Lots of our elected MP's and local councillors have never run companies or had a proper job.
They have left UNI with a degree in politics and never gotten any other experience.
Is this why the country has changed? |
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
"Lots of our elected MP's and local councillors have never run companies or had a proper job.
They have left UNI with a degree in politics and never gotten any other experience.
Is this why the country has changed?"
As opposed to when people became politicians because of nepotism, family connections, going to the right school, etc?
Meh.
Politics never changes. |
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
 |
By (user no longer on site) 39 weeks ago
|
"Lots of our elected MP's and local councillors have never run companies or had a proper job.
They have left UNI with a degree in politics and never gotten any other experience.
Is this why the country has changed?"
The system of keeping those at the top with all the money and power, while keeping the rest of us fighting for scraps has been refined over the years. |
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
|
By (user no longer on site) 39 weeks ago
|
"Lots of our elected MP's and local councillors have never run companies or had a proper job.
They have left UNI with a degree in politics and never gotten any other experience.
Is this why the country has changed?"
Changed from what to what?
Isn't it just progress and you getting old? |
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
"Lots of our elected MP's and local councillors have never run companies or had a proper job.
They have left UNI with a degree in politics and never gotten any other experience.
Is this why the country has changed?"
I suppose you'd need to specify how you think it's changed, and why you (presumably) think that's bad.
But broadly if you're looking for a reason for why politics, and by extension politicians, are progressively worse - less serious, less effective, less credible etc - with each successive government, usually a good starting point is to understand the myth of infinite economic growth and how it makes a mockery of any attempt to govern for the good of the people. |
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
|
By (user no longer on site) 38 weeks ago
|
Yes, they are mostly students straight from the Uni political debating societies. Then they get positions as interns at Westminster doing research or counting paper clips. They become MPs with very little live experience and none at all of the workplace. There should be a requirement for a min. number of years practical experience. Either that or they should read FAB Politics every morning. |
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
|
By (user no longer on site) 38 weeks ago
|
"Lots of our elected MP's and local councillors have never run companies or had a proper job.
They have left UNI with a degree in politics and never gotten any other experience.
Is this why the country has changed?
I suppose you'd need to specify how you think it's changed, and why you (presumably) think that's bad.
But broadly if you're looking for a reason for why politics, and by extension politicians, are progressively worse - less serious, less effective, less credible etc - with each successive government, usually a good starting point is to understand the myth of infinite economic growth and how it makes a mockery of any attempt to govern for the good of the people."
When you say “myth of infinite economic growth” what do you base that on?
If you look at global growth figures over the last fifty years say, then for some examples (some of these are decade averages):
1970: 6%
1974: 3%
1980: 4%
1990: 3.5%
2000: 3.5%
2009: -1.7%
2015: 3.2%
2020: -2.8%
2024: 2.7%
2025 (IMF projection): 3.0%
2026 (IMF projection): 3.1%
There are obviously standout years there impacted by oil shocks, financial crisis and Covid but otherwise the annual growth figures looks broadly static (maybe some slight slowing) over the last 55 years rather than indicating any “myth of finite growth”.
You may be thinking of laggards like the EU and UK where growth is more stilted, but that’s more due to the misguided governments in those regions.
|
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
"Lots of our elected MP's and local councillors have never run companies or had a proper job.
They have left UNI with a degree in politics and never gotten any other experience.
Is this why the country has changed?
I suppose you'd need to specify how you think it's changed, and why you (presumably) think that's bad.
But broadly if you're looking for a reason for why politics, and by extension politicians, are progressively worse - less serious, less effective, less credible etc - with each successive government, usually a good starting point is to understand the myth of infinite economic growth and how it makes a mockery of any attempt to govern for the good of the people.
When you say “myth of infinite economic growth” what do you base that on?
"
It's not based on a reality, that's my point.
The broad political narrative in capitalist countries is that sustained economic expansion is objectively good, and therefore that as long as GDP is higher this year than it was last year.
Conversely, economic contraction is therefore seem as a disaster, and over more than a couple of quarters, apocalypse.
As relates to OP's question, this creates a paradigm where everything every politician says or does is framed in terms of its impact on the balance sheet, with virtually no consideration of its other benefits or drawbacks. So politicians become accountants, procurers, sales managers and so on rather than focusing on what their role is supposed to be, i.e. focusing on outcomes for their consituents, that include but are not limited to the financial ones. |
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
|
By (user no longer on site) 38 weeks ago
|
"Lots of our elected MP's and local councillors have never run companies or had a proper job.
They have left UNI with a degree in politics and never gotten any other experience.
Is this why the country has changed?
I suppose you'd need to specify how you think it's changed, and why you (presumably) think that's bad.
But broadly if you're looking for a reason for why politics, and by extension politicians, are progressively worse - less serious, less effective, less credible etc - with each successive government, usually a good starting point is to understand the myth of infinite economic growth and how it makes a mockery of any attempt to govern for the good of the people.
When you say “myth of infinite economic growth” what do you base that on?
It's not based on a reality, that's my point.
The broad political narrative in capitalist countries is that sustained economic expansion is objectively good, and therefore that as long as GDP is higher this year than it was last year.
Conversely, economic contraction is therefore seem as a disaster, and over more than a couple of quarters, apocalypse.
As relates to OP's question, this creates a paradigm where everything every politician says or does is framed in terms of its impact on the balance sheet, with virtually no consideration of its other benefits or drawbacks. So politicians become accountants, procurers, sales managers and so on rather than focusing on what their role is supposed to be, i.e. focusing on outcomes for their consituents, that include but are not limited to the financial ones."
There was no growth at all in Britain for hundreds of years before the Industrial Revolution.
Do you think people were better off?
Is that what you’d like to return to? |
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
"Lots of our elected MP's and local councillors have never run companies or had a proper job.
They have left UNI with a degree in politics and never gotten any other experience.
Is this why the country has changed?
I suppose you'd need to specify how you think it's changed, and why you (presumably) think that's bad.
But broadly if you're looking for a reason for why politics, and by extension politicians, are progressively worse - less serious, less effective, less credible etc - with each successive government, usually a good starting point is to understand the myth of infinite economic growth and how it makes a mockery of any attempt to govern for the good of the people.
When you say “myth of infinite economic growth” what do you base that on?
It's not based on a reality, that's my point.
The broad political narrative in capitalist countries is that sustained economic expansion is objectively good, and therefore that as long as GDP is higher this year than it was last year.
Conversely, economic contraction is therefore seem as a disaster, and over more than a couple of quarters, apocalypse.
As relates to OP's question, this creates a paradigm where everything every politician says or does is framed in terms of its impact on the balance sheet, with virtually no consideration of its other benefits or drawbacks. So politicians become accountants, procurers, sales managers and so on rather than focusing on what their role is supposed to be, i.e. focusing on outcomes for their consituents, that include but are not limited to the financial ones.
There was no growth at all in Britain for hundreds of years before the Industrial Revolution.
Do you think people were better off?
Is that what you’d like to return to?"
... because that, in your view, is the other of only two options? |
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
» Add a new message to this topic
