Wrong; you really should stop this assumption habit - it's bad for your argument.



That literally makes no sense - at all.

Jeez I'd better tell the people in the 2,500 strong payroll I sign off every four weeks!
Fortunately not everyone who does well out of the economy is blind to the reality of the many and, oftentimes, the good fortune of the few.

Wow, you do all that on your own. I prostrate my self in admiration. That micky mouse degree you got worked at well after all.

I think you're confusing me for Sal, who appears to think that everything he got in life was due to his hard work and anyone who didn't have any success has only themselves to blame.

Absolutely not - yes I have worked really hard but I have had my share of luck along the way. There is no reason why the vast majority of the population could achieve what I have. I was born in a back to back house in Bradford with an outside toilet. I went to one of worst comprehensive schools in Bradford and I didn't go to university. There are people in society who are incapable either mentally or physically from working and we need to look after them but they are a very small minority. There are plenty of examples of people from humble backgrounds making good through their own hard work - that should be applauded not roundly condemned.

The worst kind of Tory (and I've never yet met a good type).
How are the Jonese's next door.

The politics of envy - as was pointed out to Ms Long-Bailey yesterday

To answer your question - richer than me

It's got nothing at all to do with envy - it's about fairness; the view that everyone can be successful if they work hard, often parroted by people who have never had to work hard because they made money by having money, is a myth, designed to keep people in wage slavery.

It has everything to do with envy - it is true there are hundreds of thousands of examples of people who have started with nothing who have done very well - SME's are lifeblood of our economy they make up 99.9% of all businesses they account for 60% of private sector output and they employ 60% of all private sector workers i.e. c17m. Very few of these businesses will represent money on money.

The idea that we shouldn't have any billionaires is complete madness and contradicts - there is a surprise - what Corbyn has previously said. As everyone knows the top 1% contribute 30% of the income tax take - how much more do you want them to pay?

So you start a business and it is successful and it grows and it continues to grow to a point where you are a billionaire due to the perceived value of the company - no chance they will be liquid billionaires - what do you do stop working stop trying to grow the company further - allow the competition to catch up - where do you stop?

He's right. It's pure envy.
If only I could come back next time as a jerk- off a la Boris, JRM or IDS, imagine how more fulfilled I'd feel?

You can only dream - I doubt you would turn down the lifestyle of the likes of James Dyson and I don't only mean the money.

Not for me mate.
I'm quite happy with my lot.

Yes but it wont be your money with which you paying these people will it



The most vulnerable in society need to be looked after - the rest have every opportunity to progress - the pinnacle of their career could be signing off of a monthly payroll of 2,500 using someone else's money to pay them

most couldn't even imagine such a lofty achievement

Sigh.
I've seen all sides of business, I've worked with someone who made his fortune from literally nothing - he grew up in a caravan but we managed to sell the business for £150m.
He sold to private equity and a more incompetent idiotic bunch of idiots you couldn't wish to meet; within four years the same company went into administration, then we had to put it through a CVA and eventually it was liquidated.

But in my life before that most of my clients (probably around 75%) owned their businesses because they inherited them or inherited wealth. I didn't begrudge them that but that's the way it is for most people of wealth - there is little equality of opportunity in the UK, just working hard doesn't cut it.

The first bloke I mentioned worked hard and was great at what he did - but he got incredibly lucky in lots of ways (not least me coming to work for him

) People who work equally or more hard don't end up multi millionaires or even close. This is what I think modern conservatives miss - they can't imagine alternate universes where their efforts come to naught, where they strike bad luck, where, in LBJ's famous words, they get caught by the tentacles of circumstance. It's this lack of empathy and lack of understanding of their own good fortune, this sense of entitled arrogance that makes me uncomfortable in the company of all too many modern conservatives.

99%, given that is their share in the income stakes.

If the UK generates £1 and the tax bill on that is 40%, then of the 40p in tax, 39.6p should be paid by the people getting 99p and .04p is the fee charged from those who share in the 1p in income.

You decrying that some should learn to swim, or they can sink, is the politics of the far right, fascism and the Nazis. The fact that the parties you support are more than happy to blame 197,000 refugees for the hardship imposed on a population of 62,000,000 is further evidence that you're a supporter of blaming anyone else other than yourselves.

