Its almost budget time....

[LosOjos]

I've just found a website for jobs in Poland. Bonus.

 

Care to share?

[tech_guy]

Poland Jobs - Search Jobs and Resumes

[mattx]

This gif sums it up for me....

 

http://img687.imageshack.us/img687/9941/condem.gif

[somabc]

Anyone want to quit their job and form an IT Consulting company with me?

[tmcd35]

Anyone want to quit their job and form an IT Consulting company with me?

 

How much are you paying

[somabc]

Depends how much business you bring in

[aerospacemango]

I'm pretty certain we could get a huge consultancy firm going, with offices all over the country.

 

Now, who's going to the bank for the business loan?

[torledo]

While everyone has been discussing VAT, wage freezes etc.....

 

Did anybody spot "He said his Budget implied further £17bn cuts in departmental spending by 2014/15, unprotected departments face an average real cut of around 25% over four years. "

 

So there is more bad news to come, when they decide where this axe falls.....

 

yeah, i did notice that.

 

but i also picked up on osbourne saying that there would be no cuts in capital investment. quite how we can have a situation where departmental cuts amount to 25% over four years without capital spending cuts.

[torledo]

What an idiot - he goes on about fighting child poverty but then freezes child allowance and puts up VAT !!- what a pratt.

A progressive alliance ? Who is trying to kid ?

 

wait a minute. don't do a harperson and fly off the handle like a complete wally.

 

The 10p tax rate has been reinstated, there's a rise in the amount before which income tax is payable, there are some tax credits increases that will benefit the poor [albeit linking to RPI overall is supposed to 'save' the govt. money], NO public sector pay freeze for those on low incomes.

 

The most regressive bit of VAT [an increase applied to food and clothes] has been avoided. If we weigh up all of that lot with the points you mention are the poor technically better or worse off ?

 

i have to side with sparky, there is no reasoned debate on this thread. The same old guff about the libdems selling out and the tories favouring the rich.

Gordon Brown reducing capital gains to 18% helped the rich, but there was no mention of that while piddly amounts in increases for child benefit and pensions were being delivered in past nulabour budgets.

 

What a gullible, all too easily convinced [by past nulab budgets] lot some of you are.

Edited June 22, 2010 by torledo

[tmcd35]

Depends how much business you bring in

 

Ahhh, yes - reminds me why I don't like working in the private sector - thanks for that!

 

 

Speaking of impending cuts. Not to much detail as of now but had an interesting conversation with a deputy head earlier whose suggest that the LA needs to claw back some money this financial year and so some of my IT budget may be cut. Can't say it was unexpected, just suprised it happened so soon. I was hoping atleast to get to next April before the axe fell.

[Jiser]

I.T. cuts no doubt will be the first to happen. They are getting rid of 25 % of the education budget. More and more open source, less spare parts, before more and more resourceful and not looking forward to a pay rise. Good luck!

[witch]

What a gullible, all too easily convinced [by past nulab budgets] lot some of you are.

 

I heartily agree - and would add that some of you lot seem easily convinced by the current tory rhetoric as well!

[localzuk]

I don't think the rhetoric is getting to me, I'm just looking at the state the country is in, and realising that we are in need of cuts and changes. Personally, I would still have preferred them to delay the cuts until the recession was slightly further behind us, but we can't all get what we want.

 

The tory cuts plan does actually seem pretty wide-ranging and relatively fair. We could all argue until we're blue in the face over whether cutting corporation tax is the right thing to do, but that would just be an argument of different economic models. Being from the Isle of Man, I know that low corporation tax can bring a huge amount of business to your country, so I can see it working to some extent. However, there are only some sorts of businesses who would be looking at that sort of cost saving - other areas will base themselves in places like Hong Kong due to the relatively high availability of cheap manufacturing and cheap labour in the rest of China.

 

So, yes, poor people are going to be worse off. We all are, rich and poor. Whatever the government did though, the rich would be able to weather it a lot better than the poor simply because they're rich! Even if their income taxes were increased further, they'd still be able to weather it just fine, but might decide to leave the UK and set up shop elsewhere...

 

So, the Tories are relatively fair, but premature IMO. At the same time, I don't think Labour would have been too much different with anything they wanted to do if they'd won...

 

One thing I do disagree with though, is them scrapping the tax relief that was planned for the video games industry though, as that is going to devastate what little we've got left, and will just lead to companies such as EA buying up any remaining independent software houses.

[broc]

It's all spin... lies, damned lies, & politics........

 

We had a long spell of Tory politics, until people got fed up & voted them out.

 

Now we have had a long spell of New Labour politics & people got fed up with them & voted them out.....

 

The only question is how long will people put up with the ConDems? The lies are already coming out from the budget.... VAT increases, protecting the poor......

 

If things go from bad to worse will they survive their first term of office before the coalition collapses? If things improve will people give them another term?

