FREE TRADE - HOW IT WORKS

How does free trade actually work?

There were three groups in the capitalist system in Ricardo’s world (and there still are):

Workers / Employees

Capitalists / Employers

Rentiers / Landowners / Landlords / other skimmers, who are just trading, speculating, taking out of the system, not contributing to its success.

Identifying the unproductive group at the top of society didn’t go down too well.

They needed a new economics to hide the discoveries of the classical economists -  "neoclassical economics".

It confuses making money and creating wealth, which hides rentier activity in the economy.

Rentiers make money, they don’t create wealth.

What does this mean for free trade?

The interests of the capitalists and rentiers are opposed with free trade.

This nearly split the Tory Party in the 19th century over the Repeal of the Corn Laws.

The rentiers gains push up the cost of living.

The capitalists want a low cost of living as they have to pay wages.

The UK knew how to prepare for free trade in the 19th century because they used classical economics.

The wider West didn’t how to prepare for free trade in the 20th century because they used neoclassical economics.

How did the UK prepare to compete in a free trade world in the 19th century?

They had the Empire to get in cheap raw materials; there were no regulations and no taxes on employees.

It was all about the cost of living, and they needed to get that down so they could pay internationally competitive wages.

UK labour would cost the same as labour anywhere else in the world.

Disposable income = wages – (taxes + the cost of living)

Employees get their money from wages and the employers pay the cost of living through wages, COGS reducing profit.

Ricardo supported the Repeal of the Corn Laws to get the price of bread down.

They housed workers in slums to get housing costs down.

Employers could then pay internationally competitive wages and were ready to compete in a free trade world.

That's the idea. You level the playing field first; then you engage in free trade.

Of course, that’s why it’s so expensive to get anything done in the West.

It’s our high cost of living.

Disposable income = wages – (taxes + the cost of living)

Employees get their money from wages and the employers pay the cost of living through wages, reducing profit.

Off-shore from the West ASAP to maximise profit.

The cost of living is way too high.

The cost of living is too high? Brexit will drive those costs even higher because your pound is now worth less.

It's just knowing how things really work.

Housing costs should be kept low to make you internationally competitive.

Ricardo was part of the new capitalist class, and the old landowning class were a huge problem with their rents that had to be paid both directly and through wages.

“The interest of the landlords is always opposed to the interest of every other class in the community” Ricardo 1815 / Classical Economist

What does our man on free trade, Ricardo, mean?

Disposable income = wages – (taxes + the cost of living)

Employees get their money from wages and the employers pay the cost of living through wages, reducing profit.

Employees get less disposable income after the landlords rent has gone.

Employers have to cover the landlord’s rents in wages reducing profit.

Ricardo is just talking about housing costs, employees all rented in those days.

Low housing costs work best for employers and employees.

Of course, employees get their money from wages and it is the UK’s employers that are paying high housing costs in wages reducing profit.

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WHICH WASHING MACHINE

Want to buy British?

I did some research and replaced my washing machine with the British made Ebac which was far superior and comes with a factory seven years parts and labour warranty and option of both hot and cold fill which means a quicker wash, less wear, cheaper etc.

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TRADITIONAL V. MODERN CONSERVATISM

The lockdowns have served well the political ambitions of those in power by muting channels for dissent. Of course, lockdowns have also saved many tens of thousands of lives. But, never let a crisis go to waste. There's a feeling that we are victims of a conspiracy to silence and mislead us and divert our attention towards covid and away from this PM's political agenda.

We see Boris with his 80 seat majority taking the opportunity to push people around 'for their own good', occupying us all with complex, ever-changing, incoherent covid rules, demanding our compliance, while he pushes through the reforms he personally wants to be known for.

We are not just talking about building hundreds of thousands of homes in southerners' back yards. We are talking about a one-nation Conservatism that looks to many Conservatives like Marxism for its top-down focus on "big society" at the expense of the individual - we lose our voice, our freedom, protest becomes a difficult affair, illegal even, they shut down regions, put up barricades, visit us in our homes, subject us to frequent testing. For what?

We are talking about very considerable increases in state spending, keeping interest rates near zero to dominate the "independent" central bank and market economy, with little regard to value or cost-benefits, that many Conservatives see as Big Socialist State.

We are talking about signing up to massive programs to combat climate change, where many wonder how on earth we can get such long-range programs right if we can't even get next week's weather right.

We are talking about capturing the black sheep of the red wall while taking loyal Conservatives and their needs for granted.

