Re: Brexit Anyone? : Fri Oct 14, 2016 7:50 am  

The Devil's Advocate wrote:

What will you do when when fuel goes up, or what about that foreign holiday, & God forbid when your new phone cost 20% more than the last

We have a huge trade deficit with the rest of the world. The whole idea of devaluation is to boost exports and more particularly reduce imports. The latter is key. If people change behaviour the devaluation will prove an economic saviour and prevent the UK having to sell its remaining property and corporate assets to foreigners in order to plug the gap. We are becoming a colony and need to reverse that before it is too late. As to holidays, the pound dropping will result in even more tourists here and a huge boost to our economy from that alone. If less of us go abroad and spend here, it's a win - win.

Look what happened when we came out of the ERM and the doom-mongers panicked about the collapsed pound - the economy went on a great upward journey.

Re: Brexit Anyone? : Fri Oct 14, 2016 8:42 am  

Dally wrote:

We have a huge trade deficit with the rest of the world. The whole idea of devaluation is to boost exports and more particularly reduce imports. The latter is key. If people change behaviour the devaluation will prove an economic saviour and prevent the UK having to seep its remaining property and corporate assets to foreigners in order to plug the gap. We are becoming a colony and need to reverse that before it is too late. As to holidays, the pound dropping will result in even more tourists here and a huge boost to our economy from that alone. If less of us go abroad and spend here, it's a win - win.

Look what happened when we came out of the ERM and the doom-mongers panicked about the collapsed pound - the economy went on a great upward journey.

I really want to be in your world.

Devaluation is never done from a position of strength and is an indicator that your economy and currency have difficulties.
If you want to see an extreme example of this, just look at the plight of Zimbabwe.

Yes, it will give a short term boost to exports and it could also help tourism in the UK but, if you seriously think that this will save our economy, which is utterly reliant on imports (which are costing "us" 12 -15% more that before the Brexit vote), you are, at best, seriously optimistic.

Our country relies massively on "invisible" exports and even this is put at risk by the Brexit vote.

Everything will be ok though as we have "taken back control"

Re: Brexit Anyone? : Fri Oct 14, 2016 11:48 am  

The Devil's Advocate wrote: How dare Unilever have the audacity to put up their prices by ten percent just because the pound has dropped by fifteen percent against the Euro. Interesting to note that prices rarely come down, even when the pound is sky high. It's just typical big business bully tactics, something many of us have become sick of. If you really want to feel sorry for Unilever, have a look at their list of brands including the fifteen which have sales of 1 billion Euros or more. The illusion of choice in action. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Unilever_brands

The Devil's Advocate wrote: How dare Unilever have the audacity to put up their prices by ten percent just because the pound has dropped by fifteen percent against the Euro. Interesting to note that prices rarely come down, even when the pound is sky high. It's just typical big business bully tactics, something many of us have become sick of. If you really want to feel sorry for Unilever, have a look at their list of brands including the fifteen which have sales of 1 billion Euros or more. The illusion of choice in action. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Unilever_brands

Re: Brexit Anyone? : Fri Oct 14, 2016 12:11 pm  

King Street Cat wrote:

It's just typical big business bully tactics, something many of us have become sick of.

Indeed - and in a post-Brexit world, that can go along with 'facts' and 'experts' on the list of things we've become sick of.

Re: Brexit Anyone? : Fri Oct 14, 2016 12:17 pm  

King Street Cat wrote: Interesting to note that prices rarely come down, even when the pound is sky high. It's just typical big business bully tactics, something many of us have become sick of. If you really want to feel sorry for Unilever, have a look at their list of brands including the fifteen which have sales of 1 billion Euros or more. The illusion of choice in action. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Unilever_brands You're right about prices not coming down very often but, ironically, we probably have the supermarket giants (and more recently the Lidl and Aldis of this world) to thank for keeping prices from suppliers surpressed. Indeed, occasionally they go too far and squeeze the life out of some companies in the supply chain. However, the unprecedented drop in the value of Sterling and associated price changes are nothing to do with bully boy tactics (although this is what Tesco appeared to be trying with Unilever), it's something that has happened to the Pound and the Euro in relation to other world currencies. If you are unfortunate to enough to be buying goods from overseas, there are major, major problems with currency led inflation, also obvious if you go on holiday and need some Euros or Dollars for your trip and although there are fluctuations in currency all the time, the current drop is directly attributable to the uncertainty within Europe, caused by the Brexit vote. Of course, over the longer term things will stabilise but, The UK has voted for change and what we are witnessing is the first part of the metamorphosis. The timing of the referendum, brought about because of divisions in the Tory party, is utterly diabolical. Even those driving the exit knew that there would be an economic shock and to have this on the back of the deepest recession in recent times is a bloody disgrace. Some of the so called "scaremongering" that was ridiculed by Boris and Farage etc is happening now and it's only the beginning of the process. I just hope that we survive the "choppy waters" without another deep recession. On the plus side, if things get really bad, it will slow down the number of people wanting to enter Europe and the UK.