[torledo]

At the same time, I don't think Labour would have been too much different with anything they wanted to do if they'd won...

.

 

it's the labour shrieking voices which probably prevent the tories from going further with spending cuts. I think labour would have needlessly continued to protect spending beyond what was necessary.....they probably couldn't believe their luck when they were forced to bring forward!!! spending to combat the recession. LOL

And the libdem presence in the coaltion prevented the tories from going further with tax incentives.....so all in all it's a pretty boring emergency budget. I am uncomfortable with the poor suffering aswell as the rich, but let's not forget that brown-blair weren't really committed to giving the rich a haircut either. Capital gains, non-doms, financial liberalisation [none of that was really tackled was it ?]

[witch]

I agree - it could have been a lot worse

[PEO]

myself and the wife planned ahead and created a new budget, we realised that we could do with out some things, so we have cut back on them, next step is our mobile phone contracts. All in all we are both planning for the next 5 year so we dont fall into dept.

[SpuffMonkey]

I agree - it could have been a lot worse

 

I don't think you can say that until the "review process" has run its course and we see really see the practical effects of the cuts (not least to our pensions and working conditions) on all the services that we have become used to.

[witch]

I don't think you can say that until the "review process" has run its course and we see really see the practical effects of the cuts (not least to our pensions and working conditions) on all the services that we have become used to.

Of course - but at first glance it isn't as vicious as it could have been.

[Hightower]

Well this is my plan to handle the cuts:

 

1) Buy all house hold goods on my Argos card

2) Pay for shopping with my Asda credit card

3) Pay for diesel on my MasterCard

4) Use mobile phone contracts as an easy way to get 'cashback'

5) Extend my already maxed out loan

6) Sell the wifes gold at 'makemerichquick.com'

 

NOTE: I don't really have that much debt!

But on a serious note, how long did the country believe that could get everything on tick, and owe money here and there? I was brought up in the height of the miners strike, and my family literally didn't have two pennies to rub together. My Mam and Dad went through some rough times, but not once did they get into debt - they simply lived within their means. What the hell gave labour the right to tell people they could have what they wanted, when they wanted, without having to worry about the consequences?!

 

I was brought up with "you save for it. if you cant save for it then you cant have it". If I wanted a new car I made sure the money was in the bank, and not spread across 'easy payments'.

 

Personally, I think we were in the eye of the storm with Labour (and I'm from a strongly opinioned labour family). To me it looks like the storm is moving on, even though we have to weather the worst part of it yet.

[mwnci]

What the hell gave labour the right to tell people they could have what they wanted, when they wanted, without having to worry about the consequences?!

 

I disagree that this is a political issue. People can't help but want more stuff, and are goaded into believing that they can have what they want by the companies that are going to take their last pennies. The ultimate problem is that we are a greedy country, and no change in government can change that. I doubt the recession or a new government will see the decline of store cards or finance for getting a new sofa.

[Rydra]

Credit cards and loans, outside of mortgages are all a waste of time.

 

So many of my friends live in the red; they have credit cards or overdrafts which they run to the limit, get paid which brings them back in the green, and then restart the process.

 

I'm 25 now, i've had one payment on a credit card, it was there for less than 2 weeks before I paid it (honeymoon in the US, they like credit cards over there). One training company loan (for a train at home scheme i got screwed on, long story for another day), and my mortgage, which I pay the repayments on comfortably.

 

I have never got how people can live in their overdraft like that, and still do things like holidays, new TV's, new cars. My concience just wouldn't let me do it.

 

All in all, as long as interest rates don't screw up, and they don't kill the school system completely, I should be fine with the new budget.

I have no debts, not on any benefits, have a good lump of savings, due to inherit a fair sum from some recently deceased granparents (but not enough to really get stung on). I don't drink much, don't smoke, and I live close enough to work if I had to i could walk or cycle.

 

My big worry is the screw up part; there is a good chance, that the cuts to the education sector could see me severely restricted on future prospects. I'm now looking at no pay rises, unlikely to get a paygrade review, less likely to get a new job elsewhere in my field, a nerf to my pension, and a complete lack of money and resources to do my job effectively.

I liked education, because through the recession it was a safe place to be. Now, public sector is quite a dangerous place to be working, I'm wondering if I'd be better off in the private sector.

[SpuffMonkey]

I disagree that this is a political issue. People can't help but want more stuff, and are goaded into believing that they can have what they want by the companies that are going to take their last pennies. The ultimate problem is that we are a greedy country, and no change in government can change that. I doubt the recession or a new government will see the decline of store cards or finance for getting a new sofa.

 

I don't mind that - people are responsible for their own spending - I mind that I am having to pay (both in cash and in the quality of service I receive) to bail out the people who did overspend (and that includes you - bankers!)