countries. So how is the UK going to handle this? Separate standards with every FTA? UK manufactures will be very happy with that.

It just part of non-thinking that went on in Brexiteer's minds. It is one colossal balls up and by activating art 50 has determined that UK cant get out of it.

Here is the site of Liverpool University with Professor Michael Dougan, a famous international law specialist who specialises on European law. Plenty to read and plenty of explanations the Brexiteers are terrified to read.

https://news.liverpool.ac.uk/tag/eu-referendum/

[rainbow]

The EU accounts for c.44% of the UK's exports and c.53% of its imports.

[pErvinalia]

Just had another thought... No one should underestimate the financial services sector's ability to self-perpetuate it's own bullshit jobs model. No doubt you will lose a lot of financial services business with the split, but a good chunk will remain to service the UK itself, and it will create a whole host of new bullshit jobs in pretty quick time I'd suspect. Of course, bullshit jobs ultimately aren't any good for an economy, and only serve to prop up the system in the short term. But if we are talking long term, the UK (and all neoliberal capitalist countries) is fucked regardless of if it leaves or stays in the EU. Without a change in the way we all do business, a massive collapse is inevitable.

With whom are they going to start theses services? Go on call out the countries.

What percentage of the UK financial sector is solely engaged with EU clearing accounts? Go on, provide the number.

To compensate for the loss of EU trade a growth of 50% trade with other countries will be required and the UK does not have any FTA's so how is that going to be achieved?

That's some fucked maths you are applying there. For a start, if all trade was to stop with the EU (which it won't) it would require a growth of trade in other markets of 100%. But more importantly, you are making a hyperbolic claim that all trade with the EU will stop. That's nonsense. And FTA's will be achieved like they are always achieved. Given there are already FTA's in place, any replacement FTA's have a successful template to copy. You do realise that trade continues on while FTA's are being negotiated, right? And as I said, free trade is the starting point. If the UK has something that another nation wants and that nation has something that the UK wants, there is absolutely nothing (other than standard international conventions) stopping that from happening. It's almost certain the UK economy will take a hit, but apocalyptic predictions are hyperbole. People can't seriously believe that the UK is going to tank permanently when hundreds of other countries aren't part of the EU and plenty of them do just fine.

[Scot Dutchy]

Brexiteers economics again. What FTA's does the UK have then? Ones negotiated outside the EU? Impossible. Once it has left all treaties are broken and dont apply. The average time for a simple FTA is 7 years. How many does the EU have which the UK enjoys? 60+!
The UK has not got the manpower to negotiate them and the associated discussions. What is to stop the UK from tanking permanently?

Have not read Dougan yet have we? Here is one on the subject we are discussion.

https://news.liverpool.ac.uk/2016/06/16 ... um-debate/

[pErvinalia]

Brexiteers economics again. What FTA's does the UK have then? Ones negotiated outside the EU? Impossible. Once it has left all treaties are broken and dont apply.

I didn't suggest that they would. So why are you even mentioning this? More empty rhetoric.

The average time for a simple FTA is 7 years.

As I said, and a point you didn't address, trade occurs while FTA's are negotiated. The idea that no trade will occur for 7 years til FTA's are put in place is simply nonsense.

The UK has not got the manpower to negotiate them and the associated discussions. What is to stop the UK from tanking permanently?

More hyperbole. New Zealand has an economy and population of something like 5% the size of the UK. You apparently aren't aware that New Zealand isn't part of the EU, and it's also not permanently tanking (any moreso than any other country). What kind of busted up logic finds you thinking that an advanced nation with an economy about 2000% bigger than New Zealand can't operate as an independent union, whereas tiny New Zealand, one single country, can do just fine.

Have not read Dougan yet have we? Here is one on the subject we are discussion.

https://news.liverpool.ac.uk/2016/06/16 ... um-debate/

Thanks, I'll have a look. Does it explain how there are many successful countries that aren't part of the EU, yet apparently the UK is going to be fucked permanently for not being part of the EU?

[Scot Dutchy]

Once again but sorry you dont have any idea. Look at Dougan maybe he can convince you. I give up. New Zealand is not the UK. Comparison is worthless. When did it leave the biggest trading bloc in the world? Your view from down under is very short sighted.

[pErvinalia]

And your grasp of logic and reasoning is frankly retarded. As is your ability to correctly read and parse what other people have written. In pretty much every subject you can't cogently argue any point at all. It's just empty statements over and over again.