We are looking at, effectively, a one-party state, with Boris everywhere to be seen, taking over the commanding heights of the economy, the institutions, disregarding Parliament and law Lords, changing, menacing, the unity of the Kingdom without consent.

None of this feels like classic, traditional Conservatism.

I'm beginning to think what is happening should be seen through a different lens. Where is it going? What is it leading to?

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LIFE AFTER LOCKDOWN - WHEN WILL WE BE FREE AGAIN?

Covid-19 is a coronavirus, the flu is also a coronavirus, but I wouldn't call covid-19 "the flu".

To be practical rather than purist, as I understand things, everyone who wants to be vaccinated will be by September. So this seems to be a a date everyone can ink into their calendars.

Thereafter, and maybe before, people who've had two jabs don't need to wear a mask, nor keep social distancing, nor practise frequent hand washing.

They don't need to get checked before or after travel provided destinations are up to speed on these reg.s, nor quarantine or self-isolate.

Unless they have signs of infection, because though they'll likely be fine, they should think about refuseniks and people with weakened immune systems.

It also seems apparent that kids under six can take care of themselves without a vaccination.

Of course, Public Health will be on the lookout for variants that could undo all this, so cannot promise no further lockdowns, although annual boosters should deal with variants too.

This is life when everyone's vaccinated and covid-19 passes into the background of viruses that are endemic.This is from the Autumn. The tussle between health and economy will continue till then I guess.

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SENDING TOULOUSE SAUSAGES TO PARIS

 It seems that Macron did not suggest that Northern Ireland was not part of the UK, but simply that Northern Ireland is a separate country. The position as to this is not obvious at all. For at least some purposes, the United Kingdom is not so much a country, but a union consisting of two countries (England and Scotland), a principality (Wales, albeit that the local government of Wales now asserts that Wales is a country in its own right) and a province (Northern Ireland, albeit that purists note that Ulster is, or was, a province, and that only six of Ulster’s nine counties are in Northern Ireland, the other three being in the Republic of Ireland). Northern Ireland plays football, and many other sports, as a separate country. Like Scotland, it has its own national laws which are different from those of England and Wales. If the separate parts of the United Kingdom insist on referring to themselves as separate countries, it is hardly surprising that Macron does the same.There are serious issues at stake in relation to the Northern Ireland protocol, but this is not one of them.

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TIS NOT TOO LATE TO SEEK A NEWER WORLD

https://youtu.be/ptqoSZgh7q8

https://poems.poetrysociety.org.uk/poems/ulysses/

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ulysses_(poem)

The two pieces in the poem that I especially appreciated:

"I am a part of all that I have met;

Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough

Gleams that untravelled world, whose margin fades

For ever and for ever when I move."

"We are not now that strength which in old days

Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are;

One equal temper of heroic hearts,

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield."

The first piece was used in Skyfall.

It's the story of Ulysses, retold by Tenysson.

Ulysses the adventurer, thirsty for experience and knowledge, is contrasted to his son, Telemachus, an excellent leader and king, bringing peace and stability to his people.

That's how I read the poem. Here is James Navé

giving the best reading I've found.

https://youtu.be/FknHtLjwLjY

James Navy reading the poem very nicely.

You don't have to understand all! to appreciate the rhythm and meter (there's no rhyme).

It is a poem written in what's called "blank verse", which is unrhymed iambic pentameter, and as near as you can get to natural speech.

Why write in iambic pentameter? It is the most popular structure for writing poetry. Created by Shakespeare to help his actors memorise their lines.

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THE SONNET

When writing a Shakespearean-style sonnet. ...This form of poetry is required to follow a specific format including length, rhythm, and rhyme scheme. To write a sonnet properly, follow this process (from "poetry for dummies"):

1. Select a subject to write your poem about (Shakespearean sonnets are traditionally grounded as love poems).
2. Write your lines in iambic pentameter (duh-DUH-duh-DUH-duh-DUH-duh-DUH-duh-DUH.
3. Write in one of various standard rhyme schemes (Shakespearean, Petrarchan, or Spenserian).
4. Format the sonnet using 3 quatrains followed by 1 couplet.
5. Compose your sonnet as an argument that builds up as it moves from one metaphor to the next.
6. Ensure your poem is exactly 14 lines.

The Shakespearean rhyme scheme

If you’re writing the most familiar kind of sonnet, the Shakespearean, the rhyme scheme is as follows:

A
B
A
B

C
D
C
D

E
F
E
F

G
G

Every A rhymes with every A, every B rhymes with every B, and so forth. You’ll notice this type of sonnet consists of three quatrains (that is, four consecutive lines of verse that make up a stanza or division of lines in a poem) and one couplet (two consecutive rhyming lines of verse).

