Are you voting tommorow?

Its the election here tomorrow in the UK and there still time to vote. I have never voted in my life and never will vote. I don't no what I am voting for and if one says one thing they don't keep there promise any way. I nearly got chucked out of a taxi once which wasn't voting for government but it was something big. But the driver asked me who I was voting for and I said I wasn't because I don't understand it. Any way he went red in face and started shouting at me for not voting. At one point I thought he was going to chuck me out of car going 75MPH down motorway. I was glad to get out when I got to destination even though I shouted back to him explaining why I wasn't voting.

:P

@skipper847: In my opinion not voting due to lack of information is doing yourself and your country a disservice. You have the opportunity to help shape the future of your country (presumably the country you're going to be living in, therefore it affects your future too) and you won't vote because reading up on things is too much work? Think about it, man.

cba.

@korvus: The main reason is they don't do what they say.

I don't understand the fanatical "how dare you not vote" people. If you genuinely don't know which you think is best, how on earth could just randomly picking one be a good thing?

As for them not keeping their promises: I've learnt not to really take their specific policies too seriously (unless they have a long history of consistently supporting one of them). I find it better to vote based on the general worldview and philosophy they have a history of representing.

Teresa May represents more or less a continuation of the current system. Slightly lowered public spending (probably aiming for something like the pre-2008 levels). Jeremy Corbyn represents a large increase in public spending, and therefore higher taxes and/or more debt.

In a country where the government already spends over 40% of GDP and people get taxed at 40% of their income once they earn over £45K, I really don't think going even further Left on economics is a good idea. Britain is already Left-wing enough. Corbyn is not remotely comparable to someone like Bernie Sanders, who's speaking in a country that really should become a bit more Left-wing on economics.

For the sake of comparison, for those people who say "Corbyn's the UK version of Sanders": The 40% tax rate in the UK kicks in once you earn £45K. The 40% tax rate in the US kicks in once you earn $400K.

That's not necessarily true. The conservatives have proven themselves to be very ineffective at handling money, so while they have made many cuts to vital services, taxes have increased for many. The main difference is that the conservatives have raised it for the many and spared the few, while labour want to raise it for the people who can actually afford to pay the increase and spare those who would be put into poverty by it. Besides even if it was exactly as you descrbe it, I'd much rather have to pay more tax than pay a slightly lower tax but also higher tuition fees, medical insurance due to further privatisation of the nhs, private security due to further cuts to the police, higher rent, and lower pay.

I don't get the fanatical "everyone must vote" people either. I know a guy who didn't even know what a Tory was and that they were in power until I told him a few weeks ago. It's probably for the best that he's going to stay home on election day.

Well, ignorance is not an excuse not to vote. Get educated and make a decision.

And yes, I'm one of those "I look down on people who don't vote unless they have a legitimate reason".

How have they spared the few when the top rate of income tax is 45%? And how is it inpoverishing people when they've constantly increased the tax-free allowance for the lowest earners? Maybe you're talking about corporation tax rather than income tax?

I don't buy into the logic of "can afford to pay it". Of course there are people who COULD pay more, but the fact is in a globalised economy, if you tax people too highly they'll just take their businesses to another country. A lot of business is international in the modern world.

As for the other parts. I'd agree on tuition fees. I went to university back when it was incredibly cheap. It was probably too cheap at that point because it meant people went just for the sake of it and did meaningless and economically worthless courses. But I'd agree with it being lower than at present.

Also, who the hell is paying for private security because of cuts to the police? Whilst cuts to the police might cause problems, it's worth remembering that we still live in basically the safest time in human history:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_the_United_Kingdom#/media/File:CrimeinUK.png

On one hand I see what you mean but on the other it sounds like an excuse. If one party says they'll give you a car and the other says they'll eat your babies (yes, both stupid examples on purpose) are you going to say "better not to vote...I won't get the car anyway..."?

Lol you just proved his point. Neither of those are believable claims.

Was your implication supposed to be that you should prefer the people who tell nice sounding lies more than bad sounding lies?