In short, the idea that UK is permanently (or near enough) fucked is ridiculous hyperbole. It will certainly take a decent hit (depending on what sort of exit concessions it gets). But all this nonsense that the sky will fall in is just that, nonsense. You operate like a conservative - elitism, false dichotomies, fear, and empty rhetoric.

[Brian Peacock]

Yes, trade agreements can be negotiated. The EU has just signed one with Canada. It only took 10 years to negotiate. The UK's entire trading platform is embedded in the EU

More weird rhetoric. What exactly does this mean? The way you are describing it is like the UK economy is a building somewhere, and after Brexit that building will be knocked down, and at that point the UK won't have an economy (or half an economy, as you would have it). Yes, renegotiating deals takes time, but in a lot of cases for the UK after Brexit I suspect it will be a relatively simply "copy and paste" type of operation, not a whole rebuilding of the wall. And keep in mind, free trade is the default starting point of all trade. It only becomes non-free when one or the other side actively decides to slap barriers up.

I fail to see what's 'weird' about a plain old-fashioned fact?

Because it makes no real sense via the usual English I use. It sounds like an empty proclamation. What does it mean to say that a "trading platform", whatever that is, is "embedded" in the EU.

I think you should have read the whole post before replying, because I went on to explain how the UKs economy is bound to EU rules and the EU zone.

...And saying the "entire" platform makes it sound that whatever the "platform" is (which isn't clear), it will cease to exist after Brexit. A "trading platform" brings to mind electrical/electronic things, so I fail to see how they would cease to exist after brexit.

Platform: the base on which our economy sits.

Aye, free trade is a possibility, and the EU is effectively a free trade zone (once you're in it) - with no restrictions on the free movement of people, goods, services, and capital - but in support of your point can your think of any nation or region that is totally open to external goods and services?

Not without actually looking into it, but that wasn't my point.

My point, such that it is, was that free trade isn't the default arrangement between trading parties, as you implied, but a negotiated one.

The point was it's fairly hyperbolic to assume that as of Brexit there will be this Trumpian wall of trade restrictions by fiat.

In effect, there will be a post-Brexit wall of trade restrictions between the UK and the EU, because new trade agreements will have to be negotiated between the UK as a non-EU nation and the 27 nation trading alliance of the EU.

The natural state of any trade between any two entities is just an agreement on value. It's only if one side and/or the other wants to protect some of their own industries/services that barriers start to be considered.

Again, cite an example of a trading zone where that 'just an agreement on value' isn't negotiated - which is to say that barriers and tariffs etc are not just protectionist insistences but negotiated terms in reciprocal agreement between trading partners.

Currently the UK trades essentially freely with the EU. Why would either side want that to change? Most countries work towards more free, not less free, trade relations.

You're just not getting this are you? Post-Brexit both sides will want to come to some sort of trade agreement. A negotiated agreement will no doubt be brokered, in time. But the basis of those agreements (and there will have to be many) will take place within the context of the UK's imports/exports with the EU accounting for about a fifth of the UK's balance of payments, while the EU's imports/exports with the UK account for about 4% of theirs.

The Tory government, and the Leave campaigns before and after the referendum, have maintained that trade arrangements can be negotiated, agreed, and implemented as part of the Article 50 process. However, the 2-year Article 50 process is only set up to deal with a structured and orderly withdrawal from the union -- it is not a trade negotiation. While the EU have, to some extent, indulged the UKs demand to tie the withdrawal process to trade rules, specifically for the UK to retain complete access to the single market, the EU have made it clear that maintaining market access as it is today would require the UK to endorse and enforce the so-called 'Four Freedoms' (freedom of movement for people, goods, services, and capital).

Here's the political sticking point. If the UK accepted the principle of the four freedoms then the UK would have to accept the EU's authority and regularity frameworks in those areas, and contribute to their maintenance both administratively and financially. In effect, Britain would still be in the EU. Accepting the four freedoms is a condition of EU membership, and only membership guarantees unfettered market access.

The difficulty here is that the Leave campaign was promoted on the back of a claim that 'them EU foreigners are coming over here, stealing our job, shagging our women, getting free money from our benefits system, bunging up our school with their foreign children and our hospitals with their foreign diseases, and we can't do anything about it because of the EU!' For the government to honour the referendum (even though the virtue of Brexit was promoted on the back of nationalistic falsehoods and misdirections) they need to renounce freedom of movement (and by association the freedom of goods, services, and capital associated with that).

The EU will not compromise on the four freedoms, it is a founding principle of the EU the acceptance of which is a necessary condition for maintaining the UKs role and participation within it's free trade zone.

