Pascometer burns red on Brexit shock

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Weoo, weeoo, weoo.

Bad news for the global economy. Pascometer has written Brexit off as meaningless thereby confirming the gravity of the the threat.

Reader Gunnamatta has done an excellent job of deconstructing the Pasconometric clap trap. Find it below. Pascoe begins:

I really don’t give a damn about Britain.

So I thought I’d add an opinion piece revolving around it to your day, given that I am particularly knowledgeable about things I don’t give a damn about.

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It’s of minor importance to Australia, worth only a couple of percentage points of our exports. If the Poms want to shoot themselves in their economic foot by withdrawing from a powerful trade bloc, I don’t care.

What I do care about is filling up my opinion piece with sentiments about places I have told you from the outset I don’t care about.

But I do care about the isolationist small-mindedness that seems to have driven the Brexit vote; the shrinking vision, the reduced hearts and minds of what was once a rather grand outward-looking nation. The danger, as many have commented, is that it gives heart to similar xenophobic, anti-globalisation types.

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Yes, anyone not entirely feeling they get a good deal out of the political mainstream as it has operated over a generation which has included the greatest financial collapse of all time (and the bailing out of an awful lot of large banks by taxpayers), the rise of managerialism and the embedding of conservative mantra as social policy (including rampant immigration without an accompanying overt policy on the economic need for this, or even a statement about how the immigration would even work economically, beyond ‘the more the merrier’ and ‘suck it up’) is………….a small-minded, small-hearted, xenophobic, anti-globalised bigot.

We should thank Pascoemeter here. He has gone to the very heart of the issue in one sentence. He supports unaccountable decisions made by the few being driven over the concerns of the many. 

More:

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The same populist forces that swung the British public – that demonise migrants and, especially, refugees, that push a myth of a smaller, protectionist future being better – are at work here and more broadly in the world.

That’s a worry.

And never more so than during an election campaign revolving around two mainstream parties which do not want to go within a bulls roar of addressing Banks, Housing policy, immigration, the rights of foreign nationals to launder money in our real estate market, the rights of large corporates to employ foreign nationals when they don’t want to employ locals, widespread concern about the competitive aspects of the economy in the present and future, and the ability of that economy to sustain the highest privately indebted people in the world, let alone the need to tax the employees of the future to pay for the entitlements of those who own the houses of the present, while they are buying the same houses of those they are supporting with their taxes using the worlds largest mortgages.

The sense that those who think they are entitled to drive their solutions over us may not have our best interests at heart, and looking at this may get out of control once we start, so it is better is that we don’t even start. Is this what the Pasoemeter is saying? That we aren’t mature enough to have the discussion? That only spouting business journalists in heavily loss making media organisations who have the right to ask questions?

Should we ask questions about the possibility the entire global financial system has completely mispriced the possibility of Brexit? Are you going to ask that question or are you just going to hector us about being small minded bigots?

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Many of the protagonists know no better. They are people with minds closed to the reality of the world being made a better place by maximising engagement, by welcoming differences and enlargement. There are others, the worst of them, happy to exploit ignorance for their short-term advantage. It sells newspapers. It can win an election. It can give an aspirant power.

Is Pascoemeter suggesting that many of the protagonists are know nothing small minded bigots, so it is best to assume that all of the protagonists are small minded bigots, and refuse to address any of the issues raised by those questioning the status quo?

Is he suggesting that the only people raising concerns about such issues as…..

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  • money laundering in real estate,
  • the level of immigration running at 4 times the thirty year average,
  • the use of primary school visas to support an entitlement by foreign nationals to buy residential real estate,
  • the overcrowding of our infrastructure,
  • the widespread evidence of malpractice by our financial system,
  • the margin generation practices by our corporates
  • the use of foreign labour and 457 visas
  • the complete lack of an economic narrative about where this country is going
  • the complete avoidance of discussion why we have the most expensive houses in the world, or that we have
  • millionaires claiming welfare payments on the basis of not having their own home calculated in the entitlement deliberation, while we have young families paying life deforming mortgages for a roof over their heads
    etc etc etc

….is only coming from small minded bigots or those seeking some sort of power advantage (notwithstanding that our mainstream parties are united by a fierce desire not to have most of those issues arise at all during the longest election campaign in a generation) or seeking to sell newspapers (notwithstanding that there are only two sellers of newspapers – his outfit and Uncle Ruperts – and that they are both losing money hand over fist, both desperate for revenues, both clinging desperately to the banking and real estate advertising spend, and that this is supported by the very factors that our mainstream politicians and press don’t want to discuss).

Is this what Pacoemeter is suggesting? Does Pascoemeter ‘get’ that any other interpretation of phenomena happening in this world is possible other than that he has a vested interest in criticising?

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The ignorant still view the interactions of nations as zero-sum games. They don’t grasp that globalisation is a win-win process, that the sum of our individual nations is indeed greater than the parts. They are blind to the lessons of post-WW2 Europe and the post-Cold War world as greater internationalism was embraced across trade and human movement.

Is Pascoemeter suggesting that we don’t engage with ignorance and educate it, but we should ignore it, that we don’t discuss the issues the ignorant are ignorant about and talk them through their concerns, but deny them that discussion? That we ignore the ignorant? And who decides when they are ignorant or not?

