National Independent Retailers Week on July, 2024: Do you think all these government spending cuts are here to stay?

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If this government and the governments of the past actually did something constructive to stop the use of tax loopholes, tax evasion and the use of offshore accounts im pretty sure we would not have a deficit.At the very least it would have been a lot lot smaller than it is now.

Billions is lest each and every year due to tax evasion and it has been that way for years and years and years.

When was the last time any of you saw a tax evader getting the justice they so rightly deserve?

When was the last time you saw a tax evader go to prison for breaking the law?

The amount the rich get away with dwarfs what is given to the poor in benefits.We don't hear about it very often though because the media is controlled by the wealthy.It is the wealthy that are evading the tax as the poor don't get the opportunity to.The poor have tax stopped from their wages before they have even received those wages.

The banking system is indeed based on debt as is our whole economy.It is a way of controlling the population.

Of course these cuts won't be reversed.

The real issue comes down to greed.It would appear to me that the more you have the more you want as the greed of the rich dwarfs the greed of the poor.The same can be said of the handouts from government.

Lets face it tax evasion or legal loopholes are in fact a benefit for the rich.

So is the government subsidising low paid workers as employers should be paying rates of pay that enables low paid workers to live off their wages and not need benefits.Look at tesco as an example.They pay a large part of their staff around the minimum wage.They were using free labour recently.despite this they made around £3 billion in profit last year.

Then also consider before tesco became so big there were lots and lots of small independent retailers selling food.Now there are very very few.The high street where i live is nearly empty.The only types of shops are mobile phones, banks, coffee shops and the odd shoe or clothing shops.The biggest majority of them are owned by multi national corporations so very little of the money spent in the stays in this country.

When you allow 4-5 players to control a certain sector of the market it slows the distribution of wealth.When that happens the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.We also find that unemployment rises as there are less jobs in the economy.

The whole thing is just 1 big spiralling circle.

We were supposed to have a monopolies commission that was to stop monopolies.They don't appear to have been very effective though do they?

There are now just 5 or 6 big players in the food shops industry where as years and years ago there were thousands.

In each area there is one operator for water, 1 operator for trains, 1 operator for buses in the area i live.How can prices ever get cheaper if there is no competition?

It was reported in the papers this week that Amazon had been avoiding corporation tax for years.They now sell around 60-70% of all the book sales in the UK.Years ago there used to be thousands of book sellers.How many high streets actually have at least 1 book store on them now?

It is the same for lots and lots of different industries now.All the big players avoid paying as much tax as possible and use off shore accounts to hide their wealth from the tax man.

The little man just can't compete with the buying power of huge corporations when the more you buy the cheaper you are able to buy it for.Of course this principle is also awesome for our environment too.It does an awesome amount of good for global warming also.

Thatchers monetarism and privatisation did not do much to help the issue.Monetarism sowed the seeds of this latest financial crisis.At the same time she massively reduced the investment in industry which meant lots and lots of industries started taking their industries to couturiers that had cheaper Labour.The privatisations meant that the prices for those public services increased.

Also consider that EDF is an energy company that makes in excess of £1 billion in profit every year.It is 80% owned by the French government.If the French government can run a public service and make a huge profit from it then why can't our own?

Imagine how much more money would be coming in if we followed the same model as the French for all the privatisations of public services in the past.This could have given us billions every year in revenues instead of lining foreigners and share holders pockets.

It appears to me we are almost destined to continue on this cycle of the rich getting richer while the poor get poorer as successive governments have not wanted to deal with the rich due to their own vested self interest

I Want to know the exact date on which oil and gas prices rise in june 2008?

December 2, 2008

Please I'm desperate for a ten and I worked hard for this info!

It might seem strange, but despite the fact that prices at the pumps are down — drastically — most gasoline stations are actually making a better profit margin now on the cost of a gallon of gas than they were over the summer, when prices topped out well above $4.

“Absolutely. There’s no doubt about it,” said Eugene Guilford, executive director and CEO of the Independent Connecticut Petroleum Association, which represents the majority of the state’s fuel dealers, when asked to confirm this odd phenomenon. “Retailers never passed on the full extent of their wholesale cost increases this past summer when gas was up to $4.25 a gallon. If they did, it would have been substantially higher than that. Retailers ate the difference then.”

Now, Guilford said, in large part thanks to the global economic downturn and a dramatic drop in the cost of crude oil, retailers have been able to adjust their margins and reap a better profit per gallon, whereas this summer, simply to stay competitive, most stations were selling at cost or sometimes even at a loss.

“It’s much more sort of business as usual right now. We get to actually make money for what we do for lower prices, and customers are happy,” Guilford said. “It’s absolutely a win-win situation. Retailers always want prices to be lower. They get to make more normal margins.”

Anwar Afrede, the owner of the EZ Mart CITGO station at 271 East Main St. in Meriden, agreed. Over the summer, Afrede complained that, despite record prices at the pumps, his station was making barely any profit at all on a gallon of gas.

Now, he said Wednesday, with a price of $1.73 at his station, “things are back to normal,” and he’s even able to bring in “a little bit more in savings.”