You'll see the bind this puts the country in. The Leavers and the government say that we should be able to retain all the benefits of the free trade zone and be able to exclude EU citizens from living and working in the UK, and the EU says no - the four freedoms are fundamental, level-ground conditions which ensure the integrity of that free trade zone. The Leavers will be blaming the EU for our economic woes for years to come, and indeed we've already heard talk of how the EU is seeking to 'punish' the UK for leaving, and how it's making things deliberately difficult for the UK just to show us who's boss etc. This is factual nonsense, but nonetheless it has a significant amount of rhetorical force with those who have already swallowed the Brexit lie.

All of the UKs trade agreements are EU trade agreements. It has to be that way, or else one supplier could import from outside the union at low cost and then undercut everyone else by exploiting the free movement of goods rules that the EU enshrines - or, in other words, thar would be a-smuggling

And this is the critical point that either some miss, or implies something to me that it doesn't actually represent. If the EU and UK have essentially the same trade agreements with external countries, then the UK already has a good frame work in place to use as a basis for any new trade deals. So this claim that keeps getting bandied about that trade is all of a sudden going to get impossibly hard for the UK, doesn't make much sense to me.

Now who's getting hyperbolic? Let's use a specific example. At the moment the UKs trade arrangements with, say, China reside in - are negotiated and implemented within - an EU/China deal. Importing into the UK from China is covered by the same arrangement as importing into any other EU country - importing into the UK from China is importing into the EU free trade zone. Chinese exporters might prefer the UK as a point of entry because English is prevalent within the Chinese business community and the lingua franca of international relations, and, well, we all owe the Chinese an awful lot of money, but whatever.... Of course, the same thing applies when it comes to exporting out of the UK into China, which is exporting out of the EU into China.

Post-Brexit the UK will not be able to just transpose the current EU-China arrangements. What China gets out of its business and trade relations with the UK is a foothold in the larger EU marketplace. That will be gone at a stroke. The Chinese will still want to do business with and in Britain post-Brexit, and the UK will definitely need to do business with China, but the balance of the relationship, the context of any future trade arrangements, will unavoidably and fundamentally be of different order than it is currently. An entirely new relationship and set of arrangements will have to be negotiated, and as usual, the major party will have the advantage and it will probably take several years to finalise. What happens in the meantime? (hint: Nobody knows, or if they do they're not saying). What applies to China here applies to all non-EU nations who might want to do business with and in the UK, and visa versa. That is a Yuge job! Yuge!

Will the EU no longer use UK financial services? If so, where will these new financial services materialise from? They clearly can't exist from within the EU aside from the UK, or there wouldn't be the need for UK's financial services. If the EU plans on importing more services, why wouldn't they just import UK services and keep the situation more or less exactly the same as it is now?

Having said all that, fuck financial services up the bum with a rusty chainsaw! They are part of the problem of neoliberalism, not part of the solution.

The City of London enjoys 'passport' status at the moment, which essentially means that London finance houses act as a gateway, mediator, and administrative hub between non-EU financial institutions and products and the EU proper. That kind of access has seen London-based financiers put fat upon fat, but it will disappear as soon as we leave the EU - the door will be closed. This is why the large facility houses like Goldman-(spit)-Sachs and JP-(spit)-Morgan are currently in the process of deciding whether to move their European headquarters to Dublin, Paris, Franfurt, or Rotterdam.

Ok, that makes sense I guess. But consider that the UK is 16% of the EU economy. There's still a big economy that needs servicing (including financial servicing) after a split.

The finance sector is an international arena. The City has benefited from its traditional position as one of the finest finance casinos in the world - but the services it supplies are completely transferable. When companies reduce their footprint in The City, as they are already doing, they'll concomitantly reduce their contribution to the economy. Post-Brexit The City will lose its foothold in the EU economic zone. With such a high proportion of our economy rooted in financial services the effects of Brexit will be unavoidably significant - and not in a good way.

Now, you'll no doubt continue to accuse me of hyperbole for pointing these kinds of things out, for suggesting that the ramifications of clean-break divorce with the EU is going to have serious, long-term, and adverse economic repercussions, and that negotiating replacement trade arrangements and restructuring the economy is going to be an uphill struggle for 20 years or more, and a struggle we still might not 'win'. Hey, I'm getting used to those kinds of accusations: I'm a 'Remoaner', a 'Saboteur', and an 'Enemy Of The People!'. Challenging the assumptions of those who favour leaving the EU opens one up to the charge of histrionics, fear-mongery, hyperbole, or even of being unpatriotic and treasonous - it's all part of the current narrative.