@garywood69: No, my implication is that just because the ones who say they will do things that please you might not do them doesn't mean that the ones who say they will do something that displeases you won't. Look at the US elections...you had 2 weak candidates and a ego-driven lunatic. Sure, the weak ones won't do what they promised so let's not vote. Welcome to the Trump era.

What I find interesting is that you say you're in the UK, yet you talk about a taxi driver going 75 "MPH".

@JustPlainLucas:

Miles per hour is the standard in the UK. It's mainland europe that uses Km.

If I'm not mistaken the UK uses mph.

I was going to vote UKIP but after thinking about it and Brexit looming I realized now's not the best time. I reluctantly decided to vote for May until Brexit is over with. Corbyn would bend over backwards for the EU and the fact he is virtually a communist at this point. I do not support May's policies this is temporary after this I'm UKIP all the way unless labour come to their senses by that time.

I think what you're trying to say is that on average a party is probably more likely to follow the policies they propose than doing the exact opposite, and that therefore you shouldn't just completely disregard their policies because they probably hint at the general direction, if not the specific.

@garywood69: Something like that, yes. Thank you...slept 6 hours the last 4 days combined and "no can English no mo" :p But yes, that was the gist of what I meant. A lot of people who disagreed with Trump didn't vote but most of the ones who agreed with him did vote...weak candidates suck for everybody, and while it probably doesn't feel great to vote on someone you don't believe will carry on with their promises, if you believe their opposition will seriously damage the country then you shouldn't just stay idle.

Here in the Netherlands we dodged a bullet...we had this maniac who had no clue what being a politician meant and was all about "whataboutism" instead of actually trying to create a plan for the country (well, he did...was half a sheet long and it was bullet points, after 11 years of talking about it...he's also the only person in his political party because nobody wanted to ally with him) but he appealed to hatred, which is so popular nowadays, so there was a very real chance he would win and we'd all be the worse for it. His competition wasn't exactly riveting but after Brexit and Trump people were really starting to see the ship sinking so basically people voted against him more than they voted FOR someone. End result? Not great, but could have been a lot worse if people had stayed home and let the guy win.

@korvus:

That was probably because while a lot people disliked a lot of Trump's policies, things like a travel ban, building a wall, or saying sexist stuff, is unlikely to actually affect their lives.

That was a massive mistake on the democrat's part. Their entire campaign was based on virtue signalling. Whereas most of the public are more pragmatic.

@garywood69: Yep, they were so busy patting their own backs telling themselves they were the good guys and how Trump didn't even stand a chance that they forgot to campaign. Guess who didn't forget? The guy sitting in the WH atm.

Is it common for people in the UK to ask strangers who they're voting for?

Yup.

I stand corrected.

The UK and US both use the same outdated imperial system, while the rest of the world use the more modern metric system.

The UK uses a combination of both. Obviously our money became decimalized decades ago.

Things like weight and height will often be done in metric nowadays too. Something like the weight on a food product is in grams, not lbs.

@garywood69: True about weight. But height and distance are still measured in imperial units.

@JustPlainLucas: We use MPH and KPH but mainly MPH that why I said motorway and not freeway :P. When I watch CNN they use KPH for wind speed and I'm like wtf is KPH we use MPH same as you.

Voted by post as I don't live in the UK any more. TBH though this one has been a bit of a farce.

I'm not from the UK but I wish ya the best of luck with your decision.

Shouldn't a win be just a win?. even though not much in it 39 to 41 a wins a win in my book?. Reminds me of Fast and Furious line. "Ask any racer. Any real racer. It don't matter if you win by an inch or a mile. Winning's winning."

That's US politics, not UK politics. UK parliamentary democracy works differently from US democracy. In US democracy, there are only two parties, so the party with the most electoral colleges gets the majority. The UK is a multi-party (more than two parties) parliamentary democracy, so the party with the most seats doesn't always get the majority, sometimes (rarely) leading to a hung parliament. This happened back in 2010, when the Tories/Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats formed a coalition government to gain a majority.