That’s not the Germans fault though is it.
kr79:
That’s not the Germans fault though is it.
Indirectly it probably is to a degree.Ze Germans have always had the notion that they deserve to get all the work and be rewarded more for whatever they do than anyone else because (as they see it) they are ze best and uber alles.
The other european governments have preferred to go along with it all since WW2 because they are zb scared of the costs of upsetting the zb’s and the results of what happens when things don’t go their way. 
It would be ‘interesting’ to see exactly what would happen ‘if’ Germany was made to take it’s fair share of all the downsides of the so called global free market economy and the resulting economic situation in Europe as a whole now.Let alone what would have happened if they’d have been subjected to the same type of economic policies as the British have had to put up with since the end of WW2.
The problem is that the Brits have always been too gullible and as in the example related to the latest double standards, of Germany calling for growth in it’s own economy,based on wage rises for it’s own workers,while wanting everyone else in Europe to go without,it’s time that the British decided to tell our government that what’s good for ze Germans is also good for us.Ironically it seems like it could be the French who might have more bottle in doing that than the British.
But importing cheap goods that we could be making for ourselves and oversupplying the domestic labour market with immigrant labour won’t help anyone.Which probably explains two of the reasons why ze Germans are ahead at the moment just as they’ve always been since WW2. 
The rest can mostly be put down to the sheer short term self interested greed of British industrialists compared to their German counterparts when it comes to doing what’s best for the domestic economy as a whole not just for themselves.
The last paragraph is the only bit of sense you are talking. Britain and Germany have both been democracy’s since 1945 and have taken different paths.
Perhaps why Germany has faired better is they have a broad mixed economy they still managacture lots of things and have service and banking industurys to complement it.
kr79:
The last paragraph is the only bit of sense you are talking. Britain and Germany have both been democracy’s since 1945 and have taken different paths.
Perhaps why Germany has faired better is they have a broad mixed economy they still managacture lots of things and have service and banking industurys to complement it.
I think paragraphs 1,2,3,4 and 5 were just as relevant in explaining the reasons.There has definitely been a double standards policy applied by Britain in the case of agreeing with the idea of a strong domestic economy driven by high income levels mostly spent on domestically produced goods in the case of Germany,but the total opposite of that here.
The only other possible motive for that,other than being scared of the results of not looking after ze German workers at the expense of the British,would be that the British banks and investment funds had more of a financial interest in the German economy than our own and it was therefore in their interests to zb up the UK economy so as to give the German one a competitive advantage and to keep the German one on top.I think the origins of where the investment came from and fortunes of manufacturers like VW after WW2 might give an indication as to the credibility of that idea.
As does the fact that North Sea oil wasn’t used to insulate us from the effects of the OPEC oil embargo and price rises of the 1970’s.Which kicked off the price/wage spiral and resulting industrial unrest here at the time.While as usual the Germans just got on with business as usual and paying their workers enough to afford the higher prices all helped by us supplying them with oil that should have been kept here for use on the British market only.
So effectively,at best,it was a case of keep the Germans happy because we know what can happen if they get upset.Or, at worst,a deliberate policy of sabotage of British industry thereby removing the competition to make sure that the British banks got a good return on their German investments.Or,more likely,a mixture of the two all done using the British workers’ unions and the so called lazy attitude of British workers compared to their German counterparts,as scapegoats for the obvious results of all that on the uk economy.
I think there’s a pattern here if you want to look for it. 
I see the pattern you talk crap and de rail every threat to either a kenworth 6x4 roadtrain is the solution to every haulage job. WW2 the Germans and some 1950s utopia that never probally existed and some half forgotten never has been politition or union leader is the answer to the worlds political and economic problems.
kr79:
I see the pattern you talk crap and de rail every threat to either a kenworth 6x4 roadtrain is the solution to every haulage job. WW2 the Germans and some 1950s utopia that never probally existed and some half forgotten never has been politition or union leader is the answer to the worlds political and economic problems.
Not me it was Orys amongst ‘others’ who decided to make an argument about all the so called lazy British workers who’d rather live on £65 per week than work blah blah issue to help explain why the government is ripping everyone off on fuel tax.It’s just that some of us have been around long enough and seen enough to know that it’s all typical tory propaganda bs.
