Coronavirus meme/panic/fear mongering general thread

[krink]

I mean, I know they're absolute thieves but 37 trillion* would be incredible even by Tory standards

*i think

 

[belboid]

I mean, I know they're absolute thieves but 37 trillion* would be incredible even by Tory standards

*i think

£34 trillion, you're a damned sight closer than he was! Even before we get into the whole question of what age someone becomes an adult in his view (it appears to be at about two days old)

 

[prunus]

Stunning fail

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edit: I think the point has been made

 

[rubbershoes]

Is it an African or European billion?

 

[danny la rouge]

Stunning fail

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His first degree was in economics so he must be rightz

 

[quiet guy]

Think Tommy must be using Hancock's calculator to work that one out

 

[Puddy_Tat]

 

[William of Walworth]

Stunning fail

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If each adult was given £500K!!!! to stay indoors for six months, I think a fair few might never go back to work at the end of that contract-specified period .....

This Universal Basic Income stuff is all very well, but .....

 

[Thora]

We'd all starve to death once we realised we can't eat £500k anyway.

 

[William of Walworth]

We'd all starve to death once we realised we can't eat £500k anyway.

I'm pretty certain that with that amount of FREE and RETIREMENT-ENABLING CASH!!,there'd be 'ways around' that issue though

 

[kabbes]

It has not it has been adequately spelt out that £36bn is more like £500 each, not £500k.

 

[two sheds]

Not, statistically speaking, if you donate it to the tory party in return for covid related contracts

 

[Yossarian]

 

[Epona]

It has not it has been adequately spelt out that £36bn is more like £500 each, not £500k.

Depends upon whether one is using outdated Imperial definition of "billion" though - of course I would expect that of right wing little Englander types who can't keep up with the current modern usage of "billion". You're talking about people who would probably relish a return of guineas as currency and workhouses for the poor, take delight in fake stories about curved cucumbers being illegal and want to stick to lbs and oz - don't expect them to understand these newfangled measurements.

 

[kabbes]

Depends upon whether one is using outdated Imperial definition of "billion" though - of course I would expect that of right wing little Englander types who can't keep up with the current modern usage of "billion". You're talking about people who would probably relish a return of guineas as currency and workhouses for the poor, don't expect them to understand these newfangled measurements.

When Serco publish that the cost has been 39bn, they mean 39 thousand million. If this so-called Imperial billion was ever actually used in finance, I have no idea, but it certainly hasn’t been used since at least the 1950s. I really doubt it was ever used in science. So I don’t know why people still get confused. It’s like a collective delusion amongst those who don’t actually have to deal in billions.

 

[Epona]

When Serco publish that the cost has been 39bn, they mean 39 thousand million. If this so-called Imperial billion was ever actually used in finance, I have no idea, but it certainly hasn’t been used since at least the 1950s. I really doubt it was ever used in science. So I don’t know why people still get confused. It’s like a collective delusion amongst those who don’t actually have to deal in billions.

Yeah I am not disagreeing with you though so don't take high dudgeon with me - I'm pointing out the origin of the 500k comment, and I suggest that it's not that the person who made it can't do maths, it is that they are harking back (as these types often do) to a mythical past where measurements were different.

 

[Epona]

I feel I am not explaining my point very well here so am going to try again.

I think that the person who made that comment about each adult getting 500k knows full well what a modern billion means, but they are making what they see as a "point" about the UK having adopted modern measurements at any point (alongside still wishing most of the globe was coloured pink) and the comment isn't all about the cost of the pointless Serco contract as it is equally about the adoption of what is seen in that commenter's view as an Americanised definition of "billion" by the UK government. I expect they still insist on buying fruit and veg in lbs and oz rather than kilos (because changing measurement standards is bad and a loss of "our culture"- in their eyes).

I hope that has clarified what I meant - I don't think that comment originated in stupidity (well at least not stupidity about the mathematics) or a miscalculation/inability to do maths, rather a calculated reactionary nationalist/imperialist bent.

 

[kabbes]

They were referring to what SERCO has spent. So no, it was a plain error that comes from not knowing what a billion has been for the last 50 years at least.

 

[Epona]

I think my interpretation actually makes them look worse...

 

[2hats]

They were referring to what SERCO has spent. So no, it was a plain error that comes from not knowing what a billion has been for the last 50 years at least.

Wilson announced in late 1974 that the government would adopt the US/French ('short scale') meaning of a billion going forward (arising from international MKS/SI common technical usage) and Healy duly used that in the 1975 budget.

 

[rubbershoes]

Wilson announced in late 1974 that the government would adopt the US/French ('short scale') meaning of billion (arising from international MKS/SI common technical usage) going forward and Healy duly used that in the 1975 budget.

Hardly needs saying. Children learn this in yr 1.

 

[Epona]

Hardly needs saying. Children learn this in yr 1.

I am not old enough to have been taught the old definition of billions, but I am old enough to have been taught feet, inches, pounds, ounces etc. And we didn't have anything called "yr 1" when I started school.

I am not defending the fuckwit who said it - some of you seem to think I am - but I think it's more damaging to brush it off as stupidity (anyone can be stupid or uneducated but that doesn't make them right wing) rather than see it as part of an ongoing right wing cultural agenda to hark back to "the good old days". 50 years ago is within living memory for a significant part of the population.

 

[Mation]

They were referring to what SERCO has spent. So no, it was a plain error that comes from not knowing what a billion has been for the last 50 years at least.

I was first taught the old definition and genuinely still think of a thousand million as an American billion

You've no idea whether they had the old definition in mind or not, so I can't see the point in insisting that it was a plain error. Might have been. Might not.

Is there something else we can get cross about, now, please?

 

[kabbes]

You've no idea whether they had the old definition in mind or not, so I can't see the point in insisting that it was a plain error. Might have been. Might not.

I do though. They referred to how much SERCO has spent on track and trace, which is £36bn. There is no financial record in the world that doesn’t mean £36 thousand million by £36bn, so if SERCO say they spent £36bn then that can only mean £36 thousand million.

Honestly, there is zero uncertainty or controversy in this. I challenge you to find a single set of accounts over the last 40 years anywhere in the world that refers to a billion as anything but a thousand million.

 

[krink]

I wish I hadn't posted the bloody thing now

 

[Mation]

I do though. They referred to how much SERCO has spent on track and trace, which is £36bn. There is no financial record in the world that doesn’t mean £36 thousand million by £36bn, so if SERCO say they spent £36bn then that can only mean £36 thousand million.

Honestly, there is zero uncertainty or controversy in this. I challenge you to find a single set of accounts over the last 40 years anywhere in the world that refers to a billion as anything but a thousand million.

My apologies. We can indeed assume that SERCO meant an American billion, but that wasn't the bit I was querying.

 

[two sheds]

I wish I hadn't posted the bloody thing now

I missed the Harold Wilson edict so I've always been confused by "billion" - cleared up for me now so ta:

 

[mx wcfc]

 

[krink]

I missed the Harold Wilson edict so I've always been confused by "billion" - cleared up for me now so ta:

I'm sure The Harold Wilson Edict were a late 70s mod revival band

 

[chilango]

Fortunately I went to school in the 1980s so my Marxist teachers were too busy reading Derrida and Foucault to me to trouble themselves with defining "billion".