In A sentence, what would you do to solve the downturn..

[TimmoB]

We are all business owners on here, (mostly), we all have to budget and manage costs. What would you do to turn around the UK economy.
1 sentence only. No rants.

I'll start:

I would put 4p on income tax for a year, i know it punishes us all, but we all have to help get out of this mess.

Timmo.

 

[Mister B]

There are a multitude of answers here, and assuming that we have to give an answer which will only benefit the country in the long term and not be a short term fix, then my sentence would have to include the sacking of the government, cutting of costs and increase in both taxes and interest rates.

Could that be construed as an early Christmas list

Mister B

 

[Maslins]

I would raise VAT (most essentials are zero rated so poor people would still be able to buy food etc), eliminate working tax credits and instead raise PA to ~£10k, halve the number of MPs, and seriously review lots of red tape for businesses like health & safety, employee's rights (with a view to reduce them).

This would (in order) raise revenue, simplify the system & encourage unemployed into work, save costs, and make life easier for businesses.

 

[graemepirie]

Increasing taxes never incentivised anyone...

Abolish employers NI, VAT threshold down to £10K, VAT rate left at 15% permanently, personal and company tax allowances up to £12K. Abolish tax loopholes through simplification. Bring benefits in line with the rest of the EU. Slash public spending to maximum of 30% of GDP.

 

[PaddyPawsPetServices]

I certainly would not have increased tax on fuel ( what idiot would think thats a good idea, when people are struggling enough to make ends meet/afford to live/losing jobs/ hauliers unable to meet rising costs )

Instead of all those cars sitting in docks doing nothing, ( and having the muppets who built them whinging that they cant move em, yet demanding money from the government ) bring them into use, sell them for a heavily reduced rate ( surely its better to get something for them, rather than have them sitting, gathering dust/costing money/losing money )

I think I would give every UK tax payer a lump sum, to do with as they please. They will save it/invest or spend. Which will certainly help to get the economy going again.

 

[Minuteman Press]

Merge NI & Income tax.
Increase tax on cigarettes by 5000000%.
Introduce serious taxation on high carbon footprint vehicles.
Privatise the Royal Family.

 

[ImproveSearchListings]

Reduce tax on alcohol, increase taxes for everyone (persons - not businesses) except the lowest earners, reduce job-seekers allowance, offer companies tax breaks for hiring long-term unemployed, reward long-term unemployed after being in work permanently for one year with a reduction in taxes for one month.

 

[KidsBeeHappy]

Merg.
Privatise the Royal Family.

Ace!!
And make them buy all their castles/estates etc from the crown with their personal stash.

 

[directmarketingadvice]

Nationalise the banks, clean up their toxic assets, let those that need to fail, fail and the others can operate properly with a clean bill of health.

As long as the government pursues their "zombie bank" policy, there will always be problems with credit.

Steve

 

[Edward Moss]

1. Stop the government supporting industries that produce products no-one wants to buy, let them fail and let the market decide who survives.

2. Vote at the next election

 

[An Oasis]

Get rid of worst-case practises and short-termism, which leads to so much wastage - either through poor advice or corruption (I know not which).

 

[FAB Enterprises]

Combination of massive capital building projects and tax cuts. Start a massive social housing building project, digital infrastucture & research projects and convert 80% of energy generation to renewable energy. Then combine this with flat rate income tax of 28% regardless of earnings and raise the thresholds for Tax & NI to £10,000.

 

[Gord]

Call an immediate election.

Right now, those in office are digging us into a deeper hole for the next 12 months in order to minimise the political damage.

 

[Rhyl Lightworks]

Abolish income tax and NI. Make up the shortfall by massive increases in VAT and excise duty (on things that are environmentally unfriendly). This would make labour much cheaper and goods more expensive (the reverse of what it is now).
Oh and start thinking 'out of the box'. Just because we've done it for the last 50 years doesn't mean it's a good thing.

Barrie

 

[Write My Site]

Impose PROPER regulation on the banking system.

