OTF: Working Towards a Stable Society

Introduction

One thing no other politician seems to be doing is looking at the whole as to what is required for a stable society. Having done so, it is then possible to work backwards and put in place policies that will allow this to happen. At the moment all politicians are trying to solve immediate problems with no recourse to the even worse problems they are building for the future. If the blob isn’t kicked out, at some point there is going to be a collapse or some form of civil war.

First of all, we are where we are, no point here trying to turn back the clock and simply reversing past mistakes.

Also some of this article will repeat parts of other articles albeit from a slightly different angle and, to me, confirming a lot of what I have written!

So let’s start at the beginning, we have limited resources so let’s see what our land is capable of supporting.

Capacity

If a country hasn’t the equivalence of self-sufficiency it is vulnerable if attacked. There should be a natural brake in the population size as it increases with regards to the resources it can draw from within its borders.

Also we have to look at how long we can last if our trade routes are shut off. Being able to survive years on domestic food production is no good if you run out of fuel within a few weeks/days. And neither are much use if we soon run out of weapons.

Population

So the population needs to be small enough that it can partly feed itself with stores that can see us through, say, a year of a siege. Something we are particularly vulnerable to nowadays as an island nation. Note that more likely than a siege, some concocted panic could easily shut down world trade as it did with COVID, with everyone surprised that there isn’t enough emergency supplies to go round…

Therefore, farmland needs to be protected. But in a clever way – my suggestion is further down. It should certainly not be handed over to the building of more houses unless there is capacity.

Under normal conditions, as life becomes more expensive the birth rate would naturally drop. And with taxpayers that is certainly the case. As a side note, women now being able to control having children may mean that in a population collapse, birth rates may not rise substantially. When governments interfere, populations, certainly in wealthy countries, will still increase due to immigration, stretching that rubber band of capacity.

Food

We have productive land, but not enough to feed us. The easiest way to increase food production is to start eating more grazing animals and get them farmed on our hills. We also need to start feeling good about wearing leather and using wool, although maybe for clothing it’s just past its sell-by date.

When we have a shortage of food, providing subsidies that lower food production (say, to set aside or ‘renewable’ energy production) is pure madness.

Energy

It seems a stupid thing to have to point out but it is fundamental to our security and quality of life to be self-sufficient in cheap energy. If only we had access to some… The cheaper the energy the better off we are. And if we pump a load of CO2 into the atmosphere then we are doing the biosphere a big favour to boot. The best resilience will be to have some thorium nuclear reactors. As a government, we may need to accept paying a premium for this energy. Otherwise we should utilise the fossil fuels around us.

Security

So how long do we need to protect ourselves?

I would say a year tops. If we are in a siege situation then the countries around us have gone badly wrong too. It could well be that nukes will be used long before we get to this stage making the need for wartime emergency provisions a moot point.

Quality of life

This is the meat and drink of the article.

At the moment we have a lot of mismatches in the marketplace that are hurting the economy and quality of life. Have I mentioned government meddling yet?

So let’s look at the imbalances that have been brought about, and the effects they are having on society.

Education

Let’s leave aside another long-term cause of unhappiness that is government indoctrination. Here I am looking at what we are training people to be in the future.

Education is set up to produce office workers. Even looking at holding people in education until they are 18. Almost anyone that is functionally illiterate at 11 is not going to be doing much better by the time they have finished school. Looking back at my education, I cannot see anything over the three Rs that were of any use in adult life. The only benefit was to show I could push myself through boredom to pass exams. That is a very useful quality for office work.

I feel that most children could leave school at eleven and learn all they need at work. They would also learn how to be useful in the jobs that are available around them. Those that educate themselves judicially can find work elsewhere. Finally, a vast amount of money would not be wasted and children would be contributing to society. Why should the state spend a fortune educating graduates? Companies should take people on at younger ages and train them in-house. Most courses can be learned online and it shouldn’t be difficult to complete their education during day release, or in evenings. In fact, I imagine the brighter ones would prosper far more than having three years in a city far away from home.

The government instead wants us to be in university until 21, educating us towards a list of jobs that we wish to do afterwards. That so many people are educated for too small a marketplace is madness, the unlucky ones refusing to work until they have found a role for which they have trained. A final problem to universal education is that creativity peaks at around 25. This means that those that have a gap year or achieve a masters are barely up and running before they are able to confer their biggest benefits.

Another problem is that, in a world where being academic is judged as being more worthy than people that are practicable, we see very few bright people staying in their hometowns learning a trade, and with it, a lack of creativity in those industries.

Following on from meddling with education, we have the next issue which is…

Skills Shortage

So we have too many sociologists, and not enough builders and carers.

Non university towns/cities have ageing populations, the academic young have left and rarely return. This leaves the settlements short of trades and carers. So we bring in carers along with dependants that require a lot of state aid and housing. There is already not enough housing due to decades of pushing people away from trades – planning being another issue, but not for this article.

