Today's Vote

[Admin Paul]

It seems that more recent posts on here are proving that a positive discussion can be had - primarily about the future following this historic referendum. This can be informative, interesting and perhaps even educational! let's hope that we continue in that vein, although the road ahead, even on this forum I'm sure will be somewhat rocky!

2 requests if you please...

First is obvious and just about decency from both sides, can we cut the insults and personal attacks. If you can't make your point without resorting to this kind of vitriolic behaviour then please go and find another forum to do so on, as you're not welcome here. Admittedly it's been heated, as the referendum is very recent and passions/tempers have been bubbling hot, but from here on in, no way! it's not fair on people looking in, and they are more important than your need to offload obscenities at 'the other side' or individuals

Second - can we please keep this as the referendum thread, and not let it start creeping into just about every other thread, and therefore just about everything else that is up for discussion. This has already started to happen! so unless completely and unavoidably relevant to the topic please keep it here.

That's it folks! I hope we can get on a little better, but I appreciate the magnitude of this decision so perhaps some fireworks were inevitable!

you know he means business when he uses the red admin Paul account

Cracking article by Monbiot in the Grauniad this morning. I usually don't agree with him on most things BTW.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... anges-left

I agree with the first half - it really is a statement of common sense (I think those Remainers who think this can somehow be "resisted" because it was "built on lies" are deluding themselves - even though it was built on lies). But the second half is largely guff. I agree that we need to use this as a chance to address some of the concerns of those who angrily voted "Out" because they felt left behind, ignored, etc (and thus confront the irreconcilible trade deal versus migration issue). However, I don't think airy words and lofty ideals - mixed up with a large dose of radical anti-capitalism - will solve those problems. We need practical measures - on employment rights, housing and education -, and some straight talking - that if we want better services we need to pay more taxes, and thats us not just someone else. We need politicians that stop pandering, but that means voters that start taking responsibility and stop rewarding such pandering.

Chatting to someone on another forum he reckoned prime central London property would fall 60%. Obviously that will create problems for the banks too. I was also having a drink with a couple of young ladies yesterday, one of whom is extremely worried because she works in a research area that conforms to EU standards. Everyone in her office was terrified.

The big divide opening up would seem to be single market vs border controls.

That was always going to be the big trade-off (unless your policy is to have your cake and eat it).

Cameron, you have to give it to him, is trying to set things up for his successor by getting in there early that "Europe will have to compromise on free movement if it wants a close trading relationship with Europe". He probably has the power dynamic wrong there though. I can't see Eastern Europe or the French accepting full access to the single market without free movement - unless we agree to stump up more cash than we do now. I could be wrong on that but this means I think my guess of what will happen is one of two choices:

a) We end up settling for something like the EEA, which preserves single market access as much as possible, but has "free movement". This gets sold to the public on the basis of the "safeguard measures" in the EEA treaty which, in principle, allow the UK to unilaterally restrict migration (or capital or trade) if there is a pressing need to. Migration would have fallen because of a weaker economy and a less welcoming society, so there will be no need to discover in the short term that this break is actually very costly and difficult to use (the EU can take appropriate 'countermeasures', not necessarily through restrictions to the same freedom). The issue may come back to bite us on the bum later though.. and its important to realise this is not "win win" as it minimises loss of access and influence: custom checks still add costs, and lots of regulations still have to be followed, both internally and in our trade with Europe.

b) We end up getting a bespoke bilateral deal which involves us stuffing European mouths with gold. We get full or close-to-full access to the single market (somewhere between Switzerland and the EEA), and a more usable "break" on migration, in exchange for increased (rather than decreased) net payments into the EU budget.

Each of these involves breaking one of the main pledges of the Leave campaign. But I just don't see the "cake and eat it" or the "cut off nose to spite face" options garnering enough support in Europe or the UK, respectively.

Paul. think I am better in control of the facts than probably 90% of the people in the country - whether that be those who voted leave or voted remain

You must have also seen this coming and made a fortune on the markets too.

Unless of course you waited to cash in as the FTSE is back above the pre Brexit dip level at close of play today!!!

The FTSE 100 is back above its closing level in £ terms, yes. FTSE 100 companies make 80% of their earnings outside the UK so those earnings are now worth more in pounds. That would normally push the FTSE up. And in $ terms, the FTSE 100 is down around 10%.The FTSE 250 is still down 7% so is down 17% in $ terms. These companies make about 50% of their earnings outside the UK. Look at the sectors most exposed - Banking, Housing - and they are all down down down.