 

[The Panda]

Impose a gag on all news about the economy to stop panicking.
Give every working person a tax break and scrap vat by imposing a higher income tax all round.
Have a national funny face day that’s compulsory to cheer us all up.
If I ruled the world.

 

[trevorwood]

Some of the above

Remove road tax an add it to fuel to penalise those who a) do a lot of mileage and b) those who drive gas guzzlers.

Change the electoral system from first past the post to single transferable vote (not PR!)

Dump IR35 - has been nothing but a drain on tax payers money given how few court cases HMRC has won.

I'm sure I'll think of a few more things later

 

[JEREMY HAWKE]

Some of the above

Remove road tax an add it to fuel to penalise those who a) do a lot of mileage and b) those who drive gas guzzlers.

Change the electoral system from first past the post to single transferable vote (not PR!)

Dump IR35 - has been nothing but a drain on tax payers money given how few court cases HMRC has won.

I'm sure I'll think of a few more things later

Im pretty sure you will find that this is a good idea when you cant even afford a loaf of bread due to high transportation cost .
Some of us NEED gas guzling 4x4s

My contribution to this is we just need more confidence.This is a mind set that is going to have to come from the business sector from the one man bands right up to the board room ..As everybody else is full of doom and gloom and look unlikly to rise from their depresion

 

Return the country to a manufacturing base that makes products the world wants.

Playing around with finance don't create anything.

Earl

 

[estwig]

I'd put me in charge of..............................Everything, that'd fix it!!!!!

 

[deniser]

Invest massively in the manufacturing sector and agriculture and then export.

 

[directmarketingadvice]

Impose a gag on all news about the economy to stop panicking.

You mean giving the government the right to censor all news media?

That's not a slippery slope or the thin end of a wedge...

Steve

 

[JEREMY HAWKE]

Return the country to a manufacturing base that makes products the world wants.

Playing around with finance don't create anything.

Earl

Thats the best line of the lot we dont want to be another Iceland !!!

But I aint workin down no mine

 

[An Oasis]

You mean giving the government the right to censor all news media?

That's not a slippery slope or the thin end of a wedge...

They have nearly managed it already.



The Blogosphere broke the last bout of Labour sleaze, not the media. If I want info on virtually anything the Blogosphere is the first point of call.

 

[The Panda]

You mean giving the government the right to censor all news media?

That's not a slippery slope or the thin end of a wedge...

Steve

No, what I mean is to not allow news media to dwell on it so much, (Self censored, not government) we all know its bad out there and getting worse but the news media just hype things up more and more and scare people.
I wont buy a newspaper any more or watch the news. Its always doom scaremongering at its best. Any good news gets a little "Oh, by the way" at the end.
There is still money out there but people are so scared they wont spend it and that is holding up the economy and pushing small businesses over the brink.

Lets all have a party.

 

[streetslocal]

• All those on job seekers for longer than 6 months should conduct 10 hours labour in exhange for benefits,this labour should be doing things like tidying local parks,volunteering at old peoples homes,doing something to help the community this would reduce the spongers i assure you....and for those who are not spongers it would allow them to gain skills for the C.V.
• Reduce tax by 2% allowing people to spend and giving something back into the economy.
• Abolish waste on services such as the NHS and put the patient at the core of there own care.
• Zero tollerance policing-abolish police cautions for offences such as theft and charge people with the offence.
• Make St Georges day a national bank holiday.
• Remove tax from people who have a 2nd pension as it believe its wrong to be taxed when retired.
• Increase speed cameras and generate revenue for all offences where law breaking has occured.
• Tax banks extra on all profits in form of an insurance policy to cover any bank collapses.
• Scrap the tv licence and allow the BBC to show advertisements to pay for themselves.
• Scrap inheritance tax altogether.

 

[graemepirie]

No, what I mean is to not allow news media to dwell on it so much, (Self censored, not government) we all know its bad out there and getting worse but the news media just hype things up more and more and scare people.
I wont buy a newspaper any more or watch the news. Its always doom scaremongering at its best. Any good news gets a little "Oh, by the way" at the end.
There is still money out there but people are so scared they wont spend it and that is holding up the economy and pushing small businesses over the brink.

