On 06/10/2021 05:27 pm, Java Jive wrote:
> On 06/10/2021 17:00, MB wrote:
>> On 06/10/2021 15:45, Bob Latham wrote:
>>> No it's wider than that. Reports from the USA of empty shelves in
>>> supermarkets and in Europe. Of course you will not see that reported
>>> by BBC, doesn't support their position.
>>
>> As in this from a few weeks ago.
>>
>> I hate to link to a tabloid like this but it was sent me by a friend.
>>
>> https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/sep/22/cargo-ships-traffic-jam-los-angeles-california
>>
>> "The bottleneck this week at America’s busiest port complex is the
>> result of a shortage of trucks and drivers to pick up goods, coupled
>> with an overwhelming demand for imported consumer products."
>
> [...]
>
> "With the peak shipping period getting under way as the holiday shopping
> season approaches, in recent weeks the ports have been setting new
> records for ships in port almost daily. Traffic has been rising since
> last summer amid a pandemic-induced buying boom that created a backlog
> at both ports and overwhelmed the workforce, some of whom were
> themselves recovering from Covid.
>
> The pandemic has battered the global supply chain, offloading the
> surging demand on to suppliers and leading to shortages of goods and
> containers and increasing costs for consumers."
>
> I'm not sure that I can buy this.  Certainly the pandemic has
> *disrupted* the global supply chain, there can be no possible doubt
> about that, but I fail to see how it can have increased the demand for
> goods overall.  Unusual numbers of people have died across the world,
> how can fewer people wanting stuff increase demand?  The economies of
> most countries have been significantly hit, how can more people being
> less well off increase demand?  Global production may have dropped due
> to staff being ill with covid, but that's a reduction in supply, not an
> increase in demand.  Christmas is approaching, but so it does every
> year.  Lorry drivers move about, so are more likely to become infected,
> and perhaps lead rather too sedentary a life behind the wheel for their
> own health, so might be more vulnerable to getting it badly, but I've
> yet to see any actual statistics that they have died or been
> incapacitated by long-covid in disproportionate numbers.
>
> So disruption certainly, but increased demand overall can at worst only
> be a very temporary thing as people try to make up for leading more
> restricted lives for a year  -  I'm surprised to see it at all, and
> can't see it being sustained.

For once, I think you may be right. The excess demand seems to be a
bounce-back effect.

I am told that for instance, standard sheets of plywood have more than
doubled in price, due to a burst of enthusiasm and activity in home
improvements following "release" from lockdown.

On 06/10/2021 05:58 pm, charles wrote:
> In article <sjkk59$k90$1@dont-email.me>, Tweed <usenet.tweed@gmail.com>
> wrote:
>> charles <charles@candehope.me.uk> wrote:
>>> In article <sjkgr9$qq2$1@dont-email.me>, MB <MB@nospam.net> wrote:
>>>> On 06/10/2021 14:34, Jeff Gaines wrote:
>>>>>> Enjoying the food and petrol distribution problems, are you?
>>>>> What on earth does that have to do with Brexit? The distribution
>>>>> problems are at least Europe wide, we are free now to come up wit
>>>
>>>> What petrol problems, seems to be only around London and no one in
>>>> their right mind would want to go near there.
>>>
>>> however a vey significant part of the UK population live there.
>>>
>
>> Which might magnify the effects of panic buying.
>
>> Actually, panic buying is unfair. Apart from some extreme examples, most
>> people have acted extremely rationally. If a politician says don‘t panic
>> buy you know most people will do that, so the only response to protect
>> your interests is to attempt to fill up. I suppose it wasn‘t helped by
>> being near the end of the month. I suspect a lot of people were running
>> their tanks down, waiting for pay day.
>
> in these days of credit cards, is "pay day" significant?

I was going to ask that too.

Our incomes are now spread throughout the calendar month and any notion
of waiting for payday are long gone, although with credit cards, there
is a sense of not wanting to buy anything expensive just before the end
of a card-charging period, but letting it wait a few days and gain an
extra month's credit.