I never called you any of those things.

And I never said that you did,

I never said that you said that I did.

And I never said that yout said that I said that you said that I did.

I don't know enough of the specifics of the arguments for or against leaving to pick a side myself.

But you know enough to accuse me hyperbole for suggesting leaving the EU is going to have serious, long-term, and adverse economic consequences eh?

"recreating upto half of the economy from a standing start." If that's not hyperbole, I'm not here. A standing start implies from nothing. That's a bullshit claim, and you know it.

I don't think that's an exaggeration. The knock on effects of Brexit are difficult to predict, but the majority of our small manufacturing base is foreign-owned, as are our utilities and transport infrastructure, foreign investors account for a significant portion of the housing market and their input has contributed to spiralling housing costs, the Chinese own and manage our national communication infrastructure, US companies have been buying up the profitable spliced-off portions of our health service and are the major players in providing teacher and nurse training programs. What profit-minded international super-corp is not going to apply pressure to the UK after Brexit: "If you want us to continue to supply the goods and services on which your rely Britain then you'll need to cut us a better deal."? I can't see that leading to cheaper bills and more jobs (other than the of the sweatshop variety).

But as Rum said, it does look as though there is hyperbole coming from both sides.

And as I said - the charge of hyperbole is the order of the day, all part of the far-right-leaning political narrative, a kind of ad hom which allows people to avoid addressing some very serious, pressing, and uncomfortable truths.

Have you morphed into an anti-DaveDodo all of a sudden? I'm not part of the far-right-leaning political narrative.

Oh don't be so bloody sensitive. I'm not confusing your tone-policing of my views with you being a fascist - so I don't know why you should - I'm just pointing out, again, that your charge of hyperbole has rather scant grounds and that what I'm saying about the economic consequences of Brexit is not an exaggerated claim but a very real concern.

[pErvinalia]

I can't be arsed with this any more. Just cut the silly hyperbole out, k?

[pErvinalia]

But as Rum said, it does look as though there is hyperbole coming from both sides.

And as I said - the charge of hyperbole is the order of the day, all part of the far-right-leaning political narrative, a kind of ad hom which allows people to avoid addressing some very serious, pressing, and uncomfortable truths.

Have you morphed into an anti-DaveDodo all of a sudden? I'm not part of the far-right-leaning political narrative.

Oh don't be so bloody sensitive. I'm not confusing your tone-policing of my views with you being a fascist - so I don't know why you should - I'm just pointing out, again, that your charge of hyperbole has rather scant grounds and that what I'm saying about the economic consequences of Brexit is not an exaggerated claim but a very real concern.

That's demonstrably NOT what you were pointing out when you said that charges of hyperbole where "ALL" part of the "far-right-leaning political narrative... ad hom... wahhh... give me a safe space" My charges of hyperbole are a subset of "all" charges of hyperbole. So, yes, you were accusing me of pushing a far-right-leaning political narrative. What the fuck is going on with people and empty fucking rhetoric on this site lately? Can't anyone who worships at the altar of the status quo actually back up their fucking arguments with any reasoning and logic?! You basically busted out a piece of ridiculous rhetoric and then when you had that pointed out to you, you say "HEY! What's that over there?! ------------------------------->". Bollocks to that.

[pErvinalia]

And as a one line summary of my argument against the chicken little claims from both sides (but specifically the remain side here), I remind you fear peddlers that trade occurred long before the EU existed, and it occurs currently in non-EU parts of the world perfectly fine, and it will continue to occur whether the EU exists or not. It also occurs in the absence of free trade agreements. Ok, that was a few lines.

[Brian Peacock]

I can't be arsed with this any more. Just cut the silly hyperbole out, k?

[pErvinalia]

The chemicals in my brain aren't playing nice today...

[Brian Peacock]

Cup of tea and a walk to the beach might help.

[DaveDodo007]

The terms are relatively meaningless. 'Hard' simply means that the UK will be subject to the default international trading regulations regime rather than some tailor made arrangement with the EU. Nobody seems to have the evidence available as to the outcome of either path, though there is a gut reaction that the 'hard' route will be a tougher one. Frankly I have not seen any evidence either way - just fear tactics.

I blame fucking Cameron who started the whole palaver going.

I agree with your first paragraph, even as a conservative I didn't like Cameron but given the anti EU sentiment of the country I don't think he had much of a choice.