OT. The futures Bright, the Futures Brexit!!!

[Andy_Faber]

Strictly speaking you may be right, Andy...but in the grand scheme of things there can be little doubt that there is a correlation between being well off and being able to afford private healthcare and private education.

I’d suggest you displayed unusual foresight in putting private health care before the acquisition of colour TV and good for you...but you aren’t typical and you were fortunate in joining a company that offered PH...most don’t.

No clever foresight on my part rA, it was after a discussion on my first day at work with the office PA (secretary in those days) Margaret, the first adult I ever fancied, and to be honest if she'd suggested I give the £3 to a chicken sanctuary I probably would have. Glad she suggested PH though

My point wasn't quite what you were responding to though, Swale was suggesting in his highly charged way that PH = 'rich' = daily baths in goats milk served by virgin handmaidens = out of touch, which is absolutely not the case - recognising that those who have it are in general more privileged than thos who don't

[ramAnag]

No clever foresight on my part rA, it was after a discussion on my first day at work with the office PA (secretary in those days) Margaret, the first adult I ever fancied, and to be honest if she'd suggested I give the £3 to a chicken sanctuary I probably would have. Glad she suggested PH though

My point wasn't quite what you were responding to though, Swale was suggesting in his highly charged way that PH = 'rich' = daily baths in goats milk served by virgin handmaidens = out of touch, which is absolutely not the case - recognising that those who have it are in general more privileged than thos who don't

Can’t help feeling that’s entirely your interpretation, AF.

Swale just used the word ‘rich’. It’s all relative and he perhaps would have been more accurate to say ‘comfortable’ or ‘well off’.

Anecdotally...I have four kids...the two who are wealthiest, as a result of the industries they have chosen to work in, are also ‘privileged’ to benefit from company provided private health care. The two who are less well remunerated, but have perfectly good and respectable jobs, have no such advantages.

It is a simple fact of life that the better off you are the more likely you are to be receive or be able to afford private education and healthcare and there’s no point in pretending otherwise. Whether it’s always worth it is a different question.

[Geoff Parkstone]

An interesting interpretation rA and not one I agree with. I've been self employed for over 25 years and have always bought PHI - even before diagnosed as diabetic. I haven't had a holiday in 6 years, I don't have a football season ticket, I rarely drink, don't smoke. I have to fund my own pension. I chose where to spend my finite financial resource on what is important to me.

So to be accused of being rich because I have PHI is as daft as calling you rich because you go on holiday several times a year (in normal conditions) or have a derby season ticket.

[ramAnag]

An interesting interpretation rA and not one I agree with. I've been self employed for over 25 years and have always bought PHI - even before diagnosed as diabetic. I haven't had a holiday in 6 years, I don't have a football season ticket, I rarely drink, don't smoke. I have to fund my own pension. I chose where to spend my finite financial resource on what is important to me.

So to be accused of being rich because I have PHI is as daft as calling you rich because you go on holiday several times a year (in normal conditions) or have a derby season ticket.

I didn’t use the word ‘rich’...I just observed that those who benefited from PHI and private (public) schooling were likely to be amongst the better, more ‘comfortably’ off.

I doubt that you not going on holiday for six years has anything to do with not being able to afford to, but you’re right, we all make choices as regards how to spend our ‘finite financial resources’. I, and by implication Swale, are also right...those who are wealthier or in more prestigious employment are more likely to benefit from PHI and private education.

[Andy_Faber]

Your ping pong has gone off my original point, that Swales original comment was *******s

[Geoff Parkstone]

Is that a point? Most of them are bollox!

[ramAnag]

Your ping pong has gone off my original point, that Swales original comment was *******s

I think you actually lost the point when you started suggesting that Swale was talking about those who ‘bathed in goats milk’ and enjoyed the delights of ‘virgin handmaidens’, Andy. That shot was well off the table.

Have to say that, personally, I’ve never understood the attraction of bathing in any sort of milk.

[Geoff Parkstone]

I didn’t use the word ‘rich’...I just observed that those who benefited from PHI and private (public) schooling were likely to be amongst the better, more ‘comfortably’ off.

I doubt that you not going on holiday for six years has anything to do with not being able to afford to, but you’re right, we all make choices as regards how to spend our ‘finite financial resources’. I, and by implication Swale, are also right...those who are wealthier or in more prestigious employment are more likely to benefit from PHI and private education.

Your doubts are misplaced

[ramAnag]

Seems odd seeing as not so long ago that you told us about some of your very wealthy clients and that you were only avoiding retirement because you didn’t want to be bored...but you’d obviously know best.

