i agree with the CAP
reason ... when i was very ill a few years ago i ran out of company sick pay and ended up on SSP (which isn't very much)
i had to quit work to get benefits so the house/home would survive. it worked out that i was about £150 a month better off then working full time

when i returned to work all benefits stopped immediately. i had to get a bank loan to cover the bills until i got my first full 4 weekly pay
but i am more then happy to be fit and well and back in full time employment

i also believe that there should be a 5 year limit to the full amount of benefit. each year after the 5 year limit benefits should be reduced by 10% until it reaches the 50% marker (excluding individuals that are exempt) ...

this. It works for the armed forces.

My issue with the minimum wage is that it pushes up inflation. If the minimum wage is high, then prices are put up to cover it, then benefits need to go up to make sure people can live on them.

the companies that have employees that are on tax credits/benefits because of low pay must pay 50% of these tax credits/benefits themselves to their employees
it just might make them think of paying a living wage and keep prices down ...

i also believe it should not only apply to pay/wages/salary it should also apply to all bonuses ...

That theory was widely debunked after the NMW was introduced, besides the increase in the NMW has actually been below the rate of inflation for years now.

But the rate of inflation has been [LIFTED] about with, it doesn't include anything that goes up in price. The official inflation rate has nothing to do with actual inflation, which is a shame as it'd be nice to be able to measure it, but we can't, we just have to guess and go by gut instinct.

The inflation calculation is based on measuring the increase or decrease in price of a given number of items. What do you mean we can't measure it?

The things that go up in price have been left off it.

Such as?

Fags

You mean any items subject to punitive taxation?

I'm pretty sure that fags and alcohol are part of the CPI, so surely they make up part of the inflation measurement?

I think he's talking about RPI vs CPI. Basically there's no such thing as 'inflation', just a group of several different measures, each calculated by taking the increase in prices of a set 'basket' of goods and services over time. You can fiddle the rate of inflation by picking which measure you want to use and therefore which goods and services are included in the basket. For example (can't remember which way round it is) for one of the measures, the basket includes mortgage payments and petrol, another one doesn't. Obviously, if you do include mortgage payments and petrol in your basket then you'd think the rate of inflation would be higher than if you don't.

'Inflation' has been a pretty much bunk number for years, because it's actually been whichever one of a group of measures is preferred at the time. The government picks whichever one of the various inflation measures it wants to quote depending on the circumstances i.e. it takes a different measure when deciding the increase in the state pension payments to the one it takes when deciding whether to increase the amount of cash in circulation. Whichever measure suits whatever the government already wants to do - as Sir Humph would say, 'never ask a question unless you already know what the answer is'.

Think of 'the rate of inflation' as how much water there is in 'a cup of water'. It's always a cup full of water, but you get to pick which cup. It's either a little espresso cup or a coffee cup or a teacup or one of those enormous cups you get in Starbucks.

The actual problem is right now all of the measures are too high for the government to look like they're in control. The government's target for inflation (any sort of inflation) is 2%, whereas even the lowest of the measures is over currently 3%. The highest is something like 6%.....

You're talking about weightings?

I thought the idea of weightings was to account for extreme volatility in the prices of some key products/items. Which does make it sound pretty abitrary, but we're talking about an empirical measurement.

I'm no economist, in fact my knowledge in this area is woeful, so feel free to educate me. However, it doesn't matter if it's called inflation or the pink elephant index - if you measure the same things and the prices have risen, then you have measured an increase.

http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/rel/cpi/cpi-r ... index.html

It seems that booze and fags are included, although the weighting has been reduced. Curiously from my point of view, hotels and restaurants are rated at triple the level of booze and fags. That's certainly not my personal experience - sounds rather posh to me!