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Our (second-)fav magazine is back with a banger: BRITAIN IS ON SALE, EVERYONE! (#1020250, #1006848)
if you were under the impression that Britain was expensive, overtaxed, overregulated etc, The Economist leaders are here to tell you otherwise.
Britain’s population is ageing and too dependent on handouts. Growth is dismal, public services are starved of funds and taxes are high and look likely to drift higher. Yet few people in politics seem able to square all that with the fact that Britain is already living beyond its means and depends on loans from foreigners to pay the bills.
The UK government fiscal troubles aside, UK assets are cheap (forgot that overpriced, under-maintained, uninsulated garbage they call "housing" over there):
Britain is cheap—cheaper than warranted by the obvious risks. If the government can seize the opportunity, then being value for money offers Britons a pathway to better economic growth. Britain’s sales pitch begins with the bargain-basement cost of assets and labour. Gilts have lower prices (and hence higher yields) than just about any rich-world bonds. Stock valuations are low, too
Well-educated British workers are cheap, too. Feeble wage growth and the clobbering sterling took after the Brexit referendum has made them cost-competitive, especially in services, including consulting, IT, law, human resources and the like. JPMorgan Chase, a bank, says that the cost of its technologists in Glasgow is closer to that in India than Texas.
This, though, I believe when I see... politicians willingly cut the pork fat??
Sir Keir must not succumb to the temptation to run up more debt, mess with credible institutions like the Bank of England and the OBR, or attempt to create room for profligacy by once again fiddling with the fiscal rules. Instead, he must confront the fantasy economics which rejects all cuts to welfare as immoral without regard to what is affordable.
"the rub is the politics," since:

"Embracing the Poundland strategy would run against a century of rhetoric obsessed with restoring the Great to Great Britain. After the chest-thumping of the Brexit era, a Poundland prime minister would be accused of declinism and of selling Britain short"

Truly. Brits think that they're rich, powerful, and globally important when they're mediocre, stagnating, and globally ignored.

"After a decade of sorry growth, Britain has no shame—and lots to gain—from being a bargain."

Fucking beautiful graphics though

oh man, I still think with despair about how much more euros (technically Bulgarian levs, but the currency is pegged to the euro) we got for our pounds before Brexit, it was a golden time, for me at least!
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public services are starved of funds and taxes are high
How are they managing both of those? I'm assuming the former is BS.
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Usually. or "starved" is in relation to some unicorn-type idea
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Like how America's schools are perpetually "under funded".
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Or health care in Europe...
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stackers have outlawed this. turn on wild west mode in your /settings to see outlawed content.