According to figures released by the American Automobile Association Tuesday, the cost of a gallon of regular gasoline in Connecticut was $1.88, down from $2.36 in November, and prices have dropped for five straight months after peaking at $4.39 a gallon on July 9. Last year at this time, the average price in the state for a gallon of regular was $3.23.

“We have never seen anything like this before,” said Steven Guveyan, executive director of the Connecticut Petroleum Council, a statewide association that represents the oil and natural gas industry. “It’s extraordinary.”

But according to the Associated Press, rumors that Saudi Arabia would significantly cut its oil production led to a volatile day of crude oil trading Wednesday, with prices swinging upward as high as 10 percent before finally settling at $43.52 a barrel.

The price of a gallon of crude oil is directly tied to the price of a gallon of gasoline, according to the American Petroleum Institute, a national industry trade association. Crude reached a 2008 low of $40.50 a barrel last week.

“The cost of crude oil really is a proxy for the economy,” Guveyan said. “When the economy booms, prices are up; when the economy tanks, it takes oil down with it.”

And right now, said Matt Rafferty, an economics professor at Quinnipiac University, the global economy is most certainly in the tank.

“… There’s been a global collapse in economic activity, which lowers the price in oil, which affects a lot of other goods and services,” Rafferty said.

The effects of this tumultuous gas market and the current economic crisis can be glimpsed locally in a number of area stations that have closed in the past year, including a CITGO on Chamberlain Highway in Meriden where the windows are boarded up and the cost of a gallon of regular remains fixed at $4.37, a holdover from the summer.

Guilford said that his organization does not keep statistics on station closings, and that he is not aware of a dramatic increase in that area.

“I can’t say that I’ve noticed there’s an unusually different number (of stations closing) this year than last or in previous years,” Guilford said.

Despite a better profit margin, Afrede said that he still considers things far from normal, both in the gasoline retail business and the economy in general, and noted that a sluggish economy tends to lead to motorists pumping less gas, no matter how low it might be priced.

“Right now, it’s a recession. People have no money - the volume is about the same as it was when it was near five dollars a gallon this summer,” he said. “Thank God it’s lower at this time of year; people can breathe a little and think about Christmas.”

But Kevin Danby, owner of A1 Auto Services farther down East Main Street, said prices have already started to rise.

“As of today, it’s tightened up a bit,” Danby said Wednesday.

That’s not surprising, Rafferty said, noting that, based on economic history, motorists should not expect these bargain-basement prices to last forever.

“My guess is that when the global economy moves towards recovery, oil prices will begin to rise again,” he said. “As lo

Are there many Americans living in the UK?

I have lived in England coming on 11 years, but was born and raised a Kansas farm boy. My accent has softened and I have had many people assume that I'm Irish.

Most English, unlike Americans, are far too reserved and polite to comment on where they think you might be from. So although the English will notice you are American, they will not talk to you about it unless they know you quite well. You won't have people stopping you in Tesco and harraunging you about Bush, Iraq or SUVs. Compare this to being in the States, where within 2 minutes most people will ask me 'what's with the accent, where you from anyway?'.

Most British people regard me with a mixture of awe and suspicion. WOW, a real live American, they think...then it sinks in and they ask...'what are you doing here then?' This is only after a few weeks of knowing me and I still have people at work pipe up and say 'you're an American??'.

It's never 'what do you think of England' or 'what has been your favourite place to visit so far'. There is this presumption by most Brits that America is the pinnacle of civilisation and that no-one would leave the land of the free, home of the brave without maybe being a criminal or tax cheat. Many Brits see their country as a failure, a write-off, a has-been, which is a myth perpetuated by a scaremongering media.

Most Brits have a burning desire to see the States and live there, but it's based on what they know from Hollywood and the telly, which has to be some of the most fake things ever produced. I remember last time I was in the States watching breakfast TV and noticing the presenters were dolled up like glamour models, whereas on the BBC a clean jumper and quick comb-through will suffice.

Watching TV once with my mum-in-law, she commented on a thunderstorm and said 'it doesn't rain like that back home does it?' as she assumed the sun always shines in the USA.

The British are aware of the underbelly to the USA and are shocked by its gun crime. Here, a shooting is national news. There, the first 5 minutes of the local news bulletin is nothing but crime, then it's on to 10 minutes of weather forecasts.

The Brits don't often realise how good they have it here. I remember going without a doctor as a kid because my folks couldn't afford it. Now I can pop into a clinic over my lunch hour, get a diagnosis for free and pick up a subsidised prescription. Serious health problems in the States can send a family into bankruptcy. Here, no worries, the NHS will look after you free of charge.

Here in the UK I can get by without a car. I walk to work. I can shop at small independent retailers and buy fresh fruit & veg from the market stall. I can buy organic and recycle most anything. I have six and a half weeks paid holiday, with all of Europe on my doorstep. The British average wage exceeds that in the US. Most importantly, I've been able to have a civil partnership with my partner and live my life without being made to feel like a freak.