Lets explore that Pascoemeter hypothesis some more. If the interactions between nations are not zero sums games are they 100% win-win? Or could they be 70% win-win and 30% zero sum?

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Or if they are win-win at a national level does this mean that not a single individual in those nations ever loses, or that somehow the decisionmaking processes within those nations send the winnings to one section of those nations while other sections of those nations may experience a diminution of their winnings (we could put that in small print – maybe it is already in small print in one of those trade agreements we don’t get to look at before our politicians sign them on our behalf).

Do those suspecting that they may not be getting any winnings from the interaction between nations game have a review mechanism? Can they raise concerns? (or are they ignorant and should be ignored?).

The lessons of post WW2 Europe were about making sure that everyone gets a piece of the pie. The lessons of Brexit (and the general post 1980s experience) is that many feel they no longer are, and that those who used to make sure that all people were getting some slice of the pie are now welcoming suitcases full of cash carried into town by someone they know nothing about. Does that greater internationalism embrace have any downsides Pascoemeter? Or is it only upside in your Panglossian world?

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The lack of confidence in a nation’s ability to absorb migrants, to compete in a wider world, is a little sad. In the end, that’s what Brexit was really about.

The saddest thing is that if the benefits are so obvious and manifest then the selling pitch has faltered somewhere. Is it a lack of confidence in a nations ability to take migrants or a lack of being able to see the point, if all it does is overcrowd infrastructure, contribute to higher mortgages, and welcome dubiously acquired capital flows that nobody wants to talk about? Is it an inability to compete or a suspicion that all that extra competition isn’t actually doing much for the day to day experience, Pascoemeter? Or that the benefits of all that extra competition are going to people sitting in nice offices with nice views telling us what we should think, while the mugaccinos are increasingly frothy?

There are people in most countries that feel that way. Weak leadership either feeds on or gives in to their fears. Strong leadership resists the ignorance and actually leads rather than follows the fear-mongering minority. Domestically, there is a duty to educate Australians about the massive rise in living standards we have achieved through embracing globalisation and migration.

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Did those miniscule looking mortgage payments of the past provide greater satisfaction than the ones being serviced now with extra hours in the health care sector looking after the mortgagors? As for your thoughts about leadership should we get in touch with Vladimir Putin? There is not an issue he will not discuss with his people, and there seems to be loads that our politicians don’t want to talk to us about.

Finally if Australians haven’t been educated enough about the dramatic rise in our living standards (sufficient to feel they have had one – maybe they got one of those dodgy private courses) should we wait until they have been or should we ram some more down their throats while they still don’t get it? Please tell us, oh strong one!

The world’s markets are suffering a knee-jerk reaction to the UK’s vote to be smaller. The actual decision doesn’t matter much to the rest of us, as long as the knee-jerk itself doesn’t upset fundamentals.

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Dear Pascoemeter, you are a business journalist. Why don’t you ask your local bank about their cost of capital? Is the potential dismemberment about the worlds second most used currency a fundamental in your view? And if it does upset fundamentals how well positioned is the Australian economy, how well do our uber sized debts (to pay our uber sized mortgages) look as a servicing requirement at that point?

When the immediate shock passes, it will take some years for the UK to extract itself from the European community. The Scots and even the Northern Irish might reconsider their positions and the UK could further shrink. Doesn’t matter to me if what was once a global power becomes a less relevant little island off the coast of Europe.

Under Article 50 of their treaty it needs to be done in less than 2 years (Google mustn’t be working at the Pascometer offices). The Scots and Northern Irish are almost certain to reconsider their positions. Do you think this could have any international effects? (which may affect fundamentals, such as the Pound Sterling, still one of the 5 most used global currencies). Do you think it may impact on the way the EU deals with people remaining within its aegis? Or the companies they control? Do you think that the EU may become a little more focused on making sure that the people of the EU see their win, and maybe less on ensuring that their counterparties also get a win?

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Could the small minded people inside the EU, or anywhere else for that matter, now see their elites paying extra special attention to them getting a slice of pie and explaining it to them real well? If all those elites were to go that way do you think that our elites may go the same path or do you reckon they would continue to avoid addressing the day to day experiences of the punterariat a little longer? Do you reckon we (a nation capable of engaging with the rest of the world in nothing but the exchange of dirt) are likely to be more or less significant than the UK (home of the worlds largest financial centre, with generations of capital management expertise) given that we are even further off the coast of anywhere?

But this caving in to populism in having such a dangerous plebiscite, this lack of leadership, should be a warning to others not to let the lies and myths of the xenophobes and small-world types go unchallenged. The steps backward to a greater degree of tribalism, of embellishing nationalism, can be a siren song for the power-hungry.

What, so there are no power hungry in the new globalised win-win world? Is explaining things thoroughly to a people really that dangerous? Wouldnt your real power seeker want a piece of that bigger connected power, especially if there were more people to dilute the downsides with? Shouldn’t those lies myths and xenophobes be addressed with rational discussion? Are you saying they should be ignored?

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Samuel Johnson said it first: Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel.

Yeah, and La Rochefoucauld rightly noted that silence was often contempt.

But all that said, somebody had best start thinking about the here and now, for the end of cycle shock. Houses and Holes often refers to is here and all the certainty of the Pascoemeters world is going to be swept away….

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