> Anyway I used tto
> get my salary in the middle of the month, half in arrears and half in
> advance.
>

On 07/10/2021 09:40 am, Roderick Stewart wrote:
> On Wed, 06 Oct 2021 17:58:11 +0100, charles <charles@candehope.me.uk>
> wrote:
>
>>> Actually, panic buying is unfair. Apart from some extreme examples, most
>>> people have acted extremely rationally. If a politician says don‘t panic
>>> buy you know most people will do that, so the only response to protect
>>> your interests is to attempt to fill up. I suppose it wasn‘t helped by
>>> being near the end of the month. I suspect a lot of people were running
>>> their tanks down, waiting for pay day.
>>
>> in these days of credit cards, is "pay day" significant? Anyway I used tto
>> get my salary in the middle of the month, half in arrears and half in
>> advance.
>
> I used to get my salary every four weeks, i.e. about thirteen times
> per year instead of the usual twelve. During the year it would slowly
> drift in and out of sync with the calendar months, and therefore most
> utility bills. For about half the year I felt rich, but had to
> remember not to spend it.

Retirement pension does that too!

Once a year (though for two of us), two payments are made in the same
calendar month.

On 07/10/2021 09:24 pm, NY wrote:
> "MB" <MB@nospam.net> wrote in message news:sjnikb$as7$1@dont-email.me...
>> On 07/10/2021 18:39, NY wrote:
>>> Because they may not even be taught what a noun and a verb are in
>>> English -
>>> and only encounter the terms when they learn a foreign language.
>>>
>>> I don't remember even in the early/mid 70s (when I was 8-13) the English
>>> teacher referring to nouns and verbs.
>>
>> Before that time but we certainly were taught about grammar.  I think
>> modern kids are taught about nouns and verbs but have different names
>> for them.
>
>
> "Things" and "doing words", probably ;-)
>
> I remember at one school where I learned Latin, the teacher referred to
> cases as "genitive", "dative", "accusative" etc. At the next school, the
> Latin teacher referred to "A form", "B form", "C form" etc. Dumbing down?

Were they still using Hillard & Botting's Latin Primer?

On 08/10/2021 15:47, JNugent wrote:
>
> On 06/10/2021 05:20 pm, Tweed wrote:
>>
>> Or https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-58643717
>>
>> Some 65 cargo ships have been forced to queue outside two of America's
>> biggest ports, in the latest sign of supply chain disruption hitting the
>> US.
>> The ships are stuck outside the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach,
>> California, which handle 40% of all cargo containers entering the
>> country.
>> Before Covid, it was unusual for more than one to wait for a berth.
>> The backlog is linked to surging demand for imports as the US economy has
>> reopened.
>> Retailers and manufacturers have rushed to place orders and restock their
>> inventories, but the global shipping system is struggling to keep up.
>> It's contributed to shortages of children's toys, timber, new clothes and
>> pet food, while also pushing up consumer prices.
>> Gene Seroka, head of the Port of LA, last week warned that a "significant
>> volume" of cargo was "headed our way throughout this year and into 2022".
>> "We continue to monitor a host of variables; disruptions continue at
>> every
>> node in the supply chain," he said.
>>
>> Not reported by the BBC?
>
> Obviously, it's all down to the USA's leaving the European Union.
>
> What else could possibly explain it?

LOL! They seem to have done much better out of leaving than we did!
Something I happened to be looking at today:

$160
https://www.amazon.com/Wolverine-Saturn-Digital-Slide-Scanner/dp/B083P4ZP5G/ref=sr_1_3

£250
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Wolverine-Saturn-Digital-Slide-Scanner/dp/B083M7YVCL

Today's exchange rate is: 1$ = 0.73£, so they save £22 or 9% off the UK
price!

--

Fake news kills!

I may be contacted via the contact address given on my website:
www.macfh.co.uk