But it’s no surprise that you couldn’t see the irony in British ex pats working in North America moaning about doubles outfits ,probably in many cases pulled by a KW tractor unit 
, when they’ve (rightly) been using the things for years on the type of long distance haulage jobs that they are best suited to and which to my knowledge is the only type of job that I’ve ever agreed there use for.I don’t think that I’ve said anything different than the late Stan Robinson did on that and most people (rightly) seem to think that he was no idiot. 
Are you a virgin?
kr79:
Are you a virgin?
kr79:
Carryfast I think you will find its labour who shafted us most with open door immigration policy’s.
Even before this current economic crisis this country had a fair size economic underclass who were happy to live on state benifits perhaps the government should have stoped there benifits rather than imported people to do jobs they could have.
at long sodding last a sensible post!
labour estimated about 50,000 poles would come over to work, they were stupidly wrong with that quote
i am obviously not old enough to know about the miners strikes etc but i get the impression carryfast thinks that trade unions closed shops etc are all good things?
at the end of the day regarding your post about line workers being a skilled job it isnt! i have went on the line at L.G electronics so i knew what i was putting people into and it is so boring mental strength is the biggest skill one of the positions was putting 3 screws into a microwave door for 8 hours at a time! this isnt skilled but it takes some doing and i wouldnt knock anyone who does it because i couldnt do it day in day out. the trouble was the people didnt see it as a way to earn a wage as they were better on the dole!
without any incentive to work your always going to get people who will choose not working as a lifestyle choice!
war1974:
kr79:
Carryfast I think you will find its labour who shafted us most with open door immigration policy’s.
Even before this current economic crisis this country had a fair size economic underclass who were happy to live on state benifits perhaps the government should have stoped there benifits rather than imported people to do jobs they could have.at long sodding last a sensible post!
labour estimated about 50,000 poles would come over to work, they were stupidly wrong with that quote
i am obviously not old enough to know about the miners strikes etc but i get the impression carryfast thinks that trade unions closed shops etc are all good things?
at the end of the day regarding your post about line workers being a skilled job it isnt! i have went on the line at L.G electronics so i knew what i was putting people into and it is so boring mental strength is the biggest skill one of the positions was putting 3 screws into a microwave door for 8 hours at a time! this isnt skilled but it takes some doing and i wouldnt knock anyone who does it because i couldnt do it day in day out. the trouble was the people didnt see it as a way to earn a wage as they were better on the dole!
without any incentive to work your always going to get people who will choose not working as a lifestyle choice!
If it hadn’t have been for trade unions living standards would have still been in the 1930’s in real terms in 1970.
I didn’t say that working on an assembly line was a skilled job.What I did say,just as you’ve said yourself,it takes something even more than just skill to do the job day in day out over the long term.Therefore the only way you’ll make that job viable for any normal person is to get the hours down and the pay rates high enough to earn a decent living on and as I’ve said any type of factory job wether skilled or not can still be a monotonous depressing working life depending on personal preference.In my case I’d prefer to do 12 hour shifts 5 days a week driving a truck over long distances for less money than doing 7 hours per day 5 days per week in a factory for more.
In view of all that it doesn’t take a genius to realise that the criterea for decent pay and conditions for manufacturing workers needs to be a lot better than paying someone such zb wages and/or asking them to work such high hours that being unemployed is considered a better option.
Which is why I think that closed shops,strong unions,German attitudes to wage levels and management and not basing the idea of industry on competing with the lowest common denominator,are all a good thing.
However there’s a big difference between my view,where I’m all for making the job viable by paying enough and keeping conditions tolerable,as opposed to the typical tory one of lowering conditions and pay to the point where unemployment would be a better option in which case the tory idea is to control that situation by making workers dependent on a non existent socialist ‘safety net’ and then taking that net away so relying on a form of slave labour based on desperation.
Carryfast:
So as I’ve said it’s all a big con put up by the British employers and the government to over supply the British labour market to keep wage levels down.I am fascinated by this theory. Are there any flying saucers involved as well?
Brilliant. TinFoilHatNet goes from strength to strength, and Carryfast is clearly David Icke’s anointed successor.
I lack cultural background but as far as I managed to find on google this Ickle is some kind of British Daeniken, only crazier?
