Quote Originally Posted by poop
It's not prosperity causing that, it's labour shortages due to ending freedom of movement with the EU.
I'd kind of like to think this is true, since it would be excellent evidence of one of the benefits of leaving the EU, but seeing as two of my colleagues are Polish, it's kinda hard to believe there are any prohibitive barriers to European workers in the UK.

Did this only arise since 2021? We're talking about the effects of Brexit and you're claiming it's down to people being lazy.
No, I'm suggesting our culture is a bigger economic problem than membership of a union. You're worried about the impact of leaving the EU while ignoring the bigger problem of poor lifestyle choices. Even the French think the British drink too much.

How do you envision us being better off while making it harder to trade with our biggest trading partners?
By making it easier to trade with other partners, who could in time become our biggest trading partners. USA alone is comparable to the EU, and within easy shipping range without having to go through geopolitical chokepoints. India and China make up nearly a third of the entire planet's population.

We can, in theory, negotiate better terms with these trading partners than the EU.

We can also continue to partner with the EU when it comes to trade, just without the political integration. There are ways for the EU and the UK to work together for their mutual benefit. There just has to be the political will on both sides. Good will is kinda low between the two sides right now, but relations will heal because we're natural allies with similar values.

Is it suddenly going to become cheaper to transport goods to Australia than to France?
No, but it might be economically viable. And if we're exporting more, then getting less profit per unit isn't really a problem.

There's a limit to how much we can export to France, because we're bound to quotas to ensure all member states can also export the same goods. An agreement with Australia is bilateral, nobody else can set terms. So we can ship whatever they want to buy off us. That means we can undercut the EU.

I mean, I'm no economist, and I can smoke a spliff and dream up ways to take advantage of our newfound economic freedom. Imagine what an economist in government could do if he could be bothered.

And is Australia suddenly going to go from 20m to 350m people?
Why are you talking about Australia like it's the only part of the world not in the EU?

Obviously nobody left the EU so we could buddy up to just Australia.

Presumably the plan is to float our island across the Atlantic and park ourselves next to the USA once we get a good trade deal with them.
All we really need to do is produce something people want to buy. That's what it really boils down to. The more we can make, the more we can sell, the better.

That's why Qatar is rich. Not because of trade blocs. Because oil. They have something other countries want. We don't have much oil, certainly not enough to be a petronation (I might have just made that word up), but we do have a large labour force and first world infrastructure, with world class education facilities. We most certainly have the potential to be an economic powerhouse. That doesn't depend on us being in the EU. It depends on the political will and competence of the governing party, and the cultural will of the people. The government have to provide the environment, and the people have to be arsed to take advantage of their opportunities.