Just about to make my next lot of washing powder and noticed I needed more soap. I just get the basic fragrance-free bars from Waitrose - which used to be £1 (and then £1.30 in 2021). Now they are £2.40 - that’s up by a further 85%!!!
Have wages gone up 85%? Nope! But the profits of Supermarkets like Waitrose and Tesco have tripled since the pandemic! The greedy capitalist system we live in is wrong - I feel sorry for the coming generations (your kids and grandkids) must be so depressing for them.
Employer NI costs which employers pay on top of wage have gone up. So the higher the wage the higher the additional NI. Both employers and employees pay, but for employers who are also manufacturers of goods such as soap the tax will be passed on in either higher prices or cheaper inputs
Not nearly as much as we do now though. Hardly anything is made here anymore.
When I was younger, we built ships, made steel, built locomotives, mined coal and supplied our own country with energy, made our own clothes, here in Doncaster we had a massive factory supplying most of the shops with fashion garments including M&S. We also manufactured our own white goods, and even vehicles. International Harvesters, less than two miles from where I live supplied the world with tractors, it’s now a new housing estate.
The factory across the road (Crompton Parkinsons) employed hundreds of people manufacturing lighting and electric motors, and Pegglers supplied the world with taps, valves and other plumbing equipment.
The largest kitchen manufacturer in Europe was in Scunthorpe (I worked there for several years as a toolmaker) and cutlery and blades made in Sheffield were legendary around the world. No need to go back 1000 years Annie, consecutive governments have managed to destroy British industry and manufacturing in less than 50 years.
OGF if you want artisan soap brands that’s ok, but we would have to import palm or coconut oil etc. I think you will find that any goods produced here would need a proportion of imported inputs. We have always been a trading nation. Unless you go back to the dark ages of course!
In terms of fashion garments, we don’t grow cotton here. I have no idea where nylon or the other fabrics source their inputs but I’ll bet we don’t have it all here with clothing output at prices that are not at designer level.
Unfortunately when I’ve bought British made brands they tend to have problems. I’m thinking of Belling cookers in particular. So quality is an issue. They just can’t produce at low cost with the right quality checks.
You either choose a living wage or you choose a stagnant economy. If you choose the former with manufacturing in the UK, nobody here could afford the goods. As the world catches up nothing will be affordable for anyone in the long run.
Yes I knew what you meant Annie, some of the raw materials would have had to be imported, but many items were assembled here providing interesting jobs with satisfying results.
We come from different worlds Annie, me from the once industrial heartland of the UK and you from the world of economics. Your world is still fairly intact, while mine has been ravaged by successive governments and the unions.
I disagree about British stuff Annie, most of it was built to last (probably part of the reason for it’s decline) but with cheap labour in far eastern countries we could never keep up or compete.
I also believe that we don’t pay the proper price for things nowadays. (I’ll probably be taken to task for saying this) but because things are cheap we have developed into a throwaway world where the cost of repair outweighs the cost of replacement.
It’s this sort of thing that is more damaging to the planet than the production of all the CO2 in the world.
Yes, buy in the raw materials, but things that could be made here, should be made here, regardless of the cost, and massive tariffs placed on imports on things that could be manufactured here. We used to have the skills to make reliable long lasting stuff.
OGF high wages, premises costs, stock storage, logistics lead to high manufacturing costs and these prices have to be passed to consumers. Jobs in the sector will never pay enough for the same people to be able to afford the goods they make.
Yes of course it’s great to build things to last. It’s also good if that happens abroad because otherwise workers at home will be sitting around being made redundant.
Yes of course it’s good to have home made produce but that would mean you have to forego your cup of tea, coffee or glass of vinho
Going global was a poor idea Annie.
You miss my point though. I didn’t say we stop all imports, justy the ones we can make ourselves. No wonder people are moving away from the UK, they can find work for their skills elsewhere and we will be left with the driftwood of the world.
Big unpopular changes will need to take place otherwise we are lost.
No secret here about a guys perspective on globalization but, we stamped “Made In Great Britain” on loads of stuff, victims of success springs to mind.
Everyone wanted to jump on te bandwagon.