Genuine question. When you were in school, what parts of BRITISH history were you taught?
[urlhttps://www.cambridgeinternational.org/images/202620-2017-2018-syllabus.pdf[/url
That link takes you to the A-level History syllabus.....not a mention of any of the colonisation of the planet and the rape and pillage by Britain on which the upper class wealth of the likes of Boris was built....plenty about Napoleon (we beat him), the Americans (they kept slaves), German aggression and loads of other stuff where Britain is GREAT.........the reality is that you've been spoon-fed a history that the upper classes want you to know, not the reality.

My 6 years of secondary education cost more than your average 2 up 2 down house in Northern Britain and I can claim to have received more "steps up" than most, but I was educated in a country that believed in ALL TRUTHS being told, not just the convenient ones. It would seem spoon feeding the lower classes stories of Otto Von Bismark with his pointy hat or the really short 5"11" Napoleon (both who you defeated) are more important that the stuff that mattered.....like why Israel is so hated by the Arabs (british thing), why India and Pakistan are at war (British Thing), why Hong Kong residents are rioting (British Thing), why Hitler rose to prominence so quickly after WWI (british thing)....oh, and who transported most of those african slaves that caused the US civil war.....yep, A british thing too. None of this is taught to your kids......why do you think that is?

You're happy to ignore this brainwashing, but decry one of the best things that Britain ever did......THE NHS.


EXAMPLE: My educators balanced the story of the original Irish Bloody Sunday, when the British drove armoured vehicles into Croke Park and opened fire on the crowd (another part of history you weren't taught) with the reality of the assassination of multiple british officers the night before by the IRA, in their beds, some beside their wives....it's about balance of information. The Black and Tans Burnt Cork after an ambush killing some of their troops....maybe a tad OTT in the revenge stakes, but I was told "the why".
Did you know that Winston Churchill planned the Galipoli campaign and as a result of its abject failure, left political life and went to the trenches racked with guilt?

Why aren't such stories taught to your youth? I think you know why, but you, like those duped into Brexit will never admit you were lied too....

you have issues, which country do you hail from, you seem to hate the western world?

We all need an element of good fortune - but as Gary Player said the harder I work the luckier I get. Second generation syndrome is a reality but its a minority in business. I agree with you nothing worse than snotty kids riding on the coat tails of successful parents. That is the parents issue for not kicking that attitude out of them.

Not sure that you're right about the "minority" aspect but, when "kids" come into the business, they aren't usually as driven as the person who started the business with blood, sweat and tears and of course, generally, are lacking in experience.
Work ethic is probably the most important attribute plus, some nouse on what makes things tick.

Younger managers often make "rookie" mistakes but, can more than make up for that with new ideas.
However, luck is definitely important as well.

Completely agree

Born in Hertfordshire, educated in the UK, Ireland and got my degree back in the UK and my doctorate in New Zealand. History is my hobby, marketing is my business.
I have no issues with the western World. I asked why is it that British kids aren't taught the truth about their history, but instead have to learn about things like the war of the roses from a TV series?
Genuine question for you
Did you know that Winston Churchill was the architect of the Galipoli campaign in WWI? Be truthful, because I'll admit that I had no idea until I moved to the southern hemisphere a decade ago, but I find it shocking the amount of air-bushed history british kids are fed

Erm, did you even read your own link?

• Why, and with what results, was there a growth in imperial expansion during the last quarter of the nineteenth century?
• Reasons for imperial expansion in the late nineteenth century
• The ‘scramble’ for Africa; Treaty of Berlin (1885)
• An entire topic: The Causes and Impact of British Imperialism, c.1850–1939

That syllabus is actually a very reasonable spread of significant historical events. Or are you suggesting it should focus purely on the British Empire? Student are invited to study these topics, during which time they will be all over the internet obtaining a pretty good understanding of the truth.

Do you think that driving home some degree of shame for Britain's Imperial past is the ONLY topic worthy of study? The world is a big place, with lots going on.

