Brexit - Is it gonna happen? (Update: UK votes to leave EU) (1 Viewer)

[superchuck500]

With the June 23 national referendum approaching, new polling shows 55 percent of Brits favor leaving the the EU.

The idea is basically that the Union's growth struggles and central monetary policy are holding the UK economy back - while, at the same time, the nation pays high membership fees and is bound to lax immigration rules that are becoming problematic. Opponents argue that the step back from regionalization and globalization will be harmful. For example, some international business institutions have stated that they will have to pull jobs out of the UK (when those operations were able to support, from within the UK, the entire EU program for that company).

In the States, the worry is that a Brexit would be destabilizing, and potentially launch of wave of similar referenda to consider withdrawal. In fact, the mere possibility has already begun to inject volatility in currency markets and sovereign debt auctions . . . volatility that could easily bleed into the broader market.

What do our UK members think will happen? It sort of feels like the run up to the Scotland referendum, that seemed to get much closer in the polls just before the vote - which turned out to not be that close in the end.

The UK's EU referendum: All you need to know - BBC News

New 'Brexit' poll shows Brits leaning toward leaving, hits markets

 

[IntenseSaint]

It's probably going to boil down to people who like large governmental agencies and bureaucracies will favor staying in the EU. And those who favor an independent state with smaller bureaucracies will favor leaving the EU.

 

[KiwiSaint]

Having been in London two weeks ago on business...the conversations I had regarding BREXIT seemed to revolve around immigration. There was a consensus that the UK was being overrun with immigrants from Eastern Europe. Of course, I would guess that the vast majority of folks I spoke to were Tories.

 

[TXSAINTFAN]

Having been in London two weeks ago on business...the conversations I had regarding BREXIT seemed to revolve around immigration. There was a consensus that the UK was being overrun with immigrants from Eastern Europe. Of course, I would guess that the vast majority of folks I spoke to were Tories.

Their lax policies just cry out for people to come live off the government.

No job, no car, no home. No problem. If you are from somewhere else. No worries they will give it all to you. You don't even have to work. Not so if you spent your entire life working and living there and paying the high taxes. Sure, you get something but shouldn't you?

I'm over there a couple of times a year. One thing that aggravates me about the whole thing is the monetary system. While the Euro doesn't have a great exchange rate, the pound is just obscene.

 

[guidomerkinsrules]

Anglos suck

 

[Lustmord]

I just got back from uk. The vote seems very generational at this point. Old folks want out and back to the way it was and young people want in as its all they know.

It really seems 50/50 at this point.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G900A using Tapatalk

 

[Arathrael]

As a UK member here, I think the whole thing is insane.

The referendum itself is insane. The government is pro-EU. It doesn't want to exit. So we're having a referendum being held by a government to seek a mandate to do something it doesn't want to to.

As a result of that, we don't actually know what Leave would involve. There's multiple different Leave campaigns, who don't seem to agree on all that much, and who aren't in a position to do anything they propose anyway. And what they do propose largely doesn't make any sense.

There's some Leave campaigners who say we'd leave the EU, but stay in the Free Trade Agreement, like Norway. But that requires continuing to make a financial contribution, accepting most of the EU's regulations, and not only accepting freedom of movement, but being in the Schengen Area (which the UK currently isn't). That makes no sense. You might as well stay in the EU if you're going to do that. But given that we have a pro-EU government that doesn't want to leave in the first place, that could actually be a possible approach if Leave won. That's nuts.

On the immigration front, we have Leave campaigners complaining about the numbers of immigrants... while simultaneously proposing a points based system like Australia's which could actually increase the numbers. The reason being, we already have a points-based system for non-EU immigrants that's stricter than the Australian approach. If they introduced an Australian style points-based system for everyone, that would represent tighter control for EU citizens, but relaxed control for non-EU citizens (which some of the Leave campaigners are explicitly arguing for). And there's a lot more people outside the EU than there are in it. That's why we've had more non-EU immigration than EU immigration for decades, even with the current rules.

You could of course simply stick on arbitrary cap on numbers, but then you're creating shortages of needed workers and making jobs harder to fill, which naturally has an economic impact. The more extreme that is, the large the economic impact is likely to be.

This is all then bolstered up with anti-immigrant rhetoric, and promises made and problems solved with nothing but wishful thinking. We'd have to accept freedom of movement to stay in the single market? No, we wouldn't, we'd just strike a great deal and the rest of the EU would have to accept it. But if we couldn't? We'd just strike great deals with the rest of the world! No problem! Having the border between Ireland and Northern Ireland turn into a border between the EU and the UK? Means nothing, it's fine!

Then there's the vast riches that would transform our health service, roads, schools, etc., etc., that would come from not giving the EU money. Except the amount of money we actually give the EU is around 0.65% of our Gross National Income - it's just not that significant - and any savings would be wiped out by even a small negative economic impact.

All of which reminds me of a certain Presidential candidate's approach.

I could criticise the Remain campaigns too, but the thing there is, I know what Remain involves. It already exists.

So will we vote to Leave? I don't know. Is the US going to elect Donald Trump?

 

[JimEverett]

About the government being pro-EU - that is a good point Arathrael.

