When did you realise that most people are morons?

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I am genuinely interested, although as much as I appreciate the effort in your response, it's covering too much at once.

I know that. I tried to give enough to show expansive, comprehensive thought while trying to be brief. A reasonably difficult task given our method of communication. I think you got the gist so that's good.

I've selected the quote above for further focus. It strikes me as contradictory but maybe I've misunderstood; People don't need a law to enable them to refuse to go to work if they don't want to, they simply don't have to go in. If you are referring to people not going to work due to health & safety concerns, then there are laws in place to cover that already, therefore we don't need to reinvent the wheel.

Yes they do need more protection. Before the current set of regulations see what happens if you just not go to work. I know as i have tested them. The current situation isn't covered in existing health and safety legislation. You would get sacked and then have to fight it afterwards. The protection is against being able to be summarily dismissed.

If you think the job retention scheme is counterproductive, then what alternative would you propose?

The current scheme isn't job protection it's welfare. All that's protected is the individual's ability to obtain, and level of, welfare because they are technically still 'employed'. The longer this goes on the less likely of being employed at the end of it becomes as companies are slowly going bust. Expect a lot of these jobs to be not around in October when the government removes the welfare. We had a zombie economy anyway and it's now been tipped over the edge. Then TSreallyHTF. It's what we have coming if we don't snap out of this.

I would have still provided welfare but not at the generous levels currently offered. Enabling an employee to not get sacked for not turning up at work is enabling the responsibility and the accountability is dealing with the consequences of having less income. When people have to deal with the outcome of their actions they miraculously make different decisions about how they handle situations. I'm sure more people would have stayed at work and it would have stopped companies forcibly furloughing their employees.

I know of multiple abuses of all of the emergency fiscal measures already. Another set of unintended consequences to have to deal with eventually.

Listen to what the government says but also listen to what they aren't saying. They really want people back to work but can't come out and say it as they'll get crucified by the noise of public opinion. 'Measures' are being put in place to keep on the right side of public opinion but it's not what they want to do. This is not leadership and if there is a criticism to be levelled at the government, for me, this is it. I don't think any flavour of government would have got this any better and based on what i'm observing of Scotland and Wales a Labour government would have been more like those countries. In my opinion even further away from personal responsibility.

My opinion is that the vocal public opinion is not very well informed. For my part i know i am not as informed as i would like be but i have to think practically instead of theoretically as the information available is incomplete. Even the information available to the government is incomplete and if they are being swayed by even less informed public opinion this is negligence.
 
Soldato
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Without wanting to turn this into a covid thread, I agree with the above. I think there will be slot of companies going bust, where we work (making lasers) I think a typical order might be 30 - 40 shipments a week, there are now 20 (in total) till the end of July. Fortunately the furlough scheme means they are not having to make anybody redundant (yet) but I know it's going through a lot of peoplas heads (including mine). As a relatively young person (34) I feel us taxpayers could be covering this till we retire. Yay more tax:p.
 
Soldato
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When people have to deal with the outcome of their actions they miraculously make different decisions about how they handle situations

This is what SSP is designed to combat, but it became very clear very early that SSP is not sufficient to guide us through a pandemic like this. The government advice was "stay at home" first and foremost, it was all about isolation. They realised that asking people to stay at home on SSP was not going to fly, because that decision you refer to in the quote above would have been a no brainer; go to work or become homeless/starve. Yes, it's welfare but it's welfare with a purpose; enable compliance with a meaningful lockdown and retain as many jobs as possible in the process. That's why it's called what it is called.

I know of multiple abuses of all of the emergency fiscal measures already. Another set of unintended consequences to have to deal with eventually

I see this too, it's collateral damage and there was no way to avoid that. I'm sure the government factored for that.

I don't think any flavour of government would have got this any better and based on what i'm observing of Scotland and Wales a Labour government would have been more like those countries. In my opinion even further away from personal responsibility

Neither Scotland nor Wales can be used as a comparison to the UK government because they are devolved parliaments and have to make secondary decisions based on primary decisions from central government. We can't excuse this miserable excuse for a UK government by fearing a hypothetical alternative government.
 
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This is what SSP is designed to combat, but it became very clear very early that SSP is not sufficient to guide us through a pandemic like this. The government advice was "stay at home" first and foremost, it was all about isolation. They realised that asking people to stay at home on SSP was not going to fly, because that decision you refer to in the quote above would have been a no brainer; go to work or become homeless/starve. Yes, it's welfare but it's welfare with a purpose; enable compliance with a meaningful lockdown and retain as many jobs as possible in the process. That's why it's called what it is called.

Like a lot of things governments come up with the name bears no relation to what it actually is. It is JUST welfare. The government does not mandate people need to fulfill a particular role to obtain the funds and there is no mechanism within it to retain the jobs. Companies will be in stasis until they need to pay their employees and then go bust. Get your popcorn out.