As I said earlier its too early to say exactly what the impact will be. I never claimed economists could do that. And economists never claimed "there will be a major recession". Instead a range of outcomes for the short-medium term were reductions in output of between 2% and 7% compared to what we would otherwise have (which was growth). So everything from a substantial slowdown to a moderate recession.

I've increasingly come to realise your main motivation is to troll and get a rise out of people who clearly care about these issues far more than you (its probably a sort of sport - like badger baiting or cock fighting - that appeals to the mean-spirited). But I just can't help myself and ignore you.

So the last thing I'll say is I would have thought you'd known there is a difference between a "fact" or "evidence" - how the EU operates, or effects of migration on public finances - and "events" - like a referendum result.

I didn't think we'd vote to leave - in part because I knew the polls, the betting markets, how past referenda have played out elsewhere (i.e. the Facts). But sometimes things go on unnoticed below the surface ('private information' in the world of markets). And sometimes there are shocks (that are bound to happen at some point, but predicting the exact moment is notoriously difficult - thats why they are shocks). So I was shocked by the result. That is despite me being better informed about the issues and about what the public information on the likely outcome of the referendum was than most people.

Simply put, if your predictions are wrong in something like this it does not mean you were "stupid" or "not in control of the (publicly available) facts". Its just that sometimes unexpected shit happens!

You know I cant help myself either, you are one conceited chap!

I knew when I was typing the FTSE thing that you would come back and talk about the 250/350 indices and the dollar values etc etc, if this is trolling then boy do you also have a problem.

I didn't think we'd vote to leave - in part because I knew the polls

Do you know, I was not that surprised of the vote leave from actually talking to people, maybe it's the circles I mix in?
Not the exalted air of the IFS, but as mad man Farage put it, people who actually do work and create jobs!

You say the polls all showed a vote Remain, no they didn't, not the online polls. Anyway, since over the last couple of elections polling organisations have gotten things so spectacularly wrong, I am surprised your gave them such credence. Maybe because you are an economist you are hard wired to follow rather than think for yourself.
Like the 2008/09 crisis where economists are even now trying to re-write history to show they had in fact saw it all coming so you are also paddling your feet in Cairo.

I reckon you will have to have the last word on this, cause I notice you logging on and off! probably deciding when to have another pop at whomever has dared to disagreed with you latest thesis.

I only "have to have the last word" when I think someone is making false claims about something. Its a little creepy thinking you've been monitoring my log ins and outs though.

Anyway, I did not say "polls all showed a vote remain". I know full well the difference between online and telephone polls (and that worried me quite a lot). But the swing towards remain shown in the last few polls, including the last couple of online polls; the betting markets; and the modest swings towards 'status quo' options seen, on average, in referenda made me think Remain would probably just, and I mean, just edge it. And the "inaccuracy" of polls would increase my margin of error - so reduce my certainty - but I'm not sure it would make me think they are biased in one particular direction. It will be interesting to see if this was a "failure of sample" or a "failure to elicit accurate responses". The official review said it was mainly the former in 2015, when online and telephone polls both got it rather wrong. The fact the online polls and telephone polls differed this time and the former were more accurate - maybe people felt more comfortable reporting their true opinions online in text rather than spoken over the phone?

Hard-wired to follow? I'll think you find that economics as a discipline makes you inclined to be sceptical, especially of people and their motives. As a quantitative social science, it encourages you to seek out facts and evidence - not just go with "common sense" and "received wisdom". And you've probably heard jokes about the lack of one handed economists, and 2 economists having 3 views on a subject. Its a notoriously fractured and argumentative discipline, albeit one where years of theory and evidence means there are some things become near universal professional consensus (trade is good, uncertainty is bad, incentives matter, markets and governments can fail, etc).

And as a profession I think you'll find economists remarkably accepting of the fact that they did not "call" the 2008/09 crash. In part because the timing is always very difficult to call. In part because the discipline moved on to other issues and did not properly study the big changes happening in capital markets and so was ill-prepared to explain and predict what was happening when it was clear something was going on. Economics got too divorced from the 'real world' financial markets and macro-economy (just as at the same time, micro-economists were doing more and more 'real world' stuff on development, education, health, transport, etc).

Maybe a few revisionists deny these failings, but isn't that always the case?