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Wednesday 2 October 2019

The world turned upside down

An empty-nester in Bavaria, the acquaintance of a friend, sold the large house in which she had brought up her kids and undergone a divorce but had no choice but to commit herself to another large mortgage on a new property. Financial downsizing was not an option. "Why?" I demanded. Because. The Germans are incurable savers, and without harsh government measures to ensure they keep borrowing and spending the economy would be hit. So the German tax system effectively prevents homes being used as pension pots.

In a world in which negative interest rates are normal, in which central banks are printing monopoly money used only to inflate the asset values of the wealthy in a huge shimmering vulnerable bubble and lenders are drowning in cash to lend (I must check whether personal lease plans have been extended to powerboats and ride-on mowers ... there is no better way of parting a man from his wealth than ownership of a prestige planing vessel kept in a marina; and no, my old displacement fishing boats lived on a half-tide mud berth up an open creek). The Guardian is at least honest about Europe's problem -
Yet as one economist perceptively put it, the problem for the eurozone is that “weak credit growth is driven by the lack of demand from creditworthy borrowers rather than the supply cost of finance”. This can be solved in part by governments stepping up to boost demand in the eurozone.
That's it; the right people don't want to borrow. Lenders are desperate to lend. I wonder if we can look back to some point in history, say the oughties, to see what happened before ....

Have PLPs been extended to adult toys?

15 comments:

JPM said...

Most Germans don't need to use their homes as a pension pot.

They have a state-managed, defined benefit, occupational pension arrangement.

The typical amount paid is about fifteen hundred euros a month, I read.

France is similar.

The US-owned UK media won't tell you that, and the BBC won't break their secret either.

Mark said...

"They have a state managed, defined benefit occupational pension arrangement"

Which they can't afford.

Why should the "US owned UK media" be telling us about unaffordable French/German pensions, and why is the absence of such trivia evidence in your febrile mind of some conspiracy?

Ravenscar. said...

Maintaining asset house/share equity prices and shovelling €billions in the pockets of the big EU based conglomerates has worked just dandy in the past - right?

Now that the whole shebang is going down toilet, single currencey fubar beyond even fucked................stagflation, deflation and negative rates, what do they do?

MORE QE - brilliant!

And eu car crash when it comes will be be a calamity but that much bigger.

Berlaymont 'strategy' soopah planning lads and lasses but then and the did - how I laughed and laughed............ if you elect the likes of, von der leyen and legarde - you deserve all that's coming.

Anonymous said...

One of the present conundrums that I see is - how can we pursue economic growth whilst being wed to a puritanical climate agenda?

With the inevitable 'Climate Emergency' already declared in my city, I am continually hearing declarations of cutting back, making do, and putting off replacing the old appliances.

I think that this Capitalism vs Climate Puritanism is going to define economic policy for the next ten years.

(I'm a bit of a CO2-caused AGW sceptic BTW)

Poisonedchalice said...

"So the German tax system effectively prevents homes being used as pension pots"

I'm not accustomed to the German tax system and property - can anyone enlighten me?

Our UK system has worked well for decades, if not centuries. My concern is that the likes of McDonnell want to overturn that and place a capital gains tax on disposal of private residences; the results of which will be an economic and social disaster. As I said, I don't know about Germany, but France is something I know well and first hand. You cannot help but notice the welter of empty rural properties, all neglected and decaying as a result of ruinous French tax stupidity.

Mark said...

"I'm a bit of a CO2 caused AGW sceptic BTW"

You little tinker!

Since I found out that methane was a more effective "greenhouse" gas, I've been doing my best!

JPM said...

Affording things is a matter of will and priority.

Decent pensions are high priority in Germany and in France, so they budget accordingly, even if the US and the UK do not.

"Affordable" is a relative, and a matter of opinion, therefore, not yet another absolute.

The BBC allows the agenda for the national conversation to be set by the press. It rarely, if ever, challenges that.

Mark said...

Governments budget. Oh well, sorted then!

Dave_G said...


The only route to lending that is 'affordable' is via Government where the expense of borrowing can be loaded onto a public that has no real method of stopping it.

Hence Government projects and spending are crucial to support the banking system. Enter the useless, unemployable immigrants, the campaign promises (to spend), faux climate scares to be taxed (to offset the banks requirement for repayment) and increased efforts to agitate between countries to justify increased military spending (which can be 'unlimited').

But none of the 'invented' means of keeping the money printing going will work indefinitely. The public can't afford to take on any more loans, there's a limit to taxation policies, the public object to immigration, object to carbon taxes and are increasingly skeptical of spending promises that either never materialize or are under-funded/over-spent before completion.

There remains only CONFLICT..... where spending (money printing) can go on regardless of the damage/harm and, afterwards, KEEP going in order to rebuild what they paid to destroy.

Which is why we're headed for war. All wars are bankers wars.

Raedwald said...

PC - It's complicated. Germany has a CGT on residential property of between about 30% and 65% (including 5.5% 'Ost' tax to pay for re-unification) with discounts if owner-occupied & equity financed. Then it gets complicated. It's common for two family and three family houses to be built - the owner having one floor, and renting the other(s). And when ownership changes as the result of e.g. divorce settlement, the discount clock can be reset. Essentially the system is geared to giving greatest tax advantage to equity-financed owner occupiers who stay put and keep any profits locked into the asset.

JPM said...

Why don't you just read up on how German pensions are managed Mark?

The US isn't the only possible model for a successful economy by far, despite what the UK media would suggest.

Mark said...

A pension derives from either investment income or taxes. I think the magic money tree comes under the latter.

If the fatherland (or france) have discovered some other source, please do enlighten us. After all, you're SO good at putting us ignorant primitives in our place with your wit, perspicacity and sage like knowledge. You do it all the time.

What has the US got to do with this?

Anonymous said...

"What has the US got to do with this?"£

Like all lefties-commies, when they are hammered and losing the point, as Saul Alinsky told it, change the subject argue ad hominem, smear and scoff at the truth tellers, never concede to FA and thus the fekkers will never learn owt - either Not that you can tell 'em anything anyway - in their delusion of omniscience, they all wanna be God, the thing (GOD), that they all swear: not to believe in.

Next!

Mark said...

Are you his probation officer by any chance?

Anonymous said...

Much better to push money into the economy.

How about 11million on a warehouse for medical supplies in South West Wales instead of 7 foreign built MRI machines, according to Mark Roscrow of NHS Wales?