Yes, but with a flatter earth and more turquoise.
i agree with the wage thing to an extent but you still have a large amount of people who see dole as a choice young girls getting pregnant so they get a flat money etc.
the unions now have no power at all which i think personally isnt great but i would hate to see the uk go back to the day of when i can remember workers going out on strike for nothing (swan hunters walked out because the water coolers broke and they didnt accept the management offer of bottled water in fridges )
closed shops were wrong why should anyone not be allowed to work in the docks just because old bob who worked there his life has a son who needs a job!
dont get me wrong i have never crossed a picket line and i never will as i will support people who feel that strongly they need to strike. whether i agree with it or not.
war1974:
i agree with the wage thing to an extent but you still have a large amount of people who see dole as a choice young girls getting pregnant so they get a flat money etc.the unions now have no power at all which i think personally isnt great but i would hate to see the uk go back to the day of when i can remember workers going out on strike for nothing (swan hunters walked out because the water coolers broke and they didnt accept the management offer of bottled water in fridges
closed shops were wrong why should anyone not be allowed to work in the docks just because old bob who worked there his life has a son who needs a job!
dont get me wrong i have never crossed a picket line and i never will as i will support people who feel that strongly they need to strike. whether i agree with it or not.
I don’t think that most of that is a million miles away from what I’m saying.However.My experience,of being on the shop floor during the 1970’s,was that no one went out on strike for no reason or would want to waste time and wages on striking over trivial issues and any action taken was all taken officially with union organisation and discipline and settled the same way with union negotiation.But those negotiations won’t ever get settled in a way in which everyone is happy if the union side is negotiating from a position of weakness.
Ironically one of the union settlements which I was subjected to at the time involved the removal of canteen tea breaks to be replaced with a few workers leaving the shop floor to get the sandwiches and drinks etc which then had to be consumed while still at the workplace and while still doing some work,which was requested by management to improve the production time losses of our two 15 minute tea breaks during the day.I was one of those who didn’t support the idea but the management seemed happy enough to go along with such union discipline when it suited them and no surprise that such settlements didn’t get into the tory bs propaganda machine,while other,usually exaggerated, misinformation often did when it suited the typical let’s bash British workers at the expense of their German counterparts and competitors stories. 
In most cases the closed shop was as adavantageous to the employers as it was to the workers in that it’s much easier to deal collectively with the workforce knowing that any decisions made apply across the board with the type of discipline which applies in the closed shop situation.Compared to the type of unofficial actions which often applied in workplaces without full union organisation of the workforce.
As for girls getting pregnant to ‘get a free council house’.I think that’s more a symptom of the fact that the unions lost the plot,in regards to the fact,that it should be the man of the house who can find a job easily and then earn enough to afford a mortgage on a decent house and to be able to keep his wife and family with the wife staying at home to raise her own children.Instead of which the Tory idea is one of 30+ year old career women,having kids when they are old enough to be their grandmothers,and sending them out to child minders,while the wife has to work full time to contribute to the two wages required these days to keep one family unit and the public and the unions are stupid enough to support it all.
Carryfast:
As for girls getting pregnant to ‘get a free council house’.I think that’s more a symptom of the fact that the unions lost the plot,in regards to the fact,that it should be the man of the house who can find a job easily and then earn enough to afford a mortgage on a decent house and to be able to keep his wife and family with the wife staying at home to raise her own children.Instead of which the Tory idea is one of 30+ year old career women,having kids when they are old enough to be their grandmothers,and sending them out to child minders,while the wife has to work full time to contribute to the two wages required these days to keep one family unit and the public and the unions are stupid enough to support it all.
