Interesting Links for 25-11-2014

[andrewducker]

• Probably my favourite "Unknown Pleasures" T-shirt
  (tags: t-shirts art space funny music )
• Alert: New Anti-Porn Censorship Law to Arrive 1st December
  (tags: porn censorship UK )
• The 3-Word Tweet That Cost a Politician Her Job
  (tags: Twitter politics class Labour UK )
• Are nurses getting 1% pay rises or 4% pay rises?
  (tags: nhs pay UK )
• NASA Will

Comments

[steepholm]

Yes, the loan system is effectively an extra 9% income tax on graduates who earn 'middle-class' incomes - except of course for those with rich parents, who can pay the loans up front and save themselves bags of money in the process. It's a useless way for the Government to raise money, but it does give graduates a huge headache, even before they try to save for an impossibly inflated house deposit, think about kids, or any of the "normal" stuff their parents took for granted. And before any Liberal Democrats tell me that a 9% hike in income tax isn't very much, I'd like to ask why, in that case, they aren't suggesting it across the board, as a way to wipe out the deficit at a stroke. How would that play, do they think?

And of course Labour are no better. They, like the Liberal Democrats, tripled fees when they were in power, after promising not to do so.

[andrewducker]

Oh, I agree that it's not the world's best solution. I'd like to see some investigation into how other European countries manage their system to allow for cheap (or free) university education.

It still, for most people, leaves them better off than they would have been under the previous system, and I'm in favour of that.

[steepholm]

What do you mean by "the previous system"?

It's a question of priorities (not many other countries are paying for Trident). I find it strange that the country could afford to give me free education plus a maintenance grant in the late 1970s, when it was so much poorer, but can't now fund the necessary the education of the graduates it needs for its own economic survival.

[wildeabandon]

About 50,000 people graduated in 1970, 80,000 in 1980, 350,000 in 2011.

Source: www.parliament.uk/briefing-papers/sn04252.pdf

[rhythmaning]

I appreciate this may be naieve, but I am baffled how at tweet without significant comment is sufficient to lose a shadow Cabinet minister her post.

Would a photograph of a neighbouring house (unflagged) house have cost her the job? What if there weren't a van in front?

She didn't say anything snobby, use the terms "chavs" or "plebs" or be otherwise offensive.

All the offence was implied. For all I know she may have been proud that the house was displaying the Cross of St George.

I find it quite bizarre.

[andrewducker]

Welcome to modern politics :-)

[a_pawson]

Listening to a lot of (less partizan) politicians, they were mostly extremely surprised that it was a sackable offence. More like the sort of thing you issue an apology for and try not to do again. But Ed Milliband is on the ropes at the moment and being accused by many (correctly in my opinion) of no longer leading the party of the working classes. So one of his own cabinet appearing to cast a slur on that very group of people was likely to provoke an overreaction.

What I Learned From Building An App For Low-Income Americans

[cartesiandaemon]

Oh wow, I want to do that.

[wildeabandon]

I already agree with everything in the Tuitions Fees article, and I found it snide and annoying. It's not going to convince anyone.

[andrewducker]

It's clearly written by someone massively frustrated. But it amused me, and I thought it might lead to an interesting discussion thread. Which it is!

[cartesiandaemon]

I'm slowly getting better at remembering you (and people in general) link to things they find interesting, not only things they support :)

[andrewducker]

And sometimes things I think might be true, and hope that if I post them here someone will point out that they aren't (or are)!

[cartesiandaemon]

"NASA will pay you to lie in bed, ESA will pay you to tell the truth in bed. Which guard is which?" :)