FWIW, I am very well educated on the British Empire, the good and the bad, and riches plundered, etc blah blah. I feel zero shame for it. Centuries ago people we have very little in common with took this little island from a miserable bankrupt fractured state to the top of the world tree. Should I feel shame or apologetic for that? Nope. Not because I'm particularly jingoistic, but because that's how the world has worked for millennia: empires rise and fall, people die, territories change, they leave their mark and the world moves on. The world was a much more ruthless, violent and unforgiving place back then. If a dominant power wanted something, they took it. The industrialised world trod roughshod over the rest. Are Italians apologetic for the Romans? Or Mongolians for Genghis Khan? Or in fact any present-day nations for their historical empires? But for some reasons Britons should feel unreserved shame for their ancestors? How odd.

Tell me, why don't we learn about the Belgian impact on the Congo? Over 10 million dead via a mix of violence and disease, all with the keen approval of the Belgian state and Leopold II. Where does that stand on the scale of Empirical outrages? What about the Herero and Nama genocide? Or the Spanish conquest of South America? Or the Armenian genocide? Or the many horrific Japanese war crimes across East Asia, such as Nanking? I could go on.

Oh, and are you saying Germany wasn't aggressive? WW1 they were engaged in an arms race and as a relatively new nation paranoid about encirclement and wondering whether it would be better to fight now rather than later, as war was considered inevitable by many. Once Austria started shelling Belgrade the Germans were only too happy to roll into neutral Belgium to get at the French. And in fact until Britain declared war none of the European powers were certain we would participate at all. As for WW2 - well I'm sure you'll blame the Treaty of Versailles without considering for a moment the utterly devastating impact of WW1 on France, who felt it quite within their rights to make massive demands of Germany. Never mind that the Treaty was renegotiated in 1924 and 1930 and reparation payments were suspended in 1932, it's probably all our fault.


Erm yep, sorry to piddle on your parade but pretty much all of that is common knowledge. In fact - [iin the very syllabus you've linked to[/i, students are invited to study most of those topics, which obviously includes the British influence on events.




None of that is 'hidden' history, whatever you might think. But the fact is, a syllabus is limited in scope. Naturally, educational time and resource are limited and as such the topics chosen are limited. Is Croke Park more important than, say, China 1945-1991? Or the US policy of containment in the late 40s? Or Lenin's legacy? Or the origins of the Cold War? Or [ithe causes and impact of British Imperialism[/i? (all of these taken from the A level syllabus you linked to).

And yes, the story of Churchill and Gallipoli is also very well known. Except he didn't 'leave political life wracked with guilt'. The disaster at Gallopoli forced the Liberal government to join with the Conservatives in a coalition government, but the Tories insisted on Churchill losing any semblance of power and he was demoted to a menial role. 6 months later he quit and headed to France. Within 2 years he was back as Munitions Minister. He was far from wracked with guilt about Gallipoli - in fact, in his later words, "The Dardanelles might have saved millions of lives. Don’t imagine I am running away from the Dardanelles. I glory in it".

You seem to think you're wise to some conspiracy to mask certain events and celebrate the rest with an undercurrent of Empirical jingoism. That just isn't the case. Knowledge of Britain's past is infinitely better and far more critical than when us old codgers were at school and watching Zulu on a Saturday afternoon.

HE'S COUNTING OUR GUNS.....always one of my favourite movie lines!

An older codger like myself saw it in my mid-20's a few days after it's London Premiere at the Plaza in 1964.

About 3 years later,living in South Africa, I visited the site of the battle at Rorke's Drift to see only a few remains of the Mission Station portrayed in the film. No commemoration or graves so pretty disappointing. Also visited Isandlwana the site of the battle just before Rorke's Drift where the British were routed. There was a commemoration to the Zulus killed and that was it. Finally visited the location where the film was made which was in a Natal National Park about 90 miles from Rorke's Drift.

One of my favourite ever films and after seeing it I became fascinated with the history of the Zulus and read everything I could find about them.

I suspect things are very different today. That sounds like a hell of a experience - from Premiere to actual site. I doubt I'll ever get to visit unfortunately.

I still love Zulu, and despite a few historical embellishments (a few character 'enhancements', the final salute, the 24th being a Welsh regiment, the singing of Men of Harlech, etc) it's fairly true to the story. You're clearly clued up on the history of those events but I can highly recommend 'Battle Story: Rorke's Drift 1879' as a worthwhile read.

[i"I'm up on the hill playing little boy soldiers"[/i