Partly, yes. I agree. The smashing of the manufacturing sector and the coal industry in particular destroyed communities in those areas and caused people to look to themselves to fix their financial difficulties.

However, it isn't the whole story. The banking system has been 'extracting exorbitant rent' from people's desire to have a roof over their head (money ex-nihilo as debt through central bank largesse) that most people in an average job require state aid to support a family.

The massive surge in immigration took place under Labour, who famously wished to rub the noses of the Right in diversity. Of course, some of the Right like cheap labour, and the Money Power have no problem financing govt debt, so win-win for them. They also decided to brutally denounce any indigenous Brit who complained as racist, islamophobe etc, which brought about a malaise in morale.

In short: it's complicated.

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I'm afraid that the things that are bad in UK right now (not evetyhing there is bad, of course) could represent how all of Europe's future looks like. Are UK just a decade or two "ahead" from others? I hope to be proven wrong on this.

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Eastern and Central Europe have a certain immunity, I think. The UK is no further ahead than countries like France, Belgium (though they have a resistant Flemish community), and Sweden.

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Sweden is a much better place to live from my experience. I haven't lived in the others, but from what I've been told Scandinavian countries are still the "gold standard" compared to others, although they have suffered from privatization and globalization as well.

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You might be right about that: we'll see.

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Cheers! Where are you from in the UK, by the way? North of England, I guess?

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Until the age of 10, I grew up in Essex. Then moved to Norfolk, where I lived until I was 29 (with three years in North London from 89 to 92). Been in Latvia since then.

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