How a sonnet tells a story

Ah, but there’s more to a sonnet than just the structure of it. A sonnet is also an argument — it builds up a certain way. And how it builds up is related to its metaphors and how it moves from one metaphor to the next. In a Shakespearean sonnet, the argument builds up like this:

• First quatrain: An exposition of the main theme and main metaphor.

• Second quatrain: Theme and metaphor extended or complicated; often, some imaginative example is given.

• Third quatrain: Peripeteia (a twist or conflict), often introduced by a “but” (very often leading off the ninth line).

• Couplet: Summarizes and leaves the reader with a new, concluding image.

One of Shakespeare’s best-known sonnets, Sonnet 18, follows this pattern:

Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date.

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature’s changing course, untrimmed;

But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest,
Nor shall death brag thou wanderest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest.

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

The argument of Sonnet 18 goes like this:

• First quatrain: Shakespeare establishes the theme of comparing “thou” (or “you”) to a summer’s day, and why to do so is a bad idea. The metaphor is made by comparing his beloved to summer itself.

• Second quatrain: Shakespeare extends the theme, explaining why even the sun, supposed to be so great, gets obscured sometimes, and why everything that’s beautiful decays from beauty sooner or later. He has shifted the metaphor: In the first quatrain, it was “summer” in general, and now he’s comparing the sun and “every fair,” every beautiful thing, to his beloved.

• Third quatrain: Here the argument takes a big left turn with the familiar “But.” Shakespeare says that the main reason he won’t compare his beloved to summer is that summer dies — but she won’t. He refers to the first two quatrains — her “eternal summer” won’t fade, and she won’t “lose possession” of the “fair” (the beauty) she possesses. So, he keeps the metaphors going, but in a different direction.

  And for good measure, he throws in a negative version of all the sunshine in this poem — the “shade” of death, which, evidently, his beloved won’t have to worry about.

• Couplet: How is his beloved going to escape death? In Shakespeare’s poetry, which will keep her alive as long as people breathe or see. This bold statement gives closure to the whole argument — it’s a surprise.

And so far, Shakespeare’s sonnet has done what he promised it would! See how tightly this sonnet is written, how complex, yet well-organized it is? Now that you know how to write a sonnet, try writing one your own!

Poets are attracted by the grace, concentration, and, yes, the sheer difficulty of sonnets. You may never write another sonnet in your life, but this exercise is more than just busywork. It does all the following:

• Shows you how much you can pack into a short form.

• Gives you practice with rhyme, meter, structure, metaphor, and argument.

• Connects you with one of the oldest traditions in English poetry — one still vital today. 

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TU FAIS QUOI DANS LA VIE ?

Tu fais quoi dans la vie ? Je suis prof de l'être. Je corrige les maux et j'en saigne.

Moi ? oh dans la vie, je me promène, je m’éclate, j’apprends des choses, je lis, j’admire la nature, je communique avec des gens, je m’émerveille, je profite, JE VIS, quoi !

Et toi, qu’est-ce que tu aimes dans la vie ?

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WE ARE NOT NOW THAT STRENGTH

To hell with dignity, I'll quit when the job's done. I'm going to find whoever did this. Be careful what you wish for. 

I like you better without your beretta.

I am a part of all that I have met;

Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough

Gleams that untravelled world, whose margin fades

For ever and for ever when I move.

...and though
We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven; that which we are,
we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

https://youtu.be/ptqoSZgh7q8

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VIETNAM HAS SO FAR ESCAPED COVID SHOULD I INVEST?

The track n trace works well in Vietnam. A population of 97m, only 6,000 cases and 49 deaths.

With those small numbers, they can reach out to F3. That's contact-of three removes and takes you to 200,000 people to track and quarantine. This is manageable.

And it does loads of sequencing, so it can know the characteristics of emerging top-dog strains, much more than would be expected for a lower to middle income.

It has a 4,500km border with Laos, Cambodia and China, that it has plugged. And flights in, almost none. 

It was the first country to get a case outside China, last 20 Jan 2020. So what an achievement.

It switched from French to American English in 1975 after the war and ditched its trad alphabet for a 24 letter roman alphabet. This let it make use of computers early on and join the Internet when it started. I'm sure this is part of it.

Emerging Markets are risky at the moment, but Vietnam looks like a good placement.

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