One observation.... since our cup final defeat, the debate on here is more friendly, sensible and gentlemanly.

Bravo every one and may the best team win!

No one has to convince me; its out all the way. 10 years ago my wifes company offered all the staff a redundacy payment to leave. My wife and two friends stayed, they then refilled the posts with Lithuanians who had just joined the EU. They haven't had a payrise since

Is the correct answer.

Time to move forward together.

Either you're George Osborne's think tank or echo.

A lot of what you've posted has been shown to be fantasy, calculations made on worst case scenarios with absolutely no positives whatsoever included or come from the cosy establishment that have vested interests and allies within their protected web of expertise. Where were they before 2008 and other obviously awful economic recessions?

Even a leftie who you respect has said he wants out, yet on here that wasn't posted. Yes, the mature Paul Mason who said he wanted out but had a problem voting out because those nasty tories, BJ and MG, would be leading Britain. How mature. Consider voting in because he doesn't like them? Why not vote out and in the next General Election and try and elect a centre left party which is what a few pro-immigration but anti-EU lefties I've heard say. That's democracy.

Martin Lewis had it right. If you can embrace risk and see a bright future then it can sway you to vote out. If you cannot take risk then vote in. You'll probably have a little less money for a while and there may be economic shocks on the way, but the upside could be worth it. 'The Agenda' programme has been removed from the ITV website. All other episodes in the series have been left there to view. Funny that.

I'm tired of this country pandering to the EU and big business, which is what this Union is all for. SME's are where the future can be for this country and a fairer distribution of wealth with less fat cats and less emphasis on short-term goals for end of year only and focus on share prices. Just look at the German economy for proof.

Edited by Rudi Hedman (27 May 2016 11.17am)

COYP

Rudi: wrt Paul Mason, i think it was fairly clear by my example that whilst i think he is worth listening to I would never subscribe to his far left economic policies. Similarly with Patrick Minford or monterism/Thatcherism far right economic policies i would never vote or advocate such policies...infact i often wonder what was worse.
But i really dont think it wise to be so dismissive of IMF, OECD, BofE etc....and using words like guesswork or fantasy. I worked as an economist/fund manager for 20 years and worked on or had oversight responsibility for some complex economic models...but i assure you NO ONE has the sophisticated models that the treasury or BofE have at there disposal. They have access to the most data inputs, historical analysis and forecasting tools you can possibly imagine....and the financial markets stop to hear the outcome of there anslysis (hanging on every word) because thats what policy is based on. If i had told the teams i worked with that they were just fantasy or guesses (hey lets use our own!) they would have thought i had become frankly delusional.
Data is data and we can interpret them differently but i find it very very hard to believe that the economists at the IMF or OECD would have somehow massaged the figures because of some grand conspiracy by George Osborne who decided to call in a favour and ask them to distort the outcome...surely this is absurd.
The 330,000 immigration figures were similarly disputed by UKIP who just seem to be trying to discredit any figures because they might not serve sufficiently their referendum objectives i.e. they have a vested political interest.
I have agreed that we need to work on the eu from within, not to say i agree with having 'elected' representatives to oversee the shape of bananas or the quality of tobacco. TBH i find it almost ridiculous to even hear it being suggested that we would hold elections for such posts but it gives UKIP the chance to accuse the trade bodies and regulators of being unelected and therefore undemocratic....and unless those allotments in Norwood have suddenly developed a tropical climate when was the last time you saw a banana grove or tobacco plantation in the uk?
The reality is that we have eu elections that apparently has had 73 laws imposed on the uk over the last 10 years or so (source: page 81 of this thread) that we voted against....although when i asked, nobody on here was able to tell me what 1 of these were (without googling)..paternity leave or workers rights maybe?.... We should remember that our own house of lords (also unelected) rejected 60 laws from the house of commons just in the last sitting, but what the conspiracy theorists should be asking is why UKIP (which hold 1/3rd) of the UK's seats in Brussels has the worst (out of more than 700 parties) attendance record and voted against (in an aye or nay vote) the UK getting the rebate (worth approx £7-8 billion)....surely they were only thinking of their political vested interests again and not of the UK economy? Bet you didnt see that emblazoned on boris' blunderbus!!
Lastly Rudi...you may have a maverick attitude towards betting and risk and say it will be worth us going through 2.5 years of smaller growth for the longer term gain. I say that this gamble is simply not worth taking and will cause considerable damage to our NHS (affecting the quality of life of millions), pensions (old people), schools (kids) and welfare (the poor and disabled)....not to mention £4,300 for every household,....these may be taken for granted by some but are simply not things to be gambled with IMO.