Or maybe it’s the result of uncontrolled benefit giveaways. In Poland for example if you refuse to undertake job offered to you by equivalent of Job Centre three times, you loose your benefits. Council flat are very rare to come by and go only to people in great need. And guess what? There arent crowds of homeless young people living under every bridge…
Because there is a big group of people (in every nation) that would like to avoid work when possible. Make it impossible to evade work and support only these, who really struggle - problem sorted. And savings on your social system will be much greater than these you expect from kicking all the foreigners away.
orys:
Carryfast:
As for girls getting pregnant to ‘get a free council house’.I think that’s more a symptom of the fact that the unions lost the plot,in regards to the fact,that it should be the man of the house who can find a job easily and then earn enough to afford a mortgage on a decent house and to be able to keep his wife and family with the wife staying at home to raise her own children.Instead of which the Tory idea is one of 30+ year old career women,having kids when they are old enough to be their grandmothers,and sending them out to child minders,while the wife has to work full time to contribute to the two wages required these days to keep one family unit and the public and the unions are stupid enough to support it all.Or maybe it’s the result of uncontrolled benefit giveaways. In Poland for example if you refuse to undertake job offered to you by equivalent of Job Centre three times, you loose your benefits. Council flat are very rare to come by and go only to people in great need. And guess what? There arent crowds of homeless young people living under every bridge…
Because there is a big group of people (in every nation) that would like to avoid work when possible. Make it impossible to evade work and support only these, who really struggle - problem sorted. And savings on your social system will be much greater than these you expect from kicking all the foreigners away.
Orys I think you’ve missed all my previous posts where I’ve said that there shouldn’t be any council houses and we should abolish the whole social security system and the NHS and replace it all with a privately funded insurance based system just as has mainly applied through the years in the states.However that type of cover don’t come cheap and it’s my bet that it’s the east european immigrants who’d find that idea more of a problem than we would considering that most east europeans wouldn’t know what hit them under that idea and yes there’s plenty of people living in tents (and carvans if they’re very lucky) in the states and who die because they can’t afford the health care costs in the new global free market economy in which they have to compete in an open market against low wage economies.
However your view of the issue of the so called ‘avoiding of work by women’ all depends on wether you think that it’s better for a woman to have to work full time for a household to survive or wether it should be a case that women shouldn’t be expected to work at all and it’s the man’s job to keep his family.Although that’s going to be a bit difficult when immigrants are taking the jobs and depressing wage rates.
Although I can understand how that might be a problem for the east europeans who’ve been indoctrinated by a load of commy zb’s who think that it’s ok to put a woman in a tank to face all the ‘aspects’ and ‘implications’ of doing that job in front line active service.
Carryfast:
Although I can understand how that might be a problem for the east europeans who’ve been indoctrinated by a load of commy zb’s who think that it’s ok to put a woman in a tank to face all the ‘aspects’ and ‘implications’ of doing that job in front line active service.
It might be a result of my commie indoctrination, but in my view woman is not to be “put” - neither in the tank, or in the kitchen. In my view woman has right to decide for herself… 
And the same applies to man. Obviously I am still far from superior British standards…
I am also amazed how smoothly you manages to put in every post that Eastern Europeans are dull and that they are to blame for something I have to say I am impressing by your equilibristic skills on that field
orys:
Carryfast:
Although I can understand how that might be a problem for the east europeans who’ve been indoctrinated by a load of commy zb’s who think that it’s ok to put a woman in a tank to face all the ‘aspects’ and ‘implications’ of doing that job in front line active service.It might be a result of my commie indoctrination, but in my view woman is not to be “put” - neither in the tank, or in the kitchen. In my view woman has right to decide for herself…
I am also amazed how smoothly you manages to put in every post that Eastern Europeans are dull and that they are to blame for something
You obviously don’t think that a woman has the ‘right’ to ‘decide’ for ‘herself’ in the case where the woman decides that she wants to have her kids when she’s young enough so that she can see them grow up and make her a great grandmother.In which case that often results in the unemployed or underpaid father of those kids not being able to support his family because there aren’t enough jobs and those jobs which there are mean that she would also need to be working herself full time,in which case the kids are raised more by child minders than their own mother and probably wait until she’s too old to have those kids anyway,in order to be able to afford to buy a house.
Women’s so called ‘rights’ have actually turned into something which they’d have been better off without because all it’s done for most working class girls is to put them into the same industrial treadmill as that which would/should have only been faced by the man of the house to keep the family not both him and his wife.
Carryfast:
You obviously don’t think that a woman has the ‘right’ to ‘decide’ for ‘herself’ in the case where the woman decides that she wants to have her kids when she’s young enough so that she can see them grow up and make her a great grandmother
This is not the case that war1974 had in mind, and you know it perfectly well.