Lets all have a party.

I agree entirely with your thoughts here. I'm absolutely positive the media caused half the problems over the last year..

 

[TimmoB]

yes i think good old Pesto did a great job of causing the run on RBS... and probably a lot more too, but we do need to know when things are wrong, no use burying our heads in the sand.

some good ideas have been posted here, anyone fancy forming a political party and running for election.

I'd like to be minister in charge of days off please.

Timmo.

 

[gamer1810]

In one line:

Hang some bankers

It might not be that helpful, but would sure make the country feel better!

 

[The Panda]

yes i think good old Pesto did a great job of causing the run on RBS... and probably a lot more too, but we do need to know when things are wrong, no use burying our heads in the sand.

some good ideas have been posted here, anyone fancy forming a political party and running for election.

I'd like to be minister in charge of days off please.

Timmo.

Yes me. We could call it the Lets all have a party party.
People in this country are so down they need some good positive news.
Lets face it, We are highly taxed, downtrodden at every level and we don't even get good weather for very long either. I am sure the bank holiday weather is pre booked by the government a year in advance just to pee us all off.

 

[directmarketingadvice]

No, what I mean is to not allow news media to dwell on it so much, (Self censored, not government)

Two things:

(1) "do not allow" and "self censored" are a contradiction. It's either one or the other.

(2) "Self censored" is very different to your original "Impose a gag on all news about the economy", which is censoring the media.

(and, presumably, done by the government - who else is going to be doing it?)

As for the "the media caused half the problems over the last year.." stuff, just not true.

RBS and HBOS are in my city.

I get enough of an insight to know these banks are in a far bigger hole than the mainstream media suggests.

(plus there's a ton of stuff that's barely being mentioned in the news - derivatives, the coming pensions disaster etc)

Steve

 

[TimmoB]

yeah but it feels good to levy the blame at someone's door.
I mean if we really wanted to go down the route of finding the real causes of this downturn, we'd be here for weeks, was it the deregulation of the banking sectors? was it Thatcher's privitisation policies? or maybe it's the rediculous cost of fighting two wars that we are not going to win!

Timmo.

 

[Emcar Vending]

In A sentence, what would you do to solve the downturn..

What downturn? I've never been so busy.

 

[apeebles]

Does winning the lottery count?

 

[DesignerNick]

I would make every woman who didn't have a job out of choice have that bar put in their arm so they couldn't have kids until they got a job for a start!

 

[OldWelshGuy]

I would impose PROPER controls on the financial industry, I would not allow re-posessions to occur by bringing all reposessions into national ownership. Doing this would stop the break up of families due to the stress of losing your home, it would prevent the corrupt packaging of re-posessed properties to investors who are making money off the misery of others, and it would prevent cheap repossessions driving down the property market.

That single action would help us financially and socially.

I would also have governement offering guaranteed mortgages through their wholly owned banks, as ownership of property helps to build family solidarity and respect for your property and neighbourhood. This could be done in some special way such as rent to buy!

 

[deniser]

I would make every woman who didn't have a job out of choice have that bar put in their arm so they couldn't have kids until they got a job for a start!

You mean you want all women to get a job and then have kids so that we small business owners have to deal with all the maternity leave stuff?

 

[DesignerNick]

You mean you want all women to get a job and then have kids so that we small business owners have to deal with all the maternity leave stuff?

I didn't mean it exactly like that! I meant it more than the people who never have any intention of getting a job having 6-7 kids and then living from the state.

The comments above about repo houses are also quite valid on one hand but on the other hand first time buyers need a house to move into and trying to get a house without a big deposit nowadays is a nightmare so most of them can only afford repo houses in certain areas.

 

[UKSBD]

We need a politician who is brave enough to stand up and tell the truth.

What we had was unsubtainable and the sooner that people realise the
fact and adjust their lifestyles the better.

 

[4little1s]

Mine is simple ' We should stop talking down the economy' so much negative press in newspapers and TV