King Street Cat wrote: Interesting to note that prices rarely come down, even when the pound is sky high. It's just typical big business bully tactics, something many of us have become sick of. If you really want to feel sorry for Unilever, have a look at their list of brands including the fifteen which have sales of 1 billion Euros or more. The illusion of choice in action. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Unilever_brands You're right about prices not coming down very often but, ironically, we probably have the supermarket giants (and more recently the Lidl and Aldis of this world) to thank for keeping prices from suppliers surpressed. Indeed, occasionally they go too far and squeeze the life out of some companies in the supply chain. However, the unprecedented drop in the value of Sterling and associated price changes are nothing to do with bully boy tactics (although this is what Tesco appeared to be trying with Unilever), it's something that has happened to the Pound and the Euro in relation to other world currencies. If you are unfortunate to enough to be buying goods from overseas, there are major, major problems with currency led inflation, also obvious if you go on holiday and need some Euros or Dollars for your trip and although there are fluctuations in currency all the time, the current drop is directly attributable to the uncertainty within Europe, caused by the Brexit vote. Of course, over the longer term things will stabilise but, The UK has voted for change and what we are witnessing is the first part of the metamorphosis. The timing of the referendum, brought about because of divisions in the Tory party, is utterly diabolical. Even those driving the exit knew that there would be an economic shock and to have this on the back of the deepest recession in recent times is a bloody disgrace. Some of the so called "scaremongering" that was ridiculed by Boris and Farage etc is happening now and it's only the beginning of the process. I just hope that we survive the "choppy waters" without another deep recession. On the plus side, if things get really bad, it will slow down the number of people wanting to enter Europe and the UK.

Re: Brexit Anyone? : Fri Oct 14, 2016 12:18 pm  

bren2k wrote:

Indeed - and in a post-Brexit world, that can go along with 'facts' and 'experts' on the list of things we've become sick of.

Which "side" would you call "bully boys", Tesco or Unilever ?

Re: Brexit Anyone? : Fri Oct 14, 2016 12:27 pm  

wrencat1873 wrote:

I really want to be in your world.

Devaluation is never done from a position of strength and is an indicator that your economy and currency have difficulties.
If you want to see an extreme example of this, just look at the plight of Zimbabwe.

Yes, it will give a short term boost to exports and it could also help tourism in the UK but, if you seriously think that this will save our economy, which is utterly reliant on imports (which are costing "us" 12 -15% more that before the Brexit vote), you are, at best, seriously optimistic.

Our country relies massively on "invisible" exports and even this is put at risk by the Brexit vote.

Everything will be ok though as we have "taken back control"

If you read what I wrote rather than what you hoped I had written, you will see I said that devaluation will only work if we stop importing as much (effectively because we are poorer). The whole reason we have the largest current account of any developed country is because we are leaving above our collective means.

Re: Brexit Anyone? : Fri Oct 14, 2016 1:55 pm  

ah so unilever chanced their arm.... only to back down again

Re: Brexit Anyone? : Fri Oct 14, 2016 2:22 pm  

wrencat1873 wrote:

Which "side" would you call "bully boys", Tesco or Unilever ?

Neither - I was rather using the opportunity to make a facetious point about the chippy Brexiteer attitude of being generally sick of things.

As it happens, I agree with your corollary point - that supermarkets have done a lot to keep consumer prices down by squeezing suppliers; price wars are quite handy for customers, providing you don't mind your milk and vegetables being the result of Victorian workhouse conditions.

Re: Brexit Anyone? : Fri Oct 14, 2016 2:38 pm  

King Street Cat wrote:

If you really want to feel sorry for Unilever, have a look at their list of brands including the fifteen which have sales of 1 billion Euros or more. The illusion of choice in action.

I feel sorry for Unilever & Tesco is the same measure, the square root of F.A.

brearley84 wrote:

ah so unilever chanced their arm.... only to back down again

Yeah, everything is now fine & dandy because Unilever & Tesco have come to a compromise on price increases, move along people, nothing to see here. We can all laugh again now the storm in a teacup has passed.

I think I just need to get with the program, no more foreign adventures for me, there's enough history & culture on my own doorstep. Interacting with the unwashed of Europe, what was I thinking.