This makes the housing shortage worse. The only short-term solution would be to import a load of builders, again probably subsidised by the government, which would require, erm, importing more builders…

Also as the carers get old, they are allowed to stay in the UK, they will require being cared for by, erm, importing more carers…

This is one area where we have to take a little pain and stop importing it. It increases the costs of assets while lowering wages. And it also lowers the efficiency of the workplace!

Non productive people

Regardless of reason or how rightful, if you are taking from society rather than contributing economically then you are adding to the strain, the economy doesn’t understand the difference. This isn’t a statement to admonish the unworthy, but something that needs taking into account when deciding policies.

A non-exhaustive list of takers are the following; Children, 16-65 year olds that do not work. Old-age pensioners. Even the idle rich, yes they pay for the services, but if you think about what would happen if everyone was a millionaire and you see how that also is a stressor. People that are at home need not be a stressor if they are part of a family unit and they are being funded by other family members.

So the less the number of people net contributing, the more stress on the productive people. If half the population is being looked after then every productive person needs to be productive enough to cover two people etc., etc. With taxes at 40% we are not far from that!

I do not say what the level should be here, but note the principle, the less we want to work, the more others need to work to support us. Retirement is the biggie here, most people are already working beyond pension age. The market dictates. The more we support people at a younger age to retire, the harder everyone else has to work to maintain a reasonable standard of living.

Housing

We need decent-sized houses for families. There are too many houses that are simply too small. There will be no easy way to redress that, we can’t magically stretch all rooms two feet wider.

Again this goes to a mismatch in education. Without government education, the market would naturally react to need. London quickly grew to seven million in Victorian times due to little meddling.

Also, this is one area where intervention may be necessary, with hard markers in place and, when achieved, the intervention to be loosened. This may mean a ban on the purchase of second homes. This will slowly free up a little housing. Another option is that houses are auctioned off on death with the proceeds going as willed. Again, only a small gain and it will not be all good. If we can free up some housing that will ease pressures while we get the population down. An extreme measure could be only allowing houses to be owned by families, no rentals, which would be limited to flats. These would be designed to curtail the large landlords and take competition out of the market which would help lower prices. Also, there may need to be a maximum number of houses that a landlord can hold, this would mean over five years plenty of properties are placed on the market, as they have to divest of them.

Hard currency

The biggest natural brake on excess spending is a hard currency. This is essential, not a pipe dream. It imposes so many natural controls that society is then forced into being a lot more stable.

It would cut competition for assets making land and housing more affordable. And less mismatching of assets in the marketplace.

Summary

So what are successive governments to blame for, in creating the mess we have now? Note none of these are minor issues at the bottom of the wish list. These are fundamental problems that need sorting before just about all else. When listed below the mind boggles at the stupidity of those in charge.

The List of the Failings

We have a population that needs to import food
We also need to import energy on a permanent regular basis
Yet we are building on good farmland
Because our population is still rapidly expanding
1. To employ carers, etc. as we have very few that wish to – or wages have been artificially suppressed
2. That haven’t got housing to put them in
3. As they cannot be built due to a lack of builders
4. And even then they would still be too expensive
Due to a hopeless education system that teaches to a wish list not to fill gaps
1. That even then cannot train enough doctors, teachers, & police, etc etc!
Natural brakes on all these problems are subverted by government meddling made further possible by a fiat currency
A lack of defence capabilities, should we not be prepared (for good reason) to use nukes

A Short List of Possible Solutions

And how can these be solved? It is not enough to not address the problem. Also sorting out these problems is going to cause some upheaval. And If we get the chance and don’t do it quickly, those that come after will reverse all the good.

The population needs to be reduced. Mainly by stopping all but about 5,000 immigrants from being given permanent right to stay.
Almost scrap government-funded university education. Businesses can sponsor their own – and pay their way, like we are expected to. It would also help increase housing stock in cities.
You could even scrap government-funded secondary education. Again City and Guilds from the age of 11 would be beneficial for 80% of the population.
Limits on home ownership. One per household going forward. Slowly reduce the maximum number of houses owned by landlords/Airbnb owners. Against my principles but a necessity until homes are affordable. Then we can let the free market take back over.
Defence to purchase UK resources to keep industries in the UK. Enough to survive a short-term threat at least.
Free energy markets with zero subsidies!
Of course, all underpinned by a hard currency – how many times can a problem be traced back at least in part to fiat currency!

You may not agree with the solutions, but the failings to me are obvious and as I said, if not my solutions, you need to find others that filter down to solve the structural problems outlined above that we are dealing with in the whole.

Also note, some intervention is called for. But other than housing, nothing more than an oversight of needed resources when facing national emergencies.

Now is the time to get the party started. Hopefully the Tories are destroyed next month and Labour do not have the money to do too much damage. If we can create something to be a major force in five years time, and then in ten, maybe form a government, we can start to correct a century of socialism. Otherwise I will be moving abroad in the foreseeable future.

Addendum

With the surge in Reform since starting this article, it is possible that a party closer to our beliefs is going to get representation. They do not go far enough for me, and if I can build a movement then it could be the libertarian wing of a broader church. Labour & Tories succeeded by being broad churches. But the road to there is long and very unlikely.