Alf Cannan's I Have A Dream

[Max Power]

8 minutes ago, jackwhite said:

I We definitely need something to bring some vibrancy from young people here. 

That's exactly it! 

[A fool and his money.....]

9 hours ago, HeliX said:

One leads to the other though, no? Short term you need to import to have the cash to have a long-term strategy to home-grow. But encouraging people to have children here and stay here is an 18-20 year investment, encouraging adults to move here is instant.

I'm not talking about encouraging people to have children here. I'm talking about providing educational and other opportunities for people who are already here, rather than actively standing in their way. We have a shortage in X profession, why not provide free training for that profession for all ages, encourage existing residents into it.

If we're short on tax take, why are we still giving tax breaks to millionaires? Why isn't the living wage law? It's government's own statistic describing what it costs to live here and already way out of date, yet we allow many employers, often rich multinational corporates, to pay their workers considerably less.

At the moment Government waste a huge amount of the revenue it gains from the 85K residents we have. If we have 100K the waste will just be greater, we'll have an extra 15K residents who don't really want to live here (most probably employed by government) and inequality will probably be even greater.

Government have been throwing money at this idea for at least the last ten years and as the recent census shows, it simply doesn't work. Net inward migration of working people was what, about 600 for the decade or something? Divide the cost of locate.im, its staff, the national insurance holidays, the relocation expenses paid, all the other sweeteners, into 600 and you'll have an eye watering figure per new worker.

Contrast this with the number of new workers from other recent decades who moved here without incentive and in many cases despite stricter work permit legislation.

[jackwhite]

13 minutes ago, Max Power said:

That's exactly it! 

I totally agree mate and am all for it. I'm just not sure this is it. 

Has it's merits and can see where you're coming from. It's in the plan so lets see. I'd certainly be willing to give it a try but, as we've said, would need some serious incentive and clever thinking. 

[jackwhite]

9 minutes ago, A fool and his money..... said:

I'm not talking about encouraging people to have children here. I'm talking about providing educational and other opportunities for people who are already here, rather than actively standing in their way. We have a shortage in X profession, why not provide free training for that profession for all ages, encourage existing residents into it.

If we're short on tax take, why are we still giving tax breaks to millionaires? Why isn't the living wage law? It's government's own statistic describing what it costs to live here and already way out of date, yet we allow many employers, often rich multinational corporates, to pay their workers considerably less.

At the moment Government waste a huge amount of the revenue it gains from the 85K residents we have. If we have 100K the waste will just be greater, we'll have an extra 15K residents who don't really want to live here (most probably employed by government) and inequality will probably be even greater.

Government have been throwing money at this idea for at least the last ten years and as the recent census shows, it simply doesn't work. Net inward migration of working people was what, about 600 for the decade or something? Divide the cost of locate.im, its staff, the national insurance holidays, the relocation expenses paid, all the other sweeteners, into 600 and you'll have an eye watering figure per new worker.

Contrast this with the number of new workers from other recent decades who moved here without incentive and in many cases despite stricter work permit legislation.

The tax breaks for rich people have, at least in the cases of a few, proven successful in enticing them here. Their involvements then leads to opportunities being created. Without that would we even have the likes of Pokerstars and Microgaming here? 

Even the case of the new Bushy's owner for example, I doubt he'd be here if it wasn't for that. 

Does then lead to an imbalanced society but nothing's perfect. 

The living wage isn't law in the UK (not saying it shouldn't be) but both our minimum and living wage are above the UK (yes I realise they should be because of costs etc). Our own minimum wage is the UK living wage. 

Doing the things you query will only lead to further people leaving the Isle of Man. In the case of these types of people it could be disastrous. It may create equality in the long run but what does that look like? My own view is that everything would become really run down and we'd resort to the likes of the little seaside towns in the UK but without any draw to come here, other than TT. 

[Andy Onchan]

29 minutes ago, jackwhite said:

I just don't see it gaining traction.

Any incentives would have to be significantly better than what they could get in the UK. I get the safety thing but you could flip that on it's head by saying it's inevitable there will have been people the students know who have been in these places, or may still be studying there when they are arriving. With time the same could be said here but there's just so much more for them in the UK. 

I'm just not confident it's viable given the costs involved but we'll see if it is indeed delivered. We definitely need something to bring some vibrancy from young people here. 

English as a foreign language (EFL) is a massive (educational) sector. Malta is teeming with colleges and academies providing only those courses, nothing else. Tie that in with other further education opportunities for those sturdents and we might just have an employment pool of youngsters on our doorstep (for both permanent residential positions and temporary for hospitality jobs).

It works elsewhere. I really don't see why it wouldn't work here.

[jackwhite]

6 minutes ago, Andy Onchan said:

English as a foreign language (EFL) is a massive (educational) sector. Malta is teeming with colleges and academies providing only those courses, nothing else. Tie that in with other further education opportunities for those sturdents and we might just have an employment pool of youngsters on our doorstep (for both permanent residential positions and temporary for hospitality jobs).

It works elsewhere. I really don't see why it wouldn't work here.

Malta has many other attractions we don't. 

It's a nice climate for one. 

Having been there a handful of times there's also plenty to do, see and go to.

As I've said, we should try it. Just call me a sceptic on this subject. Maybe I'm just becoming Manxified! (only a joke).

I don't claim to get it right all the time either. 

[Max Power]

2 minutes ago, jackwhite said:

The tax breaks for rich people have, at least in the cases of a few, proven successful in enticing them here. Their involvements then leads to opportunities being created. Without that would we even have the likes of Pokerstars and Microgaming here? 

Even the case of the new Bushy's owner for example, I doubt he'd be here if it wasn't for that. 

Does then lead to an imbalanced society but nothing's perfect. 

