"Robin" wrote in message
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On 28/07/2018 08:52, michael adams wrote:

You seem there to be equating net fiscal contribution with contribution to
the UK economy. I thought one usually looked at total public spending as
a proportion of a region's GDP (or more probably GVA).

One might indeed normally do that. But in this case had one been
reading the newspapers over the past two years - ever since the
referendum in fact - one might have been struck by continual
references to the fact of London's contributing such a large
percentage of the GVA both of the UK and of England.

Of course had one forgotten this, although I find it hard to
imagine how one possibly could, one might I suppose need to
refresh one's memory.

Total GVA (£ million) GVA per head
UK 1,747,647 26,339
England 1,498,221 27,108
London 408,479 46,482
South East 258,902 28,683
North East 50,675 19,218
North West 166,542 23,068

https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/gross...duk/1998to2016

All those figures are positive. So if you knew all that I fail to understand why you
claimed that "London, followed by the South East, and to a very small degree the East
of England are the only areas of the UK which actually make a positive contribution to
the UK economy".

Indeed. My original post on this topic was in response to

"Andrew" wrote in message
news

You also have massively subsidised tube, bus and Overground
rail alternatives.

To which you at one stage replied

" Grants by central government for TfL's operations[1] are being phased
out."

Which was the subsidy being talked of. Such grants will have originated
in the Treasury and so in that context I should more correctly have
referred to their contributions to the UK Treasury, rather than
to the UK economy. Fair point. Other taxes will of course have been
generated as a result of their employment, corporation tax, VAT on
goods they produce or services they provide, etc. etc. but these
again will be in proportion to the GVA contribution made by their
region.


Otherwise workers who receive, say, £3,000 p.a.
net more in benefits and public services than they pay in taxes,
duties etc score as a "net loss" to the economy, even if they are
responsible for a net positive £10,000 p.a. contribution to GVA/GDP.

That would only make sense were one able to produce any kind of
satisfactory explanation as to why people who receive more in
benefits than they pay in taxes should be consistently more
productive than anyone else.

So can one ?

No - because my example of the worker contributing £10,000 to GVA makes no such claim
about productivity. Look at your own figures above for GVA per head - which are per
head of population including the economically inactive population. So the £10,000
worker (even if only working part-time) is less productive than the average. But is
still making a net contribution to the economy. This was not an accident.

But what's being discussed here are relative contributions both to UK
Treasury and the economy as a whole, of whole regions not just
individuals. You may well quibble that GVA per head takes no account
of the respective percentage of economically inactive individuals -
comprising among others OAP's,children, the chronically sick,
students, and the unemployed across each region. Thinking about it
its totally meaningless in this context in any case, and was only
introduced at all in order to score cheap points at the expense of
our friends in the north.


But the hold on ! What am I saying ? All along I've been attempting to
prove by using one measure or another that people in other regions
can't possibly be subsiding Londoners because basically we're
doing so much better than they are. So how could they possibly be
subsiding us ?

But then one comes across headlines such as this, and it all comes
flooding back

quote

EU farming subsidies: One in five biggest recipients are billionaires
and millionaires on the UK rich list

Sir James Dyson's farming business was the biggest private recipient
of EU basic payments in the UK in 2016, receiving £1.6 million, Greenpeace says

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/u...-a7815871.html

/quote

The question on everybody's lips of course, is will the UK
Govt carry on paying these subsidies after Brexit ?

I think we should be told.

The rich didn't get to be rich by subsidising the poor.
Precisely the opposite in fact.

And of course that's how it actually works . Housing benefit
in effect subsidises landlords at the taxpayers expense as it
underpins the level of market rents for those sectors to which
it applies

Income support subsidises those employers, at the taxpayers
expense who are unwilling to pay a sufficiently high wage.


michael adams

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