I would think that if Leave won then the government would want to maintain as strong a relation with the EU as possible, which would mean (I would think) that Brussels could exact a very stiff price on the UK to maintain those ties. And Brussels will be willing to do that in order to keep another country from leaving via referendum.

 

[Arathrael]

Their lax policies just cry out for people to come live off the government.

No job, no car, no home. No problem. If you are from somewhere else. No worries they will give it all to you. You don't even have to work.

Just a note on this, no. Come on. Apart from the UK not being the only country in the EU to have social security, people don't tend to migrate for no work. Would you? People tend to move to work (and heck, if you were going to move to not work, you'd probably go somewhere with nicer weather than the UK).

That's borne out by the statistics. Around 5% of EU migrants claim Jobseekers Allowance (the main unemployment benefit in the UK) and both EU and non-EU migrants are less likely to be claiming out-of-work benefits in general than the native population.

 

[Arathrael]

I would think that if Leave won then the government would want to maintain as strong a relation with the EU as possible, which would mean (I would think) that Brussels could exact a very stiff price on the UK to maintain those ties. And Brussels will be willing to do that in order to keep another country from leaving via referendum.

I agree. Although some of the Leave campaign argue that the UK would have the advantage there, on the grounds that we have a trade deficit with the EU so they'll want a quick trade agreement so they can keep selling to us and keep their manufacturers (German car manufacturers usually being cited here) happy. So they'll give us great terms they wouldn't give anyone else.

That strikes me as more wishful thinking. The problem with that reasoning is the reason the UK buys more from the EU than the EU buys from the UK is essentially that the UK needs the EU's stuff more than the EU needs the UK's stuff. For example, the UK isn't self-sufficient in terms of food. We import about 40% of our food consumption. Things like that aren't easy to competitively source from elsewhere, as distance, climate, growing seasons, etc., all start to factor in.

If we don't have an advantageous trade deal with the EU, we'd likely just have to pay the tariffs and import much of what we import anyway. Whereas, if the EU doesn't have an advantageous trade deal with the UK, well, they've still got the entire rest of the EU to trade with.

I don't see how that puts the UK in anything other than a terrible negotiating position. And when you combine that with the necessity for the EU to, at best, offer nothing more than the same deal places like Norway get, to discourage further disintegration of the union, it's hard to see how the UK could possibly come out of an exit well.

 

[guidomerkinsrules]

Is one of the options to keep the immigrants but get rid of the hooligans?

 

[J-Donk]

I agree. Although some of the Leave campaign argue that the UK would have the advantage there, on the grounds that we have a trade deficit with the EU so they'll want a quick trade agreement so they can keep selling to us and keep their manufacturers (German car manufacturers usually being cited here) happy. So they'll give us great terms they wouldn't give anyone else.

That strikes me as more wishful thinking. The problem with that reasoning is the reason the UK buys more from the EU than the EU buys from the UK is essentially that the UK needs the EU's stuff more than the EU needs the UK's stuff. For example, the UK isn't self-sufficient in terms of food. We import about 40% of our food consumption. Things like that aren't easy to competitively source from elsewhere, as distance, climate, growing seasons, etc., all start to factor in.

If we don't have an advantageous trade deal with the EU, we'd likely just have to pay the tariffs and import much of what we import anyway. Whereas, if the EU doesn't have an advantageous trade deal with the UK, well, they've still got the entire rest of the EU to trade with.

I don't see how that puts the UK in anything other than a terrible negotiating position. And when you combine that with the necessity for the EU to, at best, offer nothing more than the same deal places like Norway get, to discourage further disintegration of the union, it's hard to see how the UK could possibly come out of an exit well.

Do Brits feel the EU is doomed to fail because of the economics of having a single currency, but doing nothing to combat the inequality it creates? Germany doesn't seem to get it. They definitely take their pound of flesh via austerity measures on the "losers" of this organization. At least there is a free flow of workers across the EU.

 

[Arathrael]

Do Brits feel the EU is doomed to fail because of the economics of having a single currency, but doing nothing to combat the inequality it creates? Germany doesn't seem to get it. They definitely take their pound of flesh via austerity measures on the "losers" of this organization. At least there is a free flow of workers across the EU.

Some of them do, certainly.

Although the EU itself does actually work to combat inequality, providing assistance to poorer regions through the EU budget. For example, Greece contributed 1.8 billion euros to the EU budget in 2014, and the EU spent 7 billion euros in Greece, over half of which was investment for growth and jobs.

But the thing there is, the EU budget is relatively tiny. It's around 1% of the EU's combined gross national income. So that kind of expenditure pales in comparison to the size of Greece's debt, the amount of money provided in bailouts and demanded in repayments. So the actions of the Eurogroup tend to have a bigger impact, and it's that group that's really enforcing the austerity approach.

Not that the UK is in the eurozone, or the Eurogroup. But we wouldn't be in much of a position to complain about inflicting austerity if we were, given that our own government is still inflicting austerity on us.

 

[El Caliente]

This is off topic but, why is Eddie Izzard the voice of those who want to stay in, and why is Eddie Izzard dressed in pink, and like a woman?

 

[guidomerkinsrules]

This is off topic but, why is Eddie Izzard the voice of those who want to stay in, and why is Eddie Izzard dressed in pink, and like a woman?

is he the sole voice or one of many
to answer the second part, because he's an action transvestite