The living wage isn't law in the UK (not saying it shouldn't be) but both our minimum and living wage are above the UK (yes I realise they should be because of costs etc). Our own minimum wage is the UK living wage. 

Doing the things you query will only lead to further people leaving the Isle of Man. In the case of these types of people it could be disastrous. It may create equality in the long run but what does that look like? My own view is that everything would become really run down and we'd resort to the likes of the little seaside towns in the UK but without any draw to come here, other than TT. 

I think there's a perception amongst some that the more wealthy residents somehow make it harder for the less wealthy of us by the inflation of housing, goods and service pricing? 

I think this may be true at the upper end of the market but certainly not at the middle. Without a more wealthy population we would actually have very poor quality of lifestyle, and as you say, we would have an even worse living environment!

[A fool and his money.....]

6 minutes ago, jackwhite said:

The tax breaks for rich people have, at least in the cases of a few, proven successful in enticing them here. Their involvements then leads to opportunities being created. Without that would we even have the likes of Pokerstars and Microgaming here? 

Even the case of the new Bushy's owner for example, I doubt he'd be here if it wasn't for that. 

Does then lead to an imbalanced society but nothing's perfect. 

The living wage isn't law in the UK (not saying it shouldn't be) but both our minimum and living wage are above the UK (yes I realise they should be because of costs etc). Our own minimum wage is the UK living wage. 

Doing the things you query will only lead to further people leaving the Isle of Man. In the case of these types of people it could be disastrous. It may create equality in the long run but what does that look like? My own view is that everything would become really run down and we'd resort to the likes of the little seaside towns in the UK but without any draw to come here, other than TT. 

The same old lazy, unimaginative politics we've relied on for over 30 years and where are we today? What benefit does a young resident have from it? They have to pay many times more for any higher education than they would have 20 years ago, housing themselves and any future family will cost a much higher proportion of their salary than at anytime in living memory, reduced and unreliable public transport, huge healthcare waiting lists, the list goes on. 

 

[A fool and his money.....]

2 minutes ago, Max Power said:

I think there's a perception amongst some that the more wealthy residents somehow make it harder for the less wealthy of us by the inflation of housing, goods and service pricing? 

I think this may be true at the upper end of the market but certainly not at the middle. Without a more wealthy population we would actually have very poor quality of lifestyle, and as you say, we would have an even worse living environment!

The trickle down economics myth.

[jackwhite]

3 minutes ago, A fool and his money..... said:

The same old lazy, unimaginative politics we've relied on for over 30 years and where are we today? What benefit does a young resident have from it? They have to pay many times more for any higher education than they would have 20 years ago, housing themselves and any future family will cost a much higher proportion of their salary than at anytime in living memory, reduced and unreliable public transport, huge healthcare waiting lists, the list goes on. 

 

I'm not saying there is any benefit to those people you mentioned but not every house is owned by a wealthy person. 

The plans they have in place take account of a campus and say they have plans to tackle housing prices. 

Yes, these things absolutely need tackled. To then say we should take away the things that enticed people here in the first place would be throwing the baby out with the bath water. 

[Max Power]

3 minutes ago, A fool and his money..... said:

The trickle down economics myth.

Not really, but a bit. The more wealthy create a market for certain things which can't be sustained by the less wealthy. The less wealthy can dip in and out of that market which wouldn't otherwise exist.

[A fool and his money.....]

9 minutes ago, jackwhite said:

I'm not saying there is any benefit to those people you mentioned but not every house is owned by a wealthy person. 

The plans they have in place take account of a campus and say they have plans to tackle housing prices. 

Yes, these things absolutely need tackled. To then say we should take away the things that enticed people here in the first place would be throwing the baby out with the bath water. 

But the money spent on "enticing" these people to live here could be better used creating the campus and tackling house prices. We can't keep relying on the same policy of effectively paying people to live here that we have for decades and expecting different outcomes.

You admit there is no benefit to the people I mention from these policies - but these are the people the government are there to serve which is often forgotten. Do you really believe this latest hair brained get rich quick scheme is for their benefit? Or are our self-serving politicos are more interested in further feathering the nest of themselves and others like them?

[A fool and his money.....]

16 minutes ago, Max Power said:

Not really, but a bit. The more wealthy create a market for certain things which can't be sustained by the less wealthy. The less wealthy can dip in and out of that market which wouldn't otherwise exist.

I'm not sure that's true, but if it is, I'm quite sure it shouldn't be a priority for government at the present time. There are far bigger fish to fry at the moment.

[Non-Believer]

26 minutes ago, jackwhite said:

Malta has many other attractions we don't. 

It's a nice climate for one. 

Having been there a handful of times there's also plenty to do, see and go to.

Climate is the only plus. I was there a couple or six years ago, admittedly on holiday. I thought it was an absolute shithole of neglect and disinterest. Some nice new development around Valletta but lots of the rest looked like the Germans had just finished bombing it - still. Typical Med attitude of even greater traa - dy - liooar than we even have here. Our scenery knocks spots off it.

[jackwhite]

10 minutes ago, A fool and his money..... said:

But the money spent on "enticing" these people to live here could be better used creating the campus and tackling house prices. We can't keep relying on the same policy of effectively paying people to live here that we have for decades and expecting different outcomes.

You admit there is no benefit to the people I mention from these policies - but these are the people the government are there to serve which is often forgotten. Do you really believe this latest hair brained get rich quick scheme is for their benefit? Or are our self-serving politicos are more interested in further feathering the nest of themselves and others like them?

So we should start our great population increase by, er, decreasing the population?

It is possible to have a dual strategy you know. We don't have to spend money enticing them, our current tax does that. 

If, and this is a big if, they follow through on the new strategy, then, yes, clearly it's for their benefit and would be. Are you saying now the new strategy isn't?