[Geoff Parkstone]

Seems odd seeing as not so long ago that you told us about some of your very wealthy clients and that you were only avoiding retirement because you didn’t want to be bored...but you’d obviously know best.

It's called pension funding sadly. Unlike yourself (this is not a dig at teachers) or those in employment, those of us who are self employed have to fund our own pensions 100%. Thus my preferred chosen use of finite finance has been to try to get my pension up to an acceptable level in the event that I cannot work as long as I want to.

I somehow don't fancy living on the state funded 8.5k pa.....

Also the reason my clients are wealthy (or should I say comfortable in the new vernacular) is that they don't like overpaying!!😊

[MadAmster]

I retired at 60. It appears I had been sufficiently lucky in my pension exploits, part company, part private from the years I ran my old language and communcation training company to be able to have a decent pension to my Dutch pensionable age. Taking part of the pension in those 6 and a bit years and have that decrease when my Dutch OAP kicked in. I'm on slightly more now than when I retired, despite the private pension reducing, The 2 state pensions compensate for it.

Over here, health insurance is just that. Insurance for which you pay. There are some commercial providers but there are also a lot of "not for profit" health insurance schemes. Everybody in the Netherlands is privately insured for health matters. Every year you get the chance to switch companies if you want to. I'm happy with the one I have. Total cost is about £140 a month. My meds cost about £90 a month. Fysio is an average of around £70. Add in dental costs, annual check up with the cardiologist.... I'm quids in. I realise that means somebody else is "subsidising" me but I "subsidised others" for a long time before I got my heart issues. Swings and roundabouts job.

The point of all this? PH isn't necessarily a rich thing, in our case it's the only thing.

[swaledale]

Wrong and a demonstration of how big and how opaque your blinkers are.

Edit: and associating being 'rich' with having access to private healthcare is just plain deluded, I had PH through the company I joined from college at around £3 per week (my contribution), I had PH before I had a colour TV. Millions of people benefit from the same benefit and if you called them rich they'd laugh at you. If you want a discussion on the other issue bring it on but you are justy plain wrong on healthcare its not even up for discussion

This from the guy who accuses me of selective xenophobia, but then doesn't substantiate the accusation when asked! Mind you thats a familiar pattern with you, so not surprised.

Talking about narrow and opaque views, your view is extremely blinkered, if your not aware that unlike you, there are millions of people who do not even have your ability to afford any sort of private healthcare and those people would indeed consider you and I to be rich. Not that I actually said that if you had access to private healthcare you were rich in any case.

I was actually referring to those in government who implement the policies, not people like you and me who have access to a certain level of private healthcare.

I must apologise I assumed a level of relative sophistication in thought and my assumption of you was wrong and explain things more clearly in the future. I mean you clearly don't udnerstand what xenophobia and racism is, so why should I be surpised.
Though if you'd considered the context of my post you might have twigged that and it would avoid you nearly having a seizure as you vented your rather foolish thoughts in your post. Funnily enough rA did get the point, but then he clearly is better at understanding these concepts.

So to clarify if your rich and you have access to high level private health care and hardly if ever have to use the NHS, or other public services such as education then your unlikely to be fully aware of (and I would say care about) the consequences of starving public services of resources. It figures therefore that any policies you create and then implement may not actually be aligned to the needs of the majority of the population.

I mean as you have so clearly shown it is easy to live within ones own bubble and be unaware of the reality of other peoples lives.

[swaledale]

No clever foresight on my part rA, it was after a discussion on my first day at work with the office PA (secretary in those days) Margaret, the first adult I ever fancied, and to be honest if she'd suggested I give the £3 to a chicken sanctuary I probably would have. Glad she suggested PH though

My point wasn't quite what you were responding to though, Swale was suggesting in his highly charged way that PH = 'rich' = daily baths in goats milk served by virgin handmaidens = out of touch, which is absolutely not the case - recognising that those who have it are in general more privileged than thos who don't

No I wasn't, as is often the case with you, that was your interpretation, anybody with the ability to read the context would have understood i was referring to the wealthy who can afford to pay in entirety for privately as opposed to publicly provide services.

The only person highly charged and frothing at the mouth was you, for some reason the idea that you might be well off and in a fincnial position not open to millions of people in the Uk seems to worry you!

[swaledale]

Is that a point? Most of them are bollox!

According to you, who by the evidence of your posts gets quite simple facts and concepts on a frequent basis.

[swaledale]

"Trade disruption to be deeper and longer than we thought” says Gove, whilst holding all the cards, negotiating the easiest trade deal ever, and squinting from the glare of the sunlit uplands!