I see this too, it's collateral damage and there was no way to avoid that. I'm sure the government factored for that.

I don't share your optimism in the capability of government decision-making while considering the future. It's easy to spend other people's money and then worry about it later. This isn't collateral damage it's a country-wide blue-on-blue that didn't need to happen.

Neither Scotland nor Wales can be used as a comparison to the UK government because they are devolved parliaments and have to make secondary decisions based on primary decisions from central government. We can't excuse this miserable excuse for a UK government by fearing a hypothetical alternative government.

Yes they can. It doesn't matter what type of government it is they all share the same base politics and so the path they follow will be the same. They are both clearly not following the 'primary decisions' from central government. Their politics and politicking is causing them to do their own thing because it suits their ends.
 
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Without wanting to turn this into a covid thread, I agree with the above. I think there will be slot of companies going bust, where we work (making lasers) I think a typical order might be 30 - 40 shipments a week, there are now 20 (in total) till the end of July. Fortunately the furlough scheme means they are not having to make anybody redundant (yet) but I know it's going through a lot of peoplas heads (including mine). As a relatively young person (34) I feel us taxpayers could be covering this till we retire. Yay more tax:p.

Yes. It will take us at least 5 years to get over this and it really didn't need to be this way.

This is why i am talking about letting people get on with it. Those who want to isolate can isolate. Those who need to isolate can isolate can isolate. Everyone else can make decisions for themselves (hopefully in a respectful and considerate manner) and hopefully get the country operating again.

We are in a sinking ship. If we all stay in our cabins we all drown. Anyone who is willing and able should be out manning the pumps.

Decision makers keep referring to this as being a war. If they were acting as if it were a war they wouldn't be making the decisions they are.

I'll leave it here as yes there is a covid thread and this is about morons. The last thing i'll say in closing is that it's my position that if more people were forced (not actual force) to make their own decisions and not molly-coddled we would see less moronic behaviour.
 
Soldato
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Like a lot of things governments come up with the name bears no relation to what it actually is. It is JUST welfare. The government does not mandate people need to fulfill a particular role to obtain the funds and there is no mechanism within it to retain the jobs.

Selecting particular words to display in uppercase is very condescending, it's really not necessary, we're only having a conversation. No-one has claimed that there's prerequisite conditions for qualification and the absence of such doesn't detract from the intent - it's clearly intended to retain jobs. Of course it won't be 100% successful but there are definitely people returning to work after furlough. It's aiding some companies to weather the storm in the short term.

It doesn't matter what type of government it is they all share the same base politics and so the path they follow will be the same.

That's absolutely not the case. For example The Job Retention Scheme is central government policy; the devolved parliaments have no powers to make decisions like that. They have made secondary decisions based on the existence of the JRS, and without that they are restricted. They cannot make independent policies like that.
 
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Selecting particular words to display in uppercase is very condescending, it's really not necessary, we're only having a conversation. No-one has claimed that there's prerequisite conditions for qualification and the absence of such doesn't detract from the intent - it's clearly intended to retain jobs. Of course it won't be 100% successful but there are definitely people returning to work after furlough. It's aiding some companies to weather the storm in the short term.

If you feel condescended to i apologise. I'll emphasise differently to you in future but as you don't seem to be demonstrating understanding of my point i do feel the need to emphasise.

The implementation may not detract from the intent but the outcome renders the intent null and void if the objective/intent isn't met. The jobs belong to the company and not the employee. If this was more than just welfare the funds would be getting paid to companies (who own the jobs) to offset a loss of trade so they could pay their employees (who fulfill the jobs). It isn't. It's being paid directly to people which makes it nothing more than welfare. The company is bypassed so while the name suggests it's about jobs the implementation suggests it's just about giving people money especially when there is no need to retain the jobs past the end of the scheme.

It doesn't matter what the intent is. It's the result that matters. Companies have already stated they are for all intents and purposes bust and they are refraining from going bust until October so their people keep getting money from the government. Despite the people currently getting money the jobs have already gone. Gone = not retained.

The government needed to keep the company alive so the employees could be paid to protect the jobs. Not just hand out funds.

Having a 'Petite Pois' label on a tin of beans does not magically mean you have a tin of peas. You still have a tin of beans even if your intention was to have peas. The intent becomes irrelevant. The outcome is what matters.

We have welfare in the tin with a 'Job Retention Scheme' label.

That's absolutely not the case. For example The Job Retention Scheme is central government policy; the devolved parliaments have no powers to make decisions like that. They have made secondary decisions based on the existence of the JRS, and without that they are restricted. They cannot make independent policies like that.

The devolved governments are picking and choosing what policy they go with and what they don't as it suits them and they have ability to do so. If the devolved governments could create some own version of the job retention scheme then you bet they would have and they'd have come out with a million excuses as to why the central government one wasn't good enough. They've already picked up the opportunity to criticise the holes in the existing solution. Anywhere the devolved governments can score a political point they are. It's their politics driving this and extends further back than this crisis.

The lockdown and social distancing is a primary decision and the devolved governments are choosing to disobey it because they can for political reasons.
 
Caporegime
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There has been zero opportunity for personal and professional responsibility and accountability and so it can't have caused the problems. The policies have been centrally mandated from the beginning. All we're seeing is the reaction to that.

Enforcement is a collectivist solution and it has been going on for weeks already.

There is zero evidence lockdown works. It was tried with the Spanish Flu (didn't work) and was tried all throughout the 20th Century (didn't work) and certainly hasn't had any effect in Italy where the lockdown was enforced.

Anyone at risk, or responsible for people at risk, should have been the people ensuring compliance with special measures and not the other way round. This is personal/professional responsibility/accountability.

New Zealand says hi.
 
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Lockdowns can accomplish several things - pro-active you can stamp a virus out early but it needs to be early and robust (this is essentially how some deadly viruses have been contained), they can be used to reduce excess deaths from a surge and/or buy time for a vaccine or they can reduce deaths to a controllable rate so as to prevent the overwhelming of health and government services and the much bigger impact that has.

People seem to willingly ignore that prior to lockdowns many places were accelerating to where cases were doubling every 2-3 days which came down quite quickly once lockdown measures were in place - while I think some of the models overcook the severity of it by not taking into account the rate of spread isn't constant throughout the population these measures were needed and people are doing the typical thing of equating the control the lockdown has brought as a sign that the lockdown wasn't needed.

One of the reasons I think why so many places have similar curves (if you ignore the doubling frequency step) is that the initial ramp was while the virus ran through the favourable environments and once it was moving into the more general population and less dense urban areas the rate would have fallen off somewhat anyway - though not to the point some kind of lockdown or other approach wasn't needed (personally I favour other approaches to the kind of lockdowns that have been used - they are more last ditch firefighting when you've failed to take other measures in a timely fashion).
 
Soldato
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It's being paid directly to people which makes it nothing more than welfare. The company is bypassed

Again, that's just not true. It gets paid to the company, who process tax & NI, pensions etc. and then pay the employee as normal. Actually, changes due soon will see the companies getting more involved with employees working part time and the wage burden then shared between the company and the government.

If the devolved governments could create some own version of the job retention scheme then you bet they would have and they'd have come out with a million excuses as to why the central government one wasn't good enough

That's total conjecture, you're entitled to your opinion but that's all it is.

The lockdown and social distancing is a primary decision and the devolved governments are choosing to disobey it because they can for political reasons

They aren't disobeying anything, they are setting their own rules as is their entitlement with a devolved health system and a separate legal system. Again, your opinion is based on conjecture as there's no evidence to suggest that the separate lockdown guidelines are political sabotage. Independent decisions have been taken based on regional data.
 
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Mainly through my job. I'd speak to people who would report their ex-partners as writing offensive remarks about them on Facebook. When I told a lot of them to simply block them, their reply was "No, I want to see what they're writing about me."
Then, through life experience at work and in my private life, I came to realise that a large quantity of people are opinionated idiots and that people would spout and/or share misinformation on social media platforms as if it was gospel.

What really irked me is that I'd be arresting or stop and searching people on the street, and other members of the public, of all backgrounds, would approach me and give me their opinion on how I should do my job, despite having absolutely no idea what had taken place prior to their arrival.

People in the most part just simply don't have a clue.
 
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Again, that's just not true. It gets paid to the company, who process tax & NI, pensions etc. and then pay the employee as normal. Actually, changes due soon will see the companies getting more involved with employees working part time and the wage burden then shared between the company and the government.

Specifically to give to the employee. The company cannot decide to do anything with the money. It's an effective bypass.

The company is simply acting as an agent here and is performing like the job centre. In fact, the job centre expects the claimant to do 'work' to receive the welfare. Receiving JSA is closer to having a job than JRS!

Here's the definition of a job, top hit and didn't need to search:

a piece of work, especially a specific task done as part of the routine of one's occupation or for an agreed price

No work is being done therefore it's not a job. The payment mechanism is irrelevant.

If and when companies have workers go part-time, the welfare is simply reduced but still exists as welfare for the period the employee isn't working.

Should the workers be full-time but the government pays some of the wages then this is no longer welfare but a company subsidy.

It's 'work' that is key here. Any payment without an expectation of work in return is welfare, regardless of how it is received.

That's total conjecture, you're entitled to your opinion but that's all it is.

It's an evidence based projection.

They aren't disobeying anything, they are setting their own rules as is their entitlement with a devolved health system and a separate legal system. Again, your opinion is based on conjecture as there's no evidence to suggest that the separate lockdown guidelines are political sabotage. Independent decisions have been taken based on regional data.

There is ample evidence. Taking the SNP specifically, their MO has, for a while now, been to treat every political situation as an opportunity to further independence. This consistently finds them on the opposite side of the government as they need to score points to further their case. The SNP reasoning on just about everything is absolutely transparent. It's all about independence. Their politics drives their judgement on every issue. Disobey everything appears to be their policy.
 
Soldato
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you don't seem to be demonstrating understanding of my point

To be honest, you don't seem to be demonstrating understanding of your point, so what chance do I have?

It's being paid directly to people which makes it nothing more than welfare. The company is bypassed

I counter that this simply isn't true, you respond with..

The company cannot decide to do anything with the money. It's an effective bypass.

I'm going to have to leave it there as you're clearly very entrenched in your views with limited ability to recognise a valid counter argument. Which is ironic, considering the OP... (That's a joke BTW, have a wee smiley :p)
 
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To be honest, you don't seem to be demonstrating understanding of your point, so what chance do I have?



I counter that this simply isn't true, you respond with..



I'm going to have to leave it there as you're clearly very entrenched in your views with limited ability to recognise a valid counter argument. Which is ironic, considering the OP... (That's a joke BTW, have a wee smiley :p)

Yes let's leave it here. You haven't provided a valid counter argument. It ceased to be a debate when your angle of attack is constantly changing to prove your disagreement with my point. I should have realised the commencement of nitpicking on irrelevant details would end us up here.

What is clear is that the government psychology of mislabeling has worked.

I enjoyed the interaction though. ;)
 
Soldato
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I would also say I have developed a general dislike of the general population.

It started from a young age. I think what did it was growing up among people that I didn't have anything in common with. I was quite an intelligent child but also introverted and very shy. Then you come up against others who, whilst not really very intelligent, are loud, bullyish or considered to be 'hard' as if that is a massive achievement. I knew I was more inteligent than these people but they all seemed to unfairly do better than me, i.e in popularity, with friends, with girls. And what that did is cause me to be even more introverted and more shy, because I didn't fit in and was never going to be popular, so I withdrew more and more. Once the opportunity to build confidence in a child is missed, I guess it becomes harder to do later, especially when teenage years kick in.

These days Im 40 years old so I've learned to care less about the shyness and introversion aspects of my personality. However I still dislike people who gain success by being the types of people I grew up with. So anyone who is loud, a lout, a thug, bullyish. If they don't have any substance to back up their outward appearance then I dislike them. Yet those people still continue to gain success even though in my mind they shouldn't.

That should be fine right? Those people can mix with their own kind of people and I can mix with my kind of people? But unfortunately I have found it difficult to find and develop strong friendships with people who are like me. And now I don't really try because I've kind of given up on it. Actually that's not quite true, sometimes I have a desire to get back on the horse and try again but its tiring to do so and I burn out quickly on it.

My dislike of people has led me down some paths which are not very beneficial really. For example it sometimes gives me some extreme views. For example on the topic of Covid-19, its led part of me to desire a catastrophic impact, simply because part of me wants to see less of some types of people in the world. All problems are fundamentally caused by the loud and aggressive types of people (poverty, housing crisis, crime, war, you name it) so less of these people can only benefit in the long term. I have to hold myself back from expressing a view that it might not be such a bad thing if millions did die.

In my work I have very occasionally come across people who are both very confident AND very intelligent. One example I remember well was at a job interview about 10 years ago for a large construction contractor. The guy ate me alive at interview. I wasn't bitter because he didn't do it in a negative way, it was just clear from the moment I met him he was in a different league. This neatly brings me on to the below.


The only reason why we have progressed as far as we have scientifically/technologically is due to a tiny proportion of the population with genuine talent developing this stuff for us to use; ironically, their inventions have enabled idiots to voice opinions on things they have zero knowledge of, or spreading fake news or conspiracy theories which does nothing but undermine society. It enables them access to wealth denied to many people who actually make a positive difference in society, in return for poisoning the airways with vacuous garbage and making simple people thinking they are some kind of role model that should be aspired to, which perpetuates the problem.

This was made obvious to me very recently. Due to boredom in lockdown Ive been watching a series of youtube videos on how to build a computer from scratch. The genius it must have taken for the first person/people to invent this is astounding. And I know it didn't happen overnight and was the work of many people, connected and independently, but still, I can't see how I would ever have had the imagination to be able to come up with those ideas. It is quite humbling.
 
Caporegime
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On the topic of being moronic..

I'm honestly astounded at the state of America at the moment. I mean seriously, **